How to Give Feedback Without Damaging Relationships

How to Give Feedback Without Damaging Relationships

Corrected by Selen Ikbal Uslu · on Evolang · 19 July 2026 · View published page ↗

Give feedback that people can hear and act on. The SBI model, radical candor, timing rules, and scripts for the feedback conversations everyone avoids.

The exact change

Before

Kluger, A. N., & DeNisi, A. (2021). Meta-Analysis of Feedback Interventions Revisited. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 163. Kluger et al. (2021): Meta-Analysis of Feedback Interventions Revisited [...] "The feedback that changes behavior is the feedback that the recipient cannot escape into abstraction. Specificity is the tool that keeps the conversation honest, and fairness is the trust that lets the specificity land." Dr. Heidi Grant, social psychologist and author of "Nine Things Successful People Do Differently"

After

(removed - no replacement text; the unverified content was deleted rather than corrected) [...] As social psychologist Heidi Grant and other feedback researchers have observed, feedback that changes behavior tends to be specific and concrete rather than vague or abstract, and fairness in delivery is what allows that specificity to be accepted rather than resisted.

Why this is better

The reference list cites 'Kluger, A. N., & DeNisi, A. (2021). Meta-Analysis of Feedback Interventions Revisited. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 163' with DOI 10.1016/j.obhdp.202; A specific quote is attributed verbatim to 'Dr. Heidi Grant, social psychologist and author of Nine Things Successful People Do Differently.' Heidi Grant (Halvorson) is a real social psychologist and

More by Selen Ikbal Uslu in Communication Skills

All of Selen Ikbal Uslu's contributions →