This article was originally published by Amar Singh on Medium. Singh is also the author of "Why Open-Plan Offices Don't Work (And Some Alternatives That Do)."
The first few times I received negative feedback I was surprised about how I felt. I could feel my body getting tight, my temperature rising and a feeling of tension. For a brief moment, I felt as if the air had left my body and could feel myself getting defensive.
It’s crucial to work through this feeling. The late Paul Arden (former creative director of Saatchi & Saatchi) explains the need to seek out negative or critical feedback:
It is quite easy to get approval if we ask enough people, or if we ask those who tell us what we want to hear…If you have produced a pleasantly acceptable piece of work, you will have proved to yourself that it is good simply because others have said so. It’s probably OK. But then it’s probably not great either.
