How do you not take comments personally?
I know this is the IB forum but it fits better here than in PE.
There are people I really respect and appreciate getting feedback from on my work but there are also tons of others where I just hate getting comments.
I hate opening a doc and seeing tons of comments and literally have a hard time not taking it personally. Some seniors comment in a way that sounds passive aggressive or always implies you're stupid, like “I thought we aligned that X?” when we never aligned anything. Or they leave vague open questions like “Why haven’t we tried XYZ?” without giving any help on how to operationalize it.
I feel like comments are a constant spiral since everyone feels the need to chime in. What I mean is even as I progress and get better I do not see the comments diminish. It feels like a self fulfilling prophecy that everybody needs to comment the shit out of documents no matter how well or badly developed they are. So I am missing the feeling of progress ... just sending over a piece and hearing "it is really well developed! just one minor thing..." no! It is always comments over comments on every detail. Annoying.
Is it the same in the corporate world? Do people get comments all the time on every little piece they do?
I struggled with this a great deal early on and now am experienced enough it generally doesn’t bother me.
First, you need to recognize managers are people too, so they are imperfect and emotional. Many managers are also bad at their jobs or just bad at people management. Specifically in finance, many managers can do the quant parts of the job, but the emotional part they are really really bad at. Fortunately, in finance it doesn’t really matter if you are a good manager because junior people are so motivated by the money and there’s so much competition for the seats, that the money basically does the management for senior people.
so thats a long way of saying you might have a bad manager. That’s actually normal, most managers are bad and it’s really really rare to get an actually good manager. Those that are actually encouraging, personable, competent people usually end up running and building organizations, not working their way up as an IB VP or associate. I think realizing how bad managers are is a strange realization that occurs in peoples careers kinda like realizing that your parents and parents in general might have been not good at being parents. At first it seems like an impossible truth, but rationally most people are probably pretty mediocre parents and managers and make mistakes everywhere. You need to work with what you get.
After that, any comments you get in a corporate context, you should divide into 1) could you have plausibly known better or not.
An example I love is sloppy handwriting vs forgetting a footnote after being told to add it. If you forget a footnote and I told you to add it, thi
Mobile sucks now and I refuse to download the app.
So strangely, for both the above examples, your response should be the same of somewhat apologetic deference to your manager and noting “you will make that change and note it going forward”
In reality though, I would mentally bucket scoldings into things you reasonably should have known and things that were just a senior person blowing off steam or being autistic/ harsh. If you forget a bullet and I told you to add it, that is a genuine screw up and you should probably feel a little badly. You shouldn’t dwell on it and need to move on quickly, but your should look at your systems and think about how to change them so it doesn’t happen again.
If it’s something like someone getting mad at you unable to read their handwriting or being unclear about something. You should try to improve your process, but it might not be possible. So for communciation and hand writing, going forward you should try to be more clear on what they want and ask other people who worked with them for help maybe, but ultimately it might just be they were unclear and the stress of the job has them taking it out on you.
In general, recognize even if the comments are harsh, managers often aren’t thinking about you at all. You are insignificant and they are just trying to get the deck done and are doing so without any regard for your feelings (but they also will forget mistakes you made and maybe even your name)
People, always say they want to hear the truth but most of the time they take it personally. It’s about walking that thin line. Even here people ask for opinions and when given they get offended and block your comments or leave negative comments.
Recently became a consultant, and I feel this. Really hating the office politics involved too. I got reprimanded for something a few days ago (in a polite way) that I thought was ridiculous since I didn't have transparency / updates from seniors in regards to a specific client.
Don't think of seniors like teachers who are grading your work. They're people and colleagues too and have a vested interest in having a good work product because it makes them look good.
You should be getting more upvotes for this. This was very insightful. Huge takeaway here is your job is supposed to make your manager or your superior look good whenever you guys work together.
I concur, I tried to but it got rejected. I have no idea why. Maybe it’s an app thing.
Most of the time, you probably did it fine. You just didn’t do it in the style x likes. Y might love it, z may not care, but x hates it.
So just keep samples of those in a folder, that way you can do the work in a style the Md wants.
I remember getting a comment on my performance review about how I put payroll too high on a model…after an MD told me to never send him a model with payroll lower than where it was.
so fun
corporate world - no one gives a shit about powerpoints
Sometimes they feel the only way they can provide value is to provide comments. So, it may be the case there is nothing fundamentally wrong about your work product but it is a way for them to feel good about themselves. Keep on having a great attitude and try your best. You will be fine.
Corporis nihil sint cum sequi eveniet dignissimos nemo. Commodi molestias sed veritatis dolores. Placeat occaecati qui cupiditate dolorem cumque aut ut. Cum ut mollitia rem. Placeat voluptatem ab aliquam adipisci. Tempore aut sed voluptas fugiat consequuntur vero.
Quidem ab et eum distinctio numquam sit ut consequatur. Dolor est rerum eius dolores suscipit. Doloremque voluptas et aut iste labore.
See All Comments - 100% Free
WSO depends on everyone being able to pitch in when they know something. Unlock with your email and get bonus: 6 financial modeling lessons free ($199 value)
or Unlock with your social account...