The Power of Feedback

Feedback could seem bitter from the outset, but when taken into consideration, the outcomes are always sweet and beneficial.

Most people have a negative feeling towards receiving feedback. However, feedback that is valuable and well constructed has lots of power. Let me share one of my recent experiences.

I recently wrote an article on medium entitled: “Machine Learning Model for Stochastic Processes.” The title seems to be a very interesting and captivating title, and the article discusses a subject that is of high interest in the field of data analytics.

Reading the article from the writer’s perspectives, I didn’t notice that the article was full of jargon and terminology that is too technical for the average reader to comprehend.

Few hours after my article was published, I received these comments from a reader.

Reader 1 Comments: “ Benjamin, this is fantastic work! I really appreciate you writing about Monte Carlo, since there isn’t much high quality material about applying it to really challenging problems like yours. I would be grateful for a bit more context on the setup here — what’s charge off, for example?”

My Response: “Thanks for your feedback. Charge-off refers to a loan that is in a default state, in which the borrower becomes unable to pay the lender. If a person borrows say $3000 on a loan, and has 1 year to pay off the full loan amount. Let’s say 3 months later, the borrower lost their jobs and can no longer make monthly repayments, then we can say the loan has charged off or is in default, and so the time from loan origination to charge-off would then be 3 months. Thanks again for your feedback.”

As you can see, this reader was very passionate and enthusiastic about the article’s content but he definitely struggled with the high level of technicality of the article.

I did provide a response immediately to the reader to explain the meaning of the term charge-off.

I thought this was an isolated situation, but when I looked at my article’s read ratio few days after publication, I noticed that the read ratio was low (about 30%). This means most of the readers were attracted by the title of the article, but they struggled when it comes to understanding the full details.

It was one week into the publication date of the article when I received another post from a different reader.

Reader 2 Comments: “I think you need to add a definition of charge-off. I gave up reading the piece because I didn’t understand what it meant. Only after seeing the article posted in a different place did I decide to give it another go. This time I thought I’d leave you that feedback. I can see the definition in the comments, but maybe other people like me are not following your jargon and just giving up. Always define technical definitions in your writing if your target audience is likely to fall outside the specialized topic that underlies the post.”

My Response: “Thanks for taking the time to read my article and for providing valuable feedback and comments. I have addressed your concerns by adding the following section to the article:

Definition of Technical Terms

1. Origination: This refers to the date when borrower receives a loan from a lender.
2. Charge-off (loan default) Status: The borrower then makes regular repayments, until the borrower stops making payments, typically due to financial hardship, before the end of the loan term. This event is called charge-off, and the loan is then said to have charged off or in default state.
3. Current or Active Status: The borrower continues making repayments over the entire loan term. At this point, the debt has been fully repaid.
4. Loan Term: Period over which a loan agreement is in force, and before or at the end of which the loan should either be repaid or renegotiated for another term. In this example, we consider a loan with a term or duration of 3 years.

Thanks much for your feedback.”

After reading the comments from Reader 2, I immediately figured out that something had to be fixed.

I began my response by thanking Reader 2 for his valuable comments and feedback. Then I proceeded to point out changes that have been made to the article. I added a section entitled Definition of Technical Terms to explain the terminology used in the article.

After I posted my response to Reader 2, he replied back with these comments:

Reader 2 Second Comments: “ That’s great. I think you’ll increase the clarity for a lot of readers and they’ll be able to follow the post a lot easier now.”

The feedback from these 2 readers really helped me to improve the quality of my article. Feedback, when provided in a well structured and constructive manner,has the ability to empower the person receiving the feedback. It provides a useful opportunity to grow and improve content based on reader’s viewpoints.

My goal is to monitor the revised article (with feedback from readers implemented) over the next few weeks to see if there will be some improvements in the read ratio of the article.

Lessons Learned from this Experience

1. Always view feedback as an opportunity to learn something new and to improve yourself.
2. Feedback could seem bitter from the outset, but when taken into consideration, the outcomes are always sweet and beneficial.
3. If somebody provides feedback on your work, take the time to address their feedback in a very polite and professional manner. Always look for the good in a feedback.
4. If you are providing feedback to someone else’s work, be as critical as possible, but again your feedback should be professional, it should be provided with the goal of helping the receiver to improve.