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Ask HN: How do you not take criticism of your work personally?

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Re: Ask HN: How do you not take criticism of your work personally?

#541

Post by montecarl »

I do not take criticism of my work personally. I think this is because I have already heavily criticized it myself. Everything I make falls short of the ideal form I have pictured in my head. This applies to code, woodworking projects, CAD models, documents I've written and food I've prepared. These works all feel separate from myself despite coming from my brain. That is not to say I'm not proud of them or feel like I've done a good job; quite the opposite! But at the same time it is very rare for me to feel like there is not room for improvement or even obvious shortfalls.

I think with this mindset it is easy to accept others criticism because I already agree anything I made is needs criticism and is worthy of being criticized. It is also one of the only ways to improve. I get excited when I can get someone to provide feedback on food I've prepared (people are hesitant to do that as it seems rude) because it teaches me what they like. For software, sometimes the criticism is just someone else's preferred style and that I take even less personally and try to work with them to see if there is a middle ground that suits both of us or our team.

Re: Ask HN: How do you not take criticism of your work personally?

#542

Post by Vanderson »

I learned to take it personally but not react badly. This way I am not trying to counter a normal human experience, but instead changing something I have total control over, my response.

This is a fight worth having because the more you do it, the better you get at it and you feel less and less attacked you feel when criticism comes your way.

The first few times doing this are the hardest. But after doing this for some time, I rarely feel criticisms are personal anymore. This also affected how people talk to me, and they make it less personal. It's an odd combination of success from both sides.

A key point to all of this, was I needed to make my criticisms less personal.

A manager told me a key point in a private conversation once that help me change my attitude.

He said "I don't like talking about people, I like talking about processes".

I had just been critical of a "person" in the conversation, and I realized how much easier it was to talk about a "process" with my criticism after I took his hint to heart. And others took some time to follow my lead on this, and for me to be consistent about this change of process.

Re: Ask HN: How do you not take criticism of your work personally?

#543

Post by xsmasher »

switchbak wrote: post #236
xsmasher wrote: post #42

It's kind of dumb, but I think about a line from Casino Royale - M says to James Bond "I want you to take your ego out of the equation and judge the situation dispassionately." It's unlikely that the person making the comment is out to harm or anger you. Ideally you are both on the same team, trying to perform some task for the benefit of your employer. In that case, recognize that your ego or pride has been engaged;…

"My main challenge is when people dig in their heels about technical solutions that I find distasteful" I had co-workers that avoided me as a reviewer because I would highlight important tech and architectural concerns. Those were hand waved away with the usual "we don't have time" arguments. They've since left the company and I've spent literal years pulling out those deeply embedded ticks. I've come to realize that…

Yeah, you have to decide "does this really matter in the long term?" If not, let it go. If it does, do your best to explain why.

I'm a huge fan of good interfaces with shitty code inside. You can always improve the code inside if you got the interface right. If you got the interface wrong you'll need to rewrite anyway.

Re: Ask HN: How do you not take criticism of your work personally?

#544

Post by kept3k »

At my first job, I was on a small team and my boss did all the code reviews.

He would leave comments like:

- "This is really awkward, change it to..."

- "This variable name is awkward and confusing"

- "You have failed to understand..."

- "You are overthinking this. Keep it simple and do..."

- "This causes unnecessary overhead. Think about it..."

Every review, I would have to re-write everything to exactly how he wanted it, variable names, logic and all. To the point that the code was not mine.

I would very much disagree with what he wanted. Any type of constructive push back would be met with enormous backlash.

But it wasn't always what he wanted me to change, - the way he delivered the feedback irritated me the most.

In my following jobs, I have had many reviewers for my code. I've had 30+ other people review my code. They have all been much nicer. And deliver feedback that I actually agree with.

I am thankful when someone finds a bug in my code, or an easier way to do something. Using a function that I am not aware of. This way QA won't find the bug, and I am learning.

Anyways, my advice is to look at how the person is delivering the feedback. Take note of that, and know it is them if they are toxic. And when you do a code review for someone else, be sure not to be that person.

Re: Ask HN: How do you not take criticism of your work personally?

#545

Post by ravioli_fog »

Others have made great points. I'll offer a practical approach that worked for me.

I found criticism was difficult because it came as a surprise. It seemed to me as if the person giving the critique was using criteria that I wasn't made aware. This felt unfair.

The surprise, not the criticism itself was the struggle.

my solution was two-fold:

1. Eliminate the surprise by "shopping" my work around early and often for feedback. 2. By doing step 1 I would learn the "hidden criteria" that others would use to judge my work.

At this point I am rarely if ever bothered by criticism. Since I ask for feedback early when I don't feel "done" there is nothing at stake. Early criticism doesn't stick and just feels like we're working together on a solution.

If you go up the mountain and work alone, for a long time, criticism will feel worse. I do the opposite. Might work for you.

Re: Ask HN: How do you not take criticism of your work personally?

#546

Post by ilikecode »

Realizing you can’t know everything, don’t know what you don’t know, and respecting other people can have had different experiences than you. All without judging yourself negatively for those realizations. They just are facts. No need to be hard on yourself if you put in sincere effort.

Take all criticism as a learning opportunity.

Re: Ask HN: How do you not take criticism of your work personally?

#547

Post by zdragnar »

tambourine_man wrote: post #429
zdragnar wrote: post #413

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Tougher but damaged. You're thinking scar tissue, which analogously would be a maladaptive response to criticism (inflating ego, projecting fault). Muscle strengthening doesn't cause permanent damage unless you overdo it.

I've read that one of the ways that exercise increases muscle mass is through micro-lesions that your body goes on to repair. Not my expertise at all, but it's a thing, it seems. Googling now only shows content farm generated ads for fitness, unfortunately.

I've also heard that the growth mechanism is muscle tissue responding to damage caused by strength training / use. However, the result is not scar tissue that is "tougher". The result is more muscle tissue, of the same toughness that was there before, just capable of doing more work by virtue of a larger amount present.

Compare this to true trauma to the tissue, which results in scarring. Scar tissue may be "tougher" (less pliable) but it's not contributing to additional work. A better analogy might have been that broken bones grow back stronger, though even that requires that they are set right and have an appropriate amount of recovery time, which to continue the analogy, might be therapy needed to not be so brittle in the first place.

Re: Ask HN: How do you not take criticism of your work personally?

#548

Post by catchnear4321 »

you probably don’t need the help of strangers on the internet for this. you’re looking at the important things. it is a process.

seeking your own counsel may prove more useful than seeking the counsel of others.

maybe someone will say something helpful, maybe not, in either case it might give you some ideas.

Re: Ask HN: How do you not take criticism of your work personally?

#549

Post by chefandy »

maerF0x0 wrote: post #416
chefandy wrote: post #390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A low self esteem from constant insults (aka non-constructive or overly harshly presented critique) or lack of encouragement will kill anybody's ability to accept useful feedback, and people can certainly become numb to that. However, that numbness is different than being unaccustomed to taking useful critique without getting defensive. Which is absolutely a learned skill– one of the most important you learn early in…

> low self esteem from ... non-constructive or overly harshly presented critique ok firstly Comments about the individual in a CR is way out of line. There is a massive difference between "This code will fail in " and "You failed " ... The latter is out of line and should be addressed head on with a manager present or a person who will enforce it's toxicity. Now that said, criticism of code should always been allowed…

Conversations aren't pure textual exchanges and people aren't robots. Things like subtext, tone, word usage, appropriateness of timing, (like interrupting a presentation,) the volume of your voice, who else is present, the examples that you give and analogies you make to explain yourself, and plenty of other factors weigh into how something lands. If someone wants to conversationally bully someone or make them look unprepared or incompetent in front of people who need to think highly of them, it might not even require criticism. TV journalists do it all the time without making statements at all– they just ask questions.

Being direct and being polite aren't mutually exclusive, and direct criticism doesn't have to leave out any information at all. Saying "This approach won't work under peak load because" in a code review conveys the same exact message as "Your code will collapse like a popsicle stick bridge the second we hit peak load because" during a meeting.

Re: Ask HN: How do you not take criticism of your work personally?

#550

Post by catchnear4321 »

haunter wrote: post #135
mnky9800n wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

George Lucas said that "you make a movie, given the circumstances". I really like that idea because it makes it immediately clear that your ideal of what you want to do, create, etc. Will change because of the chaos and unpredictability around you.

This is funny because he is the most infamous movie maker for changing movies over and over and over and over and over again (Star Wars). He took "given the circumstances" very liberally. Or another reading that "you make a movie" which never ever ends. https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/List_of_changes_in_Star_War...

yousa die from chaos, or yousa live long enough to become it.
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