Why Do People Get Defensive Getting Feedback?
Why do people get defensive when receiving feedback?
It’s a biological and psychological response to being under ‘threat’.
Did you know…
9/10 of attendees in our workshops openly admit how someone else will respond is the reason they don’t give feedback?
Did you also know, research has found nearly half of leaders avoid giving feedback because they don’t know what to say, or how to avoid hurting someone's feelings?
Do you have a story like this from your career?
Do you ever feel sick when someone asks you for a chat?
Maybe you ramble when someone asks you a question on the spot.
If so, you have experienced a biological and psychological response to feeling you need to defend yourself.
Why do you feel under ‘attack’ when getting feedback?
When your brain sniffs that something you value is under threat, it goes into overdrive.
When you believe something you value is at stake, your amygdala, the part of the brain whose job it is to keep you safe, is on alert. It then sends a signal to other parts of your brain to act to protect yourself.
What happens next is an automatic, physiological, stress response.
You’ll either:
Freeze = the person zones out. e.g. face goes blank, slow blinking, staring at the wall.
Flight = the person exits the convo. e.g. leaves, avoids eye contact, faints.
Fight = the person becomes defensive. e.g. a word salad of why it wasn’t their fault.
Fawn = the person overly agrees. e.g. everything you say is perfect, out of character/context.
Do any of these responses seem familiar to you?
Why does feedback seem so ‘high stakes’ at work?
At work, there are five distinct ‘threats’ your brain considers when getting feedback:
Is my job safe? (Security)
Is this going to change how others see me? (Status)
Pay packet. Is this going to affect my take home? (Financial security)
Am I going to have to have more restrictions or responsibilities? (Autonomy)
Is this going to impact relationships I value and need? (Relationships)
Do any sound familiar to you?
Can you see why some people have a tough time during feedback?
The threats feel very real due to the amygdala’s signals, and uncertainty puts it on notice.
That means, the more you can be explicit about what your feedback is and isn’t related to, the better for everyone. Less freakouts, more listening.
Instead of fearing someone will be defensive when giving them feedback, expect it.
Because receiving feedback can be a stressful experience for many, there’s a high probability someone’s stress responses will take over in the conversation for a bit.
Knowing what to look out for, and what to do about it when it happens, can help you have more confidence in those moments.
Five principles for making sense of defensiveness.
If you, like 90% of our clients, avoid feedback conversations out of a fear of how others will respond, try these concepts for size.
It is not your job to project manage how someone else responds.
You can have the perfect script, key message, and environment, and someone might still pass out, fight with you for a bit, or even walk out the door.
But that’s not actually yours to manage.
Your job is to prepare two simple sentences and make sure it’s a two-way conversation. Then, hand the mic to them to process it.
Anticipate a poor response.
Because it’s a biological response to stress, give them grace to freak out for a bit. Don’t take it personally. It’s their biology and psychology making sense of the situation.
Think of defensiveness like a balloon in the room that slowly needs to deflate.
The quickest way to fast-track defensiveness is to not let them have a say.
Give the balloon time to deflate so you can get back to the real conversation. The moment will pass and it’s safer if you stay in the room to help that person process.
The more time to have their say, the better.
It can be painful listening to someone defend reasons for their poor behaviour. What’s really happening however is that they’re processing. Their biology needs time to calm down.
Talk for 20% and listen/workshop for 80%. The more they have a chance to remind themselves they’re safe, the more they’ll be able to have a rational conversation.
Your feedback conversation can happen over many convos.
By giving them time to process, you’re helping them make sense of the conversation after you’ve both left the room.
Give them time, and come back to it so you can both have a productive conversation.
Your job, when giving feedback, is these three things.
The only thing you are really in control of is:
Your message. Having your 2 sentences handy.
Handing the mic. Giving them air time to process. Sometimes that’ll be defensive.
And if you’re the one who gets defensive?
You’re certainly not alone if so. These are the principles we teach in our Giving & Receiving Feedback Programme, to help people mentally prepare to be open to feedback.
Feedback isn’t an order. It’s a request. You get to decide whether you take on the feedback.
Feedback is data. In the delivery, is a message. If you focus on what the person is trying to say, you can figure out later whether you agree.
You never need to agree on the spot. You can buy yourself some time by saying you’ll think about it and come back to them, or ask to revisit it again later once you’ve had some time to think.
Creating a sentence that brings you back ‘home’ to yourself can help you stay cool in the moment. Here is mine: ‘figure out what the message is before you decide what you think about it’.
In our Giving & Receiving Feedback Programme, we teach these lessons.
We cover how to open a feedback conversation, manage defensiveness, and land on an agreement.
The result is that people have more productive feedback conversations.
What could your leaders and individual contributors achieve at work if they got regular, empowering feedback?
Giving & Receiving Feedback Programme.
For leaders and individual contributors.