F is for... Feedback
"5-star reviews are for edutainers, not for those who lead challenging transformations" - Elise Keith
Got some negative feedback from a participant with a strong opinion? This one’s for you…
I recently watched a Chad Littlefield video in which he talks about the mindset that earns him regular 98% approval ratings. Here’s what he says about it:
Let’s be real: Two out of every hundred people are probably just having a bad day. They’re not going to love what you do no matter what you do. That used to bug me. I’d focus too much energy on the 2% with the crossed arms in the back of the room.
Not anymore.
The trick? Don’t design for the 2%. Focus on the people who want to be there. The ones who want to grow, learn, and connect. And here’s the twist: when you focus on connection and contribution, you often win over even the arms-crossed skeptics.
I agree with everything Chad says here: Our job as facilitators is to be in service to the group, rather than the taste of a particular individual. If we devote too much energy to keeping individuals happy1, it usually detracts from the experience and outcomes for the rest of the group.
But I’d take it one step further, I believe it is also ok if the number of people who didn’t enjoy a session is be even higher than 2%. Here’s why…
One of the people I admire most in the field of meeting design and facilitation, is Elise Keith, who once wrote:
Whenever you invite a group to make real changes, someone will be unhappy. Glowing 5-star reviews are for edutainers, not for those who lead challenging transformations. And the bigger the change, the wider the spread of reactions.
And as someone who has been thinking recently a lot about how to show the impact of the facilitation I do, I’ve been thinking about those words a lot.
A personal example
Once, I was facilitating a strategy day with an extended leadership team of about 30 people.
At the end of the session the group was delighted, most people said things like:
I’m astounded, I didn’t believe we could get this amount done in such a short time.
My heart: 🎉🥳🎊✨🙌🔥💯🚀🌟👏🎉🥳🎊✨🙌🔥💯🚀🌟👏🎉🥳🎊✨🙌🔥💯🚀🌟👏🎉🥳🎊
One person said:
I felt like I was in school with people taking it in turns to talk. There wasn’t enough unstructured discussion with the whole group.
💀
As with all feedback, there’s likely nugget of truth in there. At the time, I probably was over-structuring my sessions a bit, I’ve learned to let go and relax a lot more since I did this.
But the reality is: the fact that this particular person was unhappy, was actually a sign of success for the group overall.
This senior team member was used to dominating conversations, often leaving little room for others.
“Unstructured” for him meant he could speak as much as he wanted, for the others it meant a battle to get their point across.
He was likely one of the reasons I was asked to facilitate in the first place, since without structure he took over discussions. In the session, he felt he had lost freedom because he spoke less than normal, while the rest of the group felt they had finally gained space to contribute, which was the reason we were able to achieve the outcomes we did.
If I’d measured the approval rating of the session, I guess it would have come out lower than Chad’s 98%.2 It certainly wouldn’t have got five stars from everyone.
The Mindset Shift:
Approval is not the same as value. High ratings feel good, and they can help with follow-up work, but they’re often a poor measure of whether the session truly mattered.
Satisfaction reflects how enjoyable or engaging something felt in the moment. Impact reflects whether the group made progress, shifted patterns, or tackled difficult truths. Sometimes those two line up, but not always.
As facilitators, our job isn’t to chase stars or glowing approval ratings. It’s to give the group what it needs, even if it means making part of the group unhappy. In fact, a little discomfort can be a sign that the session worked, because real change is about doing things differently, and not everyone is going to like that.
From: seeking approval as a measure of worth.
To: choosing impact, even when it costs you popularity.
Lastly, it is hard to get this type of feedback and it’s natural to feel a bit rough about it. I’m not immune from my heart sinking. Just remember you’re pushing for something bigger.
You got this.
Lucy
P.S. From October, I will be working with a small cohort of people to learn how to make their facilitation more impactful on the job!
Instead of learning facilitation in the abstract, we work on the design and delivery of a real workshop you’re running, with hands-on guidance, templates and support from me.
Want to know more? Let’s talk. I have a small number of slots in my calendar for 20 minute call to quickly see if it’s a fit.
Especially when those individuals are the same ones who normally benefit from the privilege and power of airtime.
Sidenote: remember that Chad often runs huuuuge sessions and that maths is maths. 2 unhappy people in 100 is 98% approval. In my case, just 1 unhappy person in 30 is 96.6%. If you are running a session with 5 people and one of them is unhappy - you are looking 80%.