Highest Potential Three Ways to Get Feedback for Self Improvement

Our brains are powerful. We have the potential to shift into a positive mindset, but it's not as simple as it sounds. To access a positive mindset and mental toughness under pressure and during setbacks, we need self-awareness, emotional intelligence, and critical thinking skills. So if you're curious about science-backed tools to strengthen your mental resilience, you're in the right place. Welcome to the Mind Body Space podcast, where I aim to share actionable tools you can use to reach your highest potential. I'm Dr. Juna Bobby MD. I'm a mom of two kids who love challenges for the most part, and I'm also a physician, and my specialty is teaching the science of resilience. In this episode, my awesome friend Fiona Murden joins me to share her expertise on human performance. Fiona is an award-winning author and Chartered UK Organizational Psychologist who works with top-level executives and leaders.

Good morning, how are you? Or good afternoon to you, Fi.

Yeah, I'm good, thanks, Juna. Yeah, it's afternoon here in the UK, first thing for you. Well, yeah, you get up pretty early, don't you? So it's not—

I do, I do. And I just started, um, training for a 5K if you want to start with me. That would be fun.

Um, okay, I run 5K several times a week.

Oh my gosh, so you don't even have to train?

But I don't know if you even knew that.

No, I didn't. I'm so excited. I started using this Nike Run app.

Okay, it's great.

I'm so, uh, inspired now that you're doing that. I mean, I know you're athletic, so—

I had ankle surgery though a few years ago, so I have to be quite careful.

Oh wow, okay, so then maybe I can, uh, you can beat me. Yeah, so today we're going to talk about feedback and psychometrics, right, which is a kind of a more formal feedback. And the last, uh, episode with Angela Duckworth, we talked about feedback. So she was saying how feedback is awful for everybody, and, uh, if you haven't listened to that episode, go back and listen. Negative feedback can be very difficult to take for anyone, including herself. And obviously most people get defensive, right? So I think that's where like psychometrics can come in very handy. In fact, I have this book called Assessments in Sports Psychology. He's like one of the originals of sports psychology assessments and mental training. His name is Robert Nideffer.

Okay.

Anyway, so he talks about how you know, even though assessments don't necessarily give you the full picture and they're not 100% accurate because mostly psych assessments are self, you know, evaluations. So you can, you know, feel one way one day and maybe you fill out the answers a different way. So they're not, you know, they're not like measurements like temperature, let's say. So, but he talks about how it's so important because people have a hard time taking feedback. So if you do psychometrics, it's very objective and you can give them like a starting point. I remember you telling me to ask for feedback in a specific way to people in general. Let's start with that.

Well, at the moment I'm working with an investment fund and, um, I literally have just this, this morning been putting together the modules on feedback. So it's perfect timing. So. They're very, very busy. They're high—

this is the investment banking group?

Yeah, they're very, very bright, but they don't tend to give each other feedback unless it's sort of in a bit of a jokey way. Um, okay, and so it's sort of informal. Yeah, or kind of not, not really necessarily constructive. So I've suggested to them that they take the approach of, uh, Jack Canfield. So Chicken Soup for the Soul. It's actually from his book The Success Principles, which Um, he wrote with Janet Switzer, I think. Um, but it's on a scale of 0 to 10, oh, sorry, 1 to 10. How well do you think I did? Da da da da da. So I might say, Juna, at the end of this, I might say, Juna, on a scale of 1 to 10, how well do you think I described giving feedback or asking for feedback? Or I could say, on a scale of 1 to 10, Juna, How well do you think I listened to what you were saying? And so there's all sorts of different variations you can use. And what's nice about it is it, it makes it really easy for the other person, which is important because people feel uncomfortable being asked for feedback as well as asking for feedback. And then it gives you a really constructive window to work with because it says, okay, so Juna, say you gave me a 6 out of 10. For how I, how I describe something. I say, oh, okay, Juna, thanks. What would make it a 10? And then it just, it puts the person giving feedback in a very constructive mindset to think about actually what would have made it better, what could I say. And so it's a really nice way of asking for feedback and receiving feedback in a way that's not too painful.

I'm gonna do that. I'm gonna change my question today because after every class I give, I ask for feedback. So I'm going to change the two questions because I usually say, well, what did you like best about today's class? So I'm going to change it to how would you rate this class 1 to 10? And then I'll say, if it wasn't a 10, what would make it a 10?

Yeah, you can do that. I mean, you can leave in the best as well, can't you? Because you could say, what do you like best? And, and what was it on a scale of 0 to 10?

Um, it's okay because normally I say what, what 'What did you like best from today's class?' And then I say, 'What could improve today's class?' Those are the two questions I usually ask, but I like the 1 to 10, and because I always want it to be a 10, so I would like to ask them like, 'What would have made this a 10?' Yeah, and that's really nice because, you know, they could say 9.5, and it's—

but what, what's that little thing that would have just made it better? Um, so yes, I mean, that's one method.

And I have to say, when they tell me like, what would have made it better? Usually my first reaction is like defensive, but then, but then I do fix it. I do fix it. So that's, that's important.

So one of the other things I say is take it from what you would call the top-down brain. I'd say the observing brain. So take it, try and step back from your emotion and just give it a bit of space. And even leave it for a day or so before you think about it, so your brain has time to process it.

I mean, I definitely, um, accept it. Sometimes it takes, you know, 5-10 minutes, sometimes it takes a whole day. It depends on the— how harsh the feedback was, I guess.

There's actually, on that, there's another model that I sometimes use, or used to use, with people receiving feedback. It's called the SARA model. So the SARA model is shock, anger, rejection, acceptance, and honesty. And it's basically says that at any point that we receive feedback, we could be somewhere along that spectrum. So, and what you could do is you could go through all of them. So you could say, I'd say, Juna, why did you only give me a 6? I thought you thought I was a 10 out of 10. And then I might, so I might get angry and, Juna, huh, huh, you know, just because it's true.

I thought you were my friend.

Yeah. 'cause it's first thing in the morning there and it's later in the day here, and I thought you're my friend.' Then it might be rejection. 'I don't care what Juna thinks anyway.' And then it, then it might be acceptance. It's like, 'Do you know what? It could well be that I wasn't doing that the best way possible. She might have had something there.' And then, then it's the honesty. It's okay. In reality is a 6 out of 10. That was Juna's perception. Whether or not I wanted to hear that, whether or not I think it's true, that was Juna's perception. So I need to take that as a piece of information, and I need to think, what can I do with that?

Yeah, like, it's all information. But also, um, I want to add to that, when you're honest with yourself that it was feedback, then you can also be honest with yourself and look at what you did right and what you did wrong. And you can look at it honestly, make a column, and just write on the left side like the stuff that you liked that you did.

Absolutely.

And then on the right, like what you think could be better.

Yeah. And what you can do differently next time. Yeah.

So honesty with ourselves.

Absolutely.

So great. We have the scale of 1 to 10. We have the SARAH. Uh, what else you got up your sleeve as far as feedback?

Jahari window.

How do you spell it?

J-O-H-A-R-I. It's a quadrant with 4 quadrants in it. Yes. Um, basically what you do is you send out or you give a list of adjectives to people and you say, circle the 8 adjectives that best describe me, who I am. And so if I was to ask you, Juna, and you would say, oh, you're funny, Fiona, Um, you're quick. I'm joking. Um, but you know, you would choose 8 adjectives and I would choose 8 adjectives of myself, and then I would look at how do those— where do they match and where don't they match? So there might be things that I say about myself that no one else sees. So I might say, I, I think I'm really creative and No one else uses that word about me.

So that's your hidden self.

That's my hidden self. So people— it's helpful for people to look at this. If you pull it up, I think it's on Wikipedia, even developed by a couple of guys from UCLA.

It's a quadrant. So it's like a part of you that's known to yourself and known to others, which is the open part. Yeah, there's a part of you that's not known to yourself but known to others, which is your blind spot. Like, you don't know that about yourself. Then there's the part that others don't know but you know, and that's the hidden part. And then there's the unknown, which is kind of odd, but so you'll explain that.

The unknown is quite a deep bit. I mean, that's the place you want to go with a psychotherapist, really, because it's—

but what's in there if, if you don't know it and the other people don't know it?

Things—

it's just empty?

No, things like childhood memories, potential that you haven't recognized in yourself. What other people have.

Okay.

So that's very much deep self-exploration. The blind spots are the things that you can see much more quickly. You could say, you know, um, someone might say that you're domineering and you think, really? Oh no, I didn't know I was domineering. Everyone's saying domineering. Or someone might say that you're really funny and you didn't realize that people found you funny, or that you're kind and it's not a word you would use about yourself, but you like when you see it. So that it doesn't have to be all blind spots as in bad things. And then the hidden self is the stuff that you keep private or you're unaware that you're not sharing with the world. And what we try and do is it— particularly if you're working with other people, um, whether that's peers or family, just try and increase the open self. So the amount that you see and other people see and how it aligns, because that helps build trust, connection, um, collaboration, all those sorts of things. So it's just another fun way of doing it, cuz it's so easy to ask people, give them a list and say, circle 8 adjectives that you think describe me. It's really, really easy thing to do.

I love it.

So it's just like a Sunday night dinner fun.

Yeah.

I love it.

Okay.

So those are 3 ways that we can ask for feedback. And we can become more aware and, um, try to improve.

Absolutely.

That was great. Next time, let's cover psychometrics.

That sounds good.

Awesome. Thank you so much, Phi. It was so much fun seeing you again.

Thanks for having me.

Thank you so much for listening.

I hope you got as much out of it as I did.

To support the creation of this content, subscribe and share this podcast with anyone curious about achieving their highest potential. Go check out Fi's website, fionamurden.com, to find out more about her podcast and award-winning books. And then go on over to mindbodyspace.com to sign up for my newsletter. You'll get tips from my unique neuroscience-based planner and courses developed from over 10 years of experience teaching high-performing students of all ages at Juilliard, NYU, Columbia, Achievement First, and many other organizations. Thanks again for spending this time with me. Until next time, this is Dr. Juna Bobby MD wishing you and your family wellness.