I grew up playing sports and therefore I was subject to a lot of feedback – from coaches, other players, spectators, and the press – whether I wanted it or not. It seemed like everyone had an opinion as to how I performed on the basketball court and how I could do better. 

Now, as an executive coach, I’ve had the opportunity to work with professional athletes and Olympic hopefuls in building mental fitness (mindset coaching) and find them to be among the most receptive clients to receiving and incorporating feedback. Even executives who have played college sports have an affinity to receiving feedback and coaching in a way many others do not. And it doesn’t surprise me. 

Athletes are under constant scrutiny and comparison. They’ve learned to digest and act on the feedback they receive very well. As a result, their sport skills improve because they are constantly adjusting their awareness, method and technique. Remember how Shaquille (Shaq) O’Neill spent off-season time focused solely on honing his free throw skills after playing many seasons as a lackluster free throw shooter? His gap became a team liability, and he used the feedback to get motivated to improve his skills. Not only do athletes have to learn how to use feedback to survive, but they also quickly learn how to use it to thrive. 

Feedback Stings

The reason feedback can be so tough and emotional to hear is because it can impact how we view ourselves. Receiving feedback can especially hit home if we realize we are being perceived in a way that we are so blind to that it is shocking or the feedback hits to the core of what we value about ourselves or our character. 

Feedback can trigger a lot of emotions because our first reaction is typically to defend ourselves. We can be shocked; we can become angry, or it can inspire us to illicit change. But first, you must care about the feedback being delivered and care and/or respect the person delivering it. If you do not care about that person, or if you did not respect them and their competence to assess you, you are not going to put much stock into what they are telling you. At that point, it’s more opinion than feedback. And it’s likely you’ll dimmish it’s value. 

Another move I have seen people make is to disassociate themselves from the feedback. It’s like they cannot even hear it. I have coached leaders who have reported that they are delivering feedback to an employee – and the employee appeared completely zoned out. They are dissociating. They may be looking right at you, and they may appear to be attentive, but because they are internally compartmentalizing the feedback, they are not actually hearing it. Their eyes are glazed over. It is just like the little kid who puts his fingers in his ears and drowns you out when you are trying to tell him to do something he does not want to do!

When you are affected by feedback, if you are somatically aware – you will feel it. You may feel quite pronounced physical changes in your body. Your muscles get tight, the blood rushes to your head. You feel poised to pounce. You are now triggered, and your body is giving you automatic responses to protect itself from danger: and you’re in a fight, flight, or freeze mode. In that moment, whether you realize it or not, you are in a cognitively impaired state. Your pre-frontal cortex has shut down. Your capacity to reason, make decisions, maintain social appropriateness is quite low or completely shut down. In a heightened emotional state, you will not be able to process any feedback well either. You may not be able to remember everything correctly or even worse, you may react in a way that you will regret later.

Because feedback can be so emotional, people tend to ruminate over it. I have seen clients get multiple pieces of feedback about how confident, professional, and successful they are at their jobs. But they get one small nugget of negative feedback, and they focus on that. They discount everything that is good, and they embellish what is negative. It’s like they never even heard the positive comments! 

Feedback is Only a Perception

People also lose sight of the fact that feedback is a perception of someone else; it is not who you are. Feedback is about behavior, not an individual. I recently read a fascinating article about India’s newest star athlete. Preeti Pal is the first Indian track and field athlete to double medal at the Paralympics. 

Pal, now twenty-three, was born with cerebral palsy and misshapen legs and feet, making it difficult for her to walk as a child. No one believed she could follow her heart and become a runner. But after years of treatment, physical therapy, and coaching, she has become a track sensation. She told NPR, “If you think you can’t do it, you’ve lost even before you tried.”

Pal did not listen to the feedback imposed upon her when she was younger. She persevered past the limitations people and society imposed on her. This is an important lesson to all of us to ascertain if the feedback is meaningful for you or not – and whether it’s helpful, or impeding. 

Related: How to Handle Negative Feedback as a Leader

Assess Like an Athlete

Athletes live in a fishbowl where they are observed all the time. They are constantly making adaptations and adjustments to get to a prominent level of mastery in their sport. What I love about athletes is that if they are not good at a certain skill, say a crossover dribble, they will practice and practice until they become masterful, and their body is comfortable with the movement. Most people do not have that kind of patience, focus or intention to work at that kind of level. 

Many people recognize the value of feedback and express a desire to change, but they often struggle with consistent practice and implementation. This gap between intention and action can arise from several factors, such as low self-awareness, unclear goals, low motivation, or the discomfort of altering established habits. When you work with an executive coach, if they are a transformational coach, they will first uncover any blind spots, work to get your self-awareness at the heightened level it needs to be for change to happen, and then work to help you adjust your thoughts and moods to affect behavior.  

This requires technology of change:

  1. You start by taking radical accountability and always look in the mirror at yourself. A team player does not start with pointing fingers at others on the team, he examines what he could have done differently for a different outcome. 
  2. You must then take the right action to address the changes that you want. For example, I sometimes collaborate with executives with complex issues on control or power. That is when deep work is required to shift the underlying dynamics of where the person’s driver is for control and power and how that shows up in the corporate world. It is not as simple as “delegate more.” 
  3. When you are self-aware, you have to catch yourself within 5 milliseconds (.005 seconds) before you automatically go into your “habit mode” and react as you always have. It is necessary to catch yourself in that short period to rewire your behavior. But most people do not have the discipline or mindset to put in the repetition work – work that is necessary to rewire your brain. They may have all the intention in the world of changing their behavior, but they are not implementing it effectively from the inside out. They live in thoughts or mood states that take them out of alignment with the change they want, and they do not catch it early enough to override those states to be able to get to the place where they need to be for change to occur.

An Athlete’s Mindset 

Athletes are trained in mindset even if they know nothing about mindset. Whether you feel like it or not, you practice your sport. You have your coach pushing you, and your teammates holding you accountable. You have a competitive spirit, so you have goals to achieve. You want to play, not sit on the bench! There are many different external and internal drivers that are training the mindset of athletes that most of us do not have in our work environments. 

And when you look at the greatest athletes of all time (Michael Jordan, Tom Brady, Simone Biles, Serena Williams, etc.), they have another level of mindset which is one of the most important components to making them the best. These are the athletes that can push themselves harder, further, longer with focus, competitiveness and drive that others do not possess. 

Tom Brady recently collaborated with Harvard Business Review on an expansive piece about how he motivated himself and fellow players. In it, he offers a set of principles that anyone can apply to help teams collaborate effectively toward shared goals. I encourage you to read the entire article but here are some of those key points:

  1. Competitors and Motivation: Brady observed that not all NFL players were as driven as he was, admitting he was “lucky” because it made teams easier to beat. He noted that some players take credit when things go right but blame others when they do not, which demotivates teammates.
  2. Michigan Leadership: During his time at Michigan, even when benched, Brady led by supporting his team and showing loyalty, which endeared him to his teammates and contributed to his development as a leader.
  3. NFL Players’ Potential: Brady claimed many NFL players only play at 70-80% of their ability. While he could not always get the best out of everyone, he emphasized leading by example and setting high expectations to boost performance.
  4. Motivating Teammates: Brady tailored his approach to different players. He would challenge Julian Edelman to motivate him, while Randy Moss responded better to validation.
  5. Leadership with Bill Belichick: Brady and Belichick had complementary leadership styles. Belichick was more focused on discipline and accountability, often using fear, while Brady balanced this by building personal relationships and boosting team morale. He described their partnership as interdependent, crucial to the Patriots’ success.

An executive coach can work with you to bring out your athlete mindset so that you can better handle feedback, develop your team and lead them to success.

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