The Red Pen

Oops.

Wrong story. But this story did begin a long time ago in my career. I was the sales and marketing manager for a management training product that had stormed onto the scene and was experiencing tremendous success. Because of that success, I was constantly writing letters and proposals to potential clients.

This was pre-computer. If you wanted a copy of something, you made a copy. Every letter I wrote had to be copied and delivered to the Vice President of Sales and Marketing.

I hadn’t thought about that period of my career in years. Then recently, I was reading an article that made a reference to someone using a red pen to mark up a document.

And in a flash, the memory came back.

Every letter I sent was read and critiqued by the VP of Sales. He would take his red pen and correct every grammatical error, punctuation mistake, awkward phrase, or anything else he simply didn’t like. And, I felt I was a fairly proficient writer.

The goal for all four of us who managed sales and marketing for the company’s products was simple: get through an entire week without having a letter returned covered with red marks.

It never happened.

At that point in my life, I had a very limited ability to receive and process feedback. I was just proud that I could keep up with the enormous flow of paperwork while generating huge increases in sales at the same time.

Why was this guy slowing me down with his damn red pen?

At the time, I thought he was criticizing my writing. Years later, I realized he was teaching me how to think.

And, although I hate to admit it, it worked.

After about six months of red-pen letters, I learned to slow down and carefully consider what I was writing. I began paying more attention to the words I chose, how I constructed a thought, and whether I was actually communicating what I intended to communicate.

My letters got better.

But something else was happening that I couldn’t see at the time.

I was practicing.

Today we might call it deliberate practice. I did something repeatedly, received immediate and specific feedback, made adjustments, and tried again. Week after week. Letter after letter. Red mark after red mark.

He wasn’t simply correcting my letters. He was helping me develop a skill.

The problem was that I couldn’t see it that way.

At that point in my life, I tended to experience feedback as criticism of me personally. I didn’t hear, This sentence could be better. Somewhere inside me, I heard, You’re not good enough.

There is quite a difference between those two messages.

Fortunately, I’ve gotten better at receiving feedback. Today I can freely ask for it without immediately becoming defensive.

Most of the time.

Remembering the red pen caused me to become curious about how I receive feedback today. Am I actually listening to what someone is saying? Or am I busy defending myself? Am I examining the feedback for something useful, or has some old life pattern already decided what it means?

That’s where the Gap becomes important.

There is a brief space between receiving feedback and responding to it. If I can recognize that space, I have a choice. I can automatically react from an old pattern, or I can ask myself a better question.

I’ve come to think of this as Question Intelligence: the ability to ask myself a question that expands my awareness and helps me make a wiser choice.

Instead of immediately asking, Why is this person criticizing me? I can ask, Is there something here I need to see?

That one question changes the energy of the moment.

I wish I could tell you I understood all of this when that VP was attacking my beautiful letters with his red pen.

I didn’t.

I just wanted him to stop.

But all these years later, I can see something I couldn’t see then.

Sometimes the feedback we most resist contains the lesson we most need.

Is there a “red pen” in your life that could be valuable feedback instead of criticism?