Someone Tweets, “Introduce Yourself With The Wildest Feedback You’ve Ever Received” And 50 People Don’t Hold Back
Professional feedback is one thing, but there is a special breed of person who thinks that they have some special knowledge about you that they just have to share. For your benefit, of course. At best, it’s annoying, at worst it’s so wildly off-base that you have to wonder what fantasy world they inhabit.
Content design consultant Amy Hupe started off a viral Twitter thread when she shared the most ridiculous feedback she had ever received in a creative way. She asked people to introduce themselves with the offensive things clients, coworkers, and managers had told them when trying to be “helpful.” So upvote the worst examples and comment your own terrible feedback stories below.
Bored Panda has reached out to Amy Hupe via Twitter, and we’ll update the article once we hear back from her.
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Image credits: Amy_Hupe
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What. If you have something to say you should be able to say it, and if you responding quicker then the men hurts their ego, then what are they? 5 year olds?
Both scientific reviews and many of the examples listed here together disprove the notion that experience and education will somehow stop a person from saying something deeply stupid or rude to a fellow professional. One study indicated that in scientific peer review, aka how most of our research is disseminated, people will still get personal attacks from anonymous peers (hence the term peer review). This tends to happen to women in male-dominated fields or people with feminine-sounding names. It seems that being a literal scientist isn’t enough to prevent childish prejudice.
Giving useful feedback is a skill in itself, but the main predictor of its usefulness, or lack thereof, often lies on the receiving end. If the receiving person expects judgment of performance, they are less likely to actually absorb the feedback. If the feedback is perceived as a side effect of a learning experience, they tend to perform better. This has been demonstrated in a 1995 study where two groups of students were made to solve math tasks. The first group was simply told this exercise was to help them learn, the second group was told it was designed to measure their knowledge. The first group performed better.
I hope your reaction was reporting him to HR for threatening your life!
Take heart. I had it said to me by my own SON! (Happy note - since then, I have lost nearly 100 pounds, only to prove my son wrong. I'm not gorgeous. I'm old. And a Mom.)
Obviously, a smart adult will understand that feedback will happen, regardless of context. Australian academic Phillip Dawson has a few strategies he suggests to make even genuine negative feedback feel more “toothless” and, as a result, be more effective. He recommends allowing oneself to feel whatever negative emotions we naturally feel when hearing something bad. Anger, despair, whatever, just get it out of the way. Then note down whatever was said so you can learn from it when you are in a better headspace.
Equality for women is very important and something I very strongly agree with and support. It’s something going strong now, but should’ve already been common place 60 years ago. Let’s face it, men have a history of dominating women. Speaking as a man, if it wasn’t for women, there would be no men in the world.
Now, that about the many elements of useless and downright offensive feedback shared here? A true optimist would perhaps think that the feedback-giver is just trying to be helpful, whatever that means. But the focus on specific negative traits could point to the classic psychological fallacy of projection. Basically, a person who can’t really deal with their own flaws and insecurities will just “project” them onto someone else. So if a person is very concerned about their own body image, they will be the first to point out what they think might be wrong with your body! And if you are wondering, what does body image have to do with professional ability, then you are one step closer to understanding the bewilderment of some of the Tweets here.
People who don’t know you don’t get to choose who/what you are/aren’t.
homosexuals, heterosexuals, transexual, bisexuals, pansexual, and asexuals are humans. Humans are who they are. Being different is good. Being indifferent from everyone is bad. Change is good. I am a heterosexual 14 yo male. I am pro-human. I believe that humans should not be repressed for who they are, or what they are, or who they where.
Well, at least they begged and didn't simply, you know... ensure that you suddenly had to do everyone else's tasks and backed up work since you obviously "had too much time on your hands"
Now, if the feedback-giver and receiver share a similar issue, field or experience, there is an argument to be made that the data could be valid. However, studies show that, for lack of a better word, the “projectors” tend to not absorb external information and just work with their own experience. Hence the downright useless and generally offensive feedback, as their primary motivation to give it comes from waiting to feel better about themselves. Simply put, projection is a defense mechanism and you are the unfortunate soul caught in the crossfire.
Sounds like the sudden feedback of "You don't sound quite right for the part of the white cheerleader"....after they see my picture and see I'm not Caucasian (and this is for a Voice role... aka: no one ever sees you). Raised in Canada, (unfortunately) can't speak any dialects of my ethnic background...yet... they... 'hear an accent'. Uh huh. I'm sure you do...
All told, it’s a pretty silly mechanism, since at best it just distracts the person from their own issue for a little while, all while sabotaging a potential relationship with another person. It’s particularly dumb because projection is a pretty well-known and documented psychological phenomenon, as a result, it only makes the person’s insecurities stand out even more. Our brains can recognize patterns and if we see someone always talking about other people’s bodies, professional abilities, or anything else, it’s safe to assume this topic is on their mind for a reason particularly, when they conflate these things with feedback. Because, as mentioned before, projecting makes them momentarily feel better about themselves, and “giving feedback” is, they think, a good way to do this without unmasking themselves.
Another teacher both ignoring a disability AND trying to stomp the drive,life, and creativity out of a young person...charming.
Any accomplishment a woman has, this line is always sputtered out. My old manager cried about how I must have slept my way to the top when I got promoted over him. I had suffered under him for almost 2 years so all I said was "You probably lost our because you're throwing a tantrum" in the most deadpan voice. And yes, our boss did hate that guy's guts and said he spent too much time talking over doing his actual work. He also passed off 50% of his duties to his employees to finish.
I know not everyone involved in hiring practices is a bad person. I have to just assume that the laws or company policies in place on workplace diversity just scare them into shady hiring practices sometimes so the numbers look good. At least I imagine that is true. Anyone out there involved with it that can correct me if I'm wrong?
Seeing as it's the norm now, it's not that big of a deal. Back in the 80's though... Jesus, we were all crucified for existing. That's the difference.
Welcome to womanhood where your ability to be taken seriously depends on your dress sense....
Okay, so...you should never just let people push you around even if they are "in a position of authority" (of course respect should be earned), however, if someone is in authority over you (ex. in an office setting) if you blatantly disregard anything they ask of you because you disagree with it then yeah you're not really going to get anywhere
So they are saying her voice is too sexy? I would love to hear a sexy voice teach me history!
Hahaha, a nice change from being told to smile more. I have resting b***h face
Keith, you should have made it clearer that you make yourself unavailable to your workplace when your wife is in labor, because I first thought you were unavailable to your wife while she was in labor.
I kind of love some of these for great insults to use, if you can't find a good moment to say "You appear so bright and intelligent, yet your so average really"
Note: this post originally had 79 images. It’s been shortened to the top 50 images based on user votes.
Hi, I’m Dominic and apparently I’m faking being autistic because I “don’t look disabled”. Also I’m annoying when I talk but I should also branch out to others more
Hi Dominic, I'm Nikki. My response when someone tells me I 'don't look disabled' is to say, "Well, you don't look stupid, so it's clear appearances can be deceptive." Either they apologize, or they walk away and never speak to me again. So it's a win-win. :-)
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Hi, I'm Chariot, and I don't need antidepressants, all I need is prayer.
...prayer for the right antidepressant at an affordable price, without side effects. Hope you're thriving, ChariotLee!
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Hi I’m EFH, and my womb will feel empty and I won’t fulfill my life’s purpose if I don’t have children.
Man, your poor lonely womb, should probably have a nice talk with it.
Load More Replies... Hi, I’m Dominic and apparently I’m faking being autistic because I “don’t look disabled”. Also I’m annoying when I talk but I should also branch out to others more
Hi Dominic, I'm Nikki. My response when someone tells me I 'don't look disabled' is to say, "Well, you don't look stupid, so it's clear appearances can be deceptive." Either they apologize, or they walk away and never speak to me again. So it's a win-win. :-)
Load More Replies... Hi, I'm Chariot, and I don't need antidepressants, all I need is prayer.
...prayer for the right antidepressant at an affordable price, without side effects. Hope you're thriving, ChariotLee!
Load More Replies... Hi I’m EFH, and my womb will feel empty and I won’t fulfill my life’s purpose if I don’t have children.
Man, your poor lonely womb, should probably have a nice talk with it.
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