Thanks for the Feedback cover art

Thanks for the Feedback

The Science and Art of Receiving Feedback Well

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Thanks for the Feedback

By: Douglas Stone, Sheila Heen
Narrated by: Douglas Stone, Sheila Heen
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About this listen

The authors of the classic Difficult Conversations teach you how to take criticism productively in Thanks for the Feedback.

We get feedback every day of our lives, from friends and family, colleagues, customers and bosses, teachers, doctors and strangers. We're assessed, coached, and criticised about our performance, personalities and appearance.

We know that feedback is essential for professional development and healthy relationships - but we dread it and even dismiss it. That's because while we want to learn and grow, we also want to be accepted just as we are.

Thanks for the Feedback is the first book to address this tension head on. In it, the world-renowned team behind the Harvard Negotiation Project offer a simple framework and powerful tools, showing us how to take on life's blizzard of comments and advice with curiosity and grace.

©2014 Douglas Stone & Sheila Heen (P)2014 Penguin Random House LLC Management Management & Leadership Personal Development Personal Success Business Leadership

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Critic reviews

"I'll admit it: Thanks for the Feedback made me uncomfortable. And that's one reason I liked it so much. With keen insight and lots of practical takeaways, it reveals why getting feedback is so hard - and then how we can do better." (Daniel H. Pink, New York Times best-selling author of A Whole New Mind)
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The best book I’ve read this year. So many great ideas and tips about feedback receiving. The world would be so much better if everyone read/listened to this book.

This book should be mandatory read in schools

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It is full of life changing advice. I loved it from cover to cover. Fully recommended.

One of the best books I've ever read

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I almost didn’t read this book. I’ve had so much coaching over the years that I felt I’d done feedback back to death but the recommendation I’d been given meant I at least had to commit to an hour if only to be able to prove myself right. Now I should start with a warning, this book reveals itself as you work through and practising its methods prematurely can back fire as I found out during an argument with my wife. Armed with some early chapters in the book I said that are argument was actually two separate issues and that we should separate them and deal with them separately - which would you like to take first? Don’t try that approach. It doesn’t end well! As I progressed with the book I came to question whether its title underplayed its role and I came to view it as giving wonderful advice not just about feedback but about how to have better conversations. Its range of stories help to put the content of the book in context and I even listened to the part on mindset with my 16 year old son who seemed to accept its advice far more readily than my own. I have subsequently bought the hard copy and am sure I’ll revisit it regularly.

The Best Book I’ve Read This Year

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This is really an exceptional book.

My usual complaint is that books of this genre are typically single ideas that fit on one page, inexplicably 400 times longer. This also is on a single idea - receiving feedback better - but somehow they've cracked it where so many others have failed. Maybe it's that the topic itself is so much bigger than getting up at 5am or turning off your email notifications or some other bollocks clamoring for 10 hours of your time, that the references and stories add rather than subtract.

There really is a lot of think about here and plenty to put into practice. It's ten hours long but it must have taken me fifteen because I kept pausing it to write notes. I jotted down 5,000 words in the end. The dog was not impressed, until she discovered she was free to eat horse poo without me noticing.

Sets of three abound: "here are three tools to...", "three types of...", "three common misconceptions about...", etc. Everything consistently orbits the central topic of feedback though so all this frameworking feels valuable and original even when it's derived from the work of others. The last two chapters, actioning feedback and enacting feedback systems in organisations, do drift into the generic but the first twelve chapters are rich with insights and practical pointers.

The tone of voice is down to earth and the style of writing quietly funny in places. They share the reading and do a good job.

All in all, I absolutely loved this. A real contribution to the genre and in my top five for the year.

Exceptional

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I really likes the use of 2 narrators. It always adds authenticity when the authors narrate. Extremely insightful, applicable and well structured content. The tone is funny and lighthearted, which makes the advice easier to accept - great modelling!

Extremely easy to listen to and digest.

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This has been a hugely positive help to my relationships in learning how to receive feedback calmly and reduce defensiveness and extract the useful insights from it.

Fantastically helpful insights for any relationship

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Really helped from teh first chapter. practical examples, easy to follow and real results.

impact from the first chapter

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This audiobook is 1 of 2 books that I've finished in the same month of downloading. The authors' style encourages commitment to regular listening as you start to see life differently. The beginning can be a bit tough on the ego, hang in there and you may find valuable perspective by the time you reach the final chapter :) I hope you enjoy the journey as much as I have.

A book that encourages and empowers :)

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Superb book. It’s saved me from confrontation and upset numerous times already. There’s so much in here that you should be prepared for most situations, and you DON’T, need to be in leadership to benefit, because, as the title, suggests, most of the skill is in receiving, not giving. Loved it :-)

Necessary reading for everyone on the planet

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In terms of the quality of the content, this is a book I feel I could come back to time and again and still get value. However, the audio book is badly let down by the mumbled delivery of the male narrator. His female colleague is great, clear and easy to understand. Mr Mumbles on the other hand will have you cracking up the volume just to try and understand what he's saying.

Great content let down by poor narration.

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