The Impact of Feedback on Employee Development
By Marta Gongos Feedback is one of the most powerful tools for personal and professional growth, but it’s not always easy to hear where you might fall short. However, feedback is often unavoidable for many professionals, including marketers. A marketing manager might critique your campaign strategy, or your accounts manager might have something to say about your communication skills.
As challenging and uncomfortable as these conversations may be, they’re also golden opportunities for improvement and advancement. When received correctly, the impact of feedback on employee development is limitless.
What Is Constructive Feedback?
Constructive feedback is a type of feedback that’s actionable, specific, and focused on improvement. It highlights an area to develop while offering suggestions for change. Unlike vague criticism (“this isn’t working”) or generic praise (“good job”), constructive feedback gives you a clear direction to work on.
Here are a few examples that show the difference between unhelpful and effective employee feedback:
| Negative Feedback | Constructive Feedback |
| “Your copy isn’t engaging.” | “The headline is catchy, but the body could be more concise and focused on the product’s unique selling points.” |
| “The design feels off.” | “That layout is clean, but we might get more engagement by adding visuals that pop and align with the brand.” |
| “You need to manage your team better.” | “You’ve been great at solving problems on your own. Let’s think about how you can share your knowledge with the team so they can support you better.” |
Image Source: Shutterstock
Benefits of Constructive Feedback on Personal and Professional Development
The impact of feedback on employee development often goes beyond simple course correction. When digested and implemented correctly, you can turn meaningful feedback into a catalyst for career growth. Here’s how constructive feedback supports development.
Strengthened Work Quality
The impact of feedback on employee development can be seen most clearly in job performance. Exceptional work is the currency of advertising and marketing professionals. Feedback sessions and performance reviews raise this currency by refining technical skills, reducing errors, and helping them develop higher standards for work.
Positive feedback and recognition, in particular, make employees 69% more likely to do better work. But even negative feedback, when done right, can improve performance.
Improved Self-Awareness
What is constructive feedback best known for? It’s revealing insights about ourselves that we might otherwise miss. When clients and managers deliver feedback effectively, it helps you develop a more realistic and actionable view of your professional capabilities, including:
- Actual performance versus perceived performance
- Strengths you might undervalue
- Potential blind spots in your skill set or work style
- How others experience your work and communication
- Areas to work on
Enhanced Industry Knowledge
Speaking of industry expectations, the impact of feedback on employee development can also be seen through knowledge acquisition. In marketing, where trends change rapidly and client expectations evolve constantly, employee feedback can serve as a real-time learning mechanism. When continuous feedback comes with direct insights from experienced professionals, it helps employees understand:
- Current industry trends
- Emerging technologies
- Unwritten professional expectations
- Shifting market demands
- New skills that are becoming increasingly valuable
Boosted Self-Confidence
Receiving and delivering effective feedback can also be a great way to improve confidence. Meaningful feedback provides a clear path for improvement and highlights growth potential. When you know where you stand and what steps to take next, you’re more likely to approach challenges confidently. At the same time, when you receive positive feedback, it validates your strengths, which can encourage you to keep progressing.
Improved Soft Skills
Feedback significantly influences employee development, particularly in honing essential soft skills, such as communication, collaboration, problem-solving, and emotional intelligence, which are best learned and absorbed through interactions with others. Balanced feedback is especially effective in boosting these skills, as employees get to learn how their behaviors affect others.
Image Source: Shutterstock
Best Practices for Receiving Feedback at Work
Receiving feedback can be nerve-wracking, but adopting the right mindset allows you to transform these interactions into valuable learning experiences. Here’s how:
- Take a deep breath and stay open-minded. Assume the person giving feedback wants to help, not hurt. For example, your social ads manager told you your last ad concept felt disconnected from the audience. You can take this chance to ask, “Can you share more about where it fell short? I’d love to understand.”
- If feedback feels vague, ask for examples. If you’ve been told to be more proactive, ask them for specific situations where you can step up.
- Don’t take it personally. Employee feedback is about your work, not you as a person. Focus on future improvements and avoid getting defensive.
- Keep track and follow up. Change doesn’t always happen quickly. Take note of the feedback received, and check in later to see how you’re progressing.
Do’s and Don’ts for Delivering Effective Feedback
Feedback is a two-way street. In collaborative settings, you may need to deliver feedback effectively. Here are some do’s and don’ts to consider if you’re giving feedback:
| Do: | Don’t: |
|---|---|
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Find a Company That Supports Your Growth With Ad Culture
The most successful professionals aren’t those who never make mistakes—they’re the ones who learn and adapt fastest from feedback. That’s why we bring advertising and marketing pros together with companies that see potential and offer great opportunities for growth and development.
As digital marketers, we’ve built our own company culture around continuous learning and nurturing employees, so as recruiters, we know what to look for in great workplaces. We take the time to learn your unique strengths and goals, so we can match you with employers who will bring out your full potential.
With our help, you’ll experience the impact of feedback on employee development from a company that supports your growth. Get hired today!
