Feedforward: The Proactive Path to Improvement (Better Than Feedback?)

In today's fast-paced world, whether in your personal life or professional career, timely and coherent responses are fundamental. For the digital generation, immediate feedback is not just expected—it's essential. Every "like" functions as a virtual pat on the back. Social networks and digital devices are perfect feedback providers, which is why they hold such addictive potential.

Online games leverage this effect masterfully. For completed in-game actions, you are instantly rewarded: with status upgrades, higher levels, progress bars, virtual currency, bonus points, and more. These games create "epic wins" and generate "epic highs," the exhilarating feeling of saving the world like a hero.

We now expect the same from our workplaces and relationships: instant gratification. "I want to know my score, and I want it now!" "Praise and criticism? Bring it on!" This is how we navigate forward via feedback. Gamers are accustomed to making mistakes and discussing them within their communities. "Game over?" No problem—try again! The sooner we make errors, the faster we improve.

Why Traditional Feedback Conversations Often Fail

Yet, for many, feedback conversations are highly uncomfortable. People hesitate to initiate them, fearing unpleasant backlash. They struggle when the other person cries, becomes defensive, or resists. Others worry about becoming unpopular, damaging a relationship, or facing criticism in return.

However, clear, open, and honest signals are among the most valuable gifts we can give others. Intentionally leaving colleagues or employees in the dark about their performance is cruel. Smoldering conflicts cause a permanent, health-damaging activation of our stress systems. A fairly conducted conversation, in contrast, acts like a cleansing thunderstorm, bringing fresh air.

The Critical Shift: From "Yesterday-Feedback" to "Tomorrow-Feedback"

A leader who withholds justified criticism from their team members robs them of the chance to grow. Therefore, criticism conversations are, in reality, development conversations. The direction is crucial: they should not be past-oriented but future-focused. Looking backward often involves meticulously pointing out faults, triggering shame, paralysis, defense mechanisms, and excuses in the recipient.

The consequence? We slip into a victim role, seek alibis, feign helplessness, obscure or sugarcoat facts, deny responsibility, and blame others for the mess. Discussions in these "Yesterday-Feedbacks" lead nowhere. Insight and improvement are hardly to be expected.

"Tomorrow-Feedbacks" are entirely different. They focus on optimal situations and improvement wishes, worked on collaboratively. Here, a mistake can be reframed as: a teething problem, an occasion, a matter, a correction mode, a learning field, a test run, a setback, a weak point, a slip, a lapse, a mishap, a first attempt. Instead of criticism, the employee now receives resonance.

How to Give Effective, Future-Oriented Guidance

Feedback only works if the recipient is internally open. The path to a better solution should be found by the other person themselves. Make offers instead of prescriptions, give suggestions instead of advice, speak invitations instead of orders. Nothing is worse than a know-it-all lecture at the wrong moment or someone constantly pointing out how much better they would have done it.

In these (not always easy) conversations, if you avoid rebuking and demeaning your people but instead carefully rebuild them, you promote not only their self-respect but also their critical self-assessment. Unsure how best to do this with an individual team member? Simply ask them in an expectations conversation how they prefer to receive constructive guidance.

Everyone wants praising feedback, but no one wants reprimand. Thus, the "how" in feedback conversations is decisive. "Criticism needs love," as the saying goes. Ultimately, only two questions matter: "What can we learn from this?" and "How can we do it better in the future?" Avoid the "why" question at all costs! Anyone forced to justify a mistake feels demeaned. Someone made to look ridiculous or lose face develops resentment and seeks revenge.

The fear of scornful criticism is ultimately nothing other than the fear of withdrawal of affection. Our body registers social rejection in the same brain area responsible for physical pain. Rebuke hurts in the truest sense of the word. And pain information always has right of way in the brain.

Why We Need Responses: The Psychology of Feedback

The feedback of others, as resonance to our own behavior, is a prerequisite for developing a sense of our own identity. Therefore, through our behavior, we constantly prompt reactions from our environment. Positive or negative reinforcements then ensure that the displayed behavior is either continued or stopped.

We perform a task (almost) never just for ourselves, but always also for the people around us. And we want others not only to see our efforts but ultimately to appreciate them. If they don't, we begin to waver, trying this and that to still elicit a reaction. Unfortunately, this can easily go in the wrong direction.

Taking Control: Proactively Seeking Feedforward

Feedback is perhaps the most proven means to improve quickly. But as we've seen, many find giving feedback difficult for various reasons, so they prefer to say nothing. Therefore, become active yourself. Try asking: "Do you have an idea what I could have done differently in the presentation this morning?" Or: "Can you give me a tip on how I could have said ... more constructively?"

By the way, there's something even better than feedback, and that's feedforward. Here, you don't wait for a response to past behavior but proactively ask how you can optimize future actions.

Your Action Plan for Implementing Feedforward

1. Select a Behavior: Choose one specific behavior you want to change.
2. Ask Proactively: Frame your request for future-focused advice. For example: "I need your help. I want to be more courageous in voicing my opinion in the future. Can you give me two suggestions on how I can do that better from now on?"
3. Ask Multiple People: Request this kind of help from several trusted individuals.
4. Listen and Note: Take notes, thank them, but do not comment on or debate the suggestions.
5. Decide and Act: What you do with the input is entirely up to you.

The first time might feel slightly awkward, but it will soon become completely normal—for you and your environment. The insight is immediate: Anyone who diligently seeks feedforward improves noticeably—and incredibly fast.

Author's New Book: Mastering the Future - The Trend and Toolbook for the Day-After-Tomorrow Shapers (Gabal Verlag 2024, ISBN: 978-3-96739-181-7)

Analogy for US Readers: Just as navigating private health insurance (PKV) and public statutory health insurance (GKV) in Germany requires understanding different coverage rules and proactive planning, managing your personal and professional growth requires choosing the right strategy. Relying only on past-focused feedback (like only reviewing last year's medical bills) is reactive. Actively seeking feedforward for future improvement is like proactively consulting with experts to optimize your private health insurance or Medicare Advantage plan for the coming year—it's strategic, empowering, and puts you in control of better outcomes.