For organizational functioning, feedback is a sine qua non condition (condition without which it does not) in order to improve what is done or to solve performance deficiencies or to adapt to the changing environment, ultimately to be or remain competitive in the activity.
By feedback we mean all responses and exchange of opinions or judgments between people and work teams capable of being used productively by them in the future, and the exchange of judgments is the essential means for feedback to occur. It means analyzing the actions that have occurred based on future actions. And when there have been problems in what happened, which is part of the ordinary, then it is critical judgments.
Conversationally, then, critical judgments would be the key attitude to detect what has not worked well or as expected and to be able to do something about it, otherwise, the insufficiency or deficiency remains. In general terms, it can be said that the way of exchanging critical judgments that people practice is a habit related to the conversational idiosyncrasy of the people of each country, an issue that in organizations manifests itself through internal culture, in the sense of how people communicate labor.
The theme of this text is the Chilean conversational idiosyncrasy in relation to the handling of critical judgments at work and in social relations.
According to what can be seen, the form of dialogue that Chileans mostly practice is a strong promoter or incentive for people not to know how to deal with critical judgments. I say Chileans, being that I am also, because I lived in Europe for 18 years and then for about 12 years in various Latin American countries, a circumstance that has allowed me to observe from a "foreign" perspective the behavior of people from my country.
It turns out that part of the conversational culture that is commonly handled in Chile has the habit - widely accepted and also highly valued by all - always speak "positively" on all kinds of criticizable issues or that deserve a critical opinion, never in direct critical terms although the matter is nothing serious and clearly merits an expression of unequivocal criticism. That would be to speak "negative" and that is not right.
Avoiding critical expression is the mandatory relational form. So much so, that in the interpersonal communicational form of Chileans it is a real outburst or even rude to say something half critical directly about what one thinks of the other or about something that others have done or not done.
In labor relations, especially in the Chilean public sector, saying something labor-critical in a direct way, that is, saying “not positively”, comes to be like the eighth capital sin, although what has not been done well is exposed in Absolutely professional verbal form: just so that it is acceptable to the rest, it must be said according to the line of the positive, never in clear and direct critical terms.
When the critical expression is precise and direct, then that person is classified as either not very empathetic or who does not have a good command of emotional intelligence, a term that has been in fashion for years in various Chilean circles. In fact, there are quite a few social circles where one can go and say things as they are without applying a “white glove”.
This type of conversational management is also present in the private sector, it could not not be in addition as it is part of the DNA of Chileans, but in controlled intensity since you have to be competing in the market and that means that you have to identify and solve fast which is not done well since you have to sell to get an income.
In social relations, when this conversational “error” (supposedly a verbal outburst) is incurred by issuing a direct criticism, there is always the friend or acquaintance to quickly justify the “tongue-in-cheek” opinion spoken by one, which also appears without being asked. want or request with your eyes, indicating to the other or to others that "he is not like that, but he is in trouble" or something like that.
Up to here one might wonder what is the problem in it?
In private life, the habit of "everything positive" does not constitute a problem when everyone is like this, and as they are mostly like that, then nothing to say. But in the workplace, in work relationships, this way of speaking does represent a problem: it reduces the effectiveness of the most important part of relational communication, which is feedback, seen as constant improvement of what is done..
And to improve what is done, logically, it is necessary to detect what is not being done well or is not being done as expected. There must necessarily be proactive synergy between people.
So how to improve what is not done well if everyone is talking "positively"? and problems or deficiencies are not discussed as they are through clear and unequivocal critical judgments. And not only that: when managers and chiefs ask for more proactive participation and someone occurs to say a critical judgment directly, they are "misplaced" or even branded with character problems. It sounds paradoxical but it is so.
On the other hand, this attitude of speaking "everything positive" hinders conversational efficiency in the sense that what could be said in a certain unit of time is said in double or triple (remember that time is the only "investment" that never recovers) from the fact that instead of directly indicating a critical observation “this is wrong because of this and it should be fixed specifically like this”, it is said “it's ok, but I think that this could be adjusted not because it is wrong but that everything is improvable… ”and so many more expressions of that style, that finally they only manage to artificially dilate the conversation with what ends up being ineffective for everyone.
But people do not see it that way, so to speak "everything positive" they are well endowed with a good variety of synonyms, words and alternative expressions through which it is possible to avoid saying anything criticizable as it is, and they are all convinced They speak highly of not issuing direct critical opinions or anything "negative" that would be the critical judgment by name.
This way of conversational relationship, in addition, motivates directly hypocritical behaviors and conversational habits, as is obvious.
If we want to have comparative reasons to understand that clear, unambiguous communication of what does not work well is not only necessary but vital in general to do well in the future what has not been done well, think of the conversational way that It is handled in the USA and in the developed countries of the old continent: things that do not work well are said as they are, without further verbal feedback. Due to their conversational form, they are much more effective in feedback and thus they have managed, among other factors, to do better and better what they do in all kinds of things, that is, to be Developed.
In recent years, I have had the opportunity to meet various people from France, Spain, Finland, USA, Denmark, Germany, England, Italy and Poland, whom I have consulted, among other things, about the practice spoken in handling critical judgments that It is customarily customary among people in their countries in order to update my perception brought from years ago from Europe: all by rule and without hesitation indicated to me that in their countries critical judgments are made in clear and direct terms, as they are, without search for "additives" to soften or minimize critical opinion.
The conversational form that is practiced in developed countries in relation to feedback is a relevant element, in the sense that linguistically they have the habit of speaking clearly what does not work and why it does not work.
Finally, I remember something I read about the Israelite feedback where it said that the greatest analytical effort in teamwork communication was dedicated to detecting in detail what was not working well: the more errors they were able to identify, the better. The good is clearly recognized, but as part of what is expected or what it should be, so the emphasis is not on that.
It is interesting to know this and no one can deny the technological achievements of Israel, product of its people, regardless of what is thought about its military political management regarding the Palestinians, or about its Government or about what they are as a nation.
