In my time as a government consultant, we used a robust, 360 degree performance appraisal process. 

As a manager, I would speak to 8-12 sources of input (about 4 hours worth of interviews) and spend another 8 hours compiling and writing the assessment for one individual. I did this for over 50 individuals during my tenure with the consulting firm.

That’s over 600 hours dedicated to capturing perceptions.

We had a saying: “perceptions matter.”

The perceptions of an individual’s team, manager, direct reports, clients, and self-assessment all factored into an individual’s assessment.

According to Marcus Buckingham, a strengths-based psychometrician, formerly of Gallup and co-author with Don Clifton, others are, indeed, the best judge of our performance. 

It’s important that we listen to others to know how our contributions are making an impact in the world.

But what happens when others’ perceptions of us are, well, wrong? Or at least their perceptions would make us think that we’re not on the right path? It does happen.

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Albert Einstein dropped out of his German high school because of an extreme dislike of their authoritarian approach, focus on memorizing facts, and because he was depressed at the thought of entering the required military service upon graduation. He was a pacifist. The academy wrote him back that they would be better off without him. Ouch.

Einstein then failed his college entrance exam for all subjects except math, which he blew out of the water. He finally did gain college admissions after completing his degree. While Einstein liked his math professor, he thought Einstein was lazy. Things were not looking good for Albert.

Upon completion of his bachelor’s degree, Einstein had not built strong relationships with his professors. 

One might conclude, at this point in his life, that Einstein had no future in academia. 

However, Einstein had a strong internal drive for creative thinking, problem-solving, and enough disregard for social convention that he didn’t let his poor educational performance (as decided by his educators) stop him. You know how his story ends. He is considered one of the top geniuses of all time.

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The same year that Einstein graduated from college, Sergei Rachmaninoff performed on the piano for Leo Tolstoy, who had less than flattering things to say – he actually said, “is such music needed by anybody?” 

Rachmaninoff, unfortunately, didn’t have the resilience of Einstein, and sunk into a deep depression that was eventually overcome with hypnotherapy. Tolstoy’s reaction stalled him professionally, and he was unable to compose for several months.

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Scott Barry Kaufman received the label that he wasn’t smart after his elementary school guidance counselor saw his low IQ scores when he was 11 years old. 

What his teachers and guidance counselor perceived was a learning disability was a result of his delayed ability to process language due to a severe ear infection when he was three years old. Because he had to process someone’s words in his brain before he could give a reply, he was labeled “slow” and put in special education classes until a high school teacher saw through the label and saw that he could learn perfectly fine. 

Kaufman was accepted into Carnegie Mellon, and went on to earn two bachelor's degrees, two master’s degrees, and a Ph.D. in cognitive psychology. He conducted research on IQ at Cambridge university, the very test that had resulted in a label on him as a young person, and has helped to redefine how we understand intelligence.

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Why did the perceptions of others not line up with the potential of the individuals in each example above?

In the case of Einstein’s teachers, they had a strong value for an authoritarian approach to education. They thought the best students were the ones who obeyed the rules, didn’t think for themselves, memorized the material, and tested well. 

Einstein valued independent thought, creative thinking, and curiosity. He didn’t fit their mold.

It was a values mismatch.

Leo Tolstoy simply had a different opinion to what good music was. He preferred folk music. He was an outlier. His opinion didn’t align with the praise and recognition that Rachmaninoff had been receiving in Russia or continued to enjoy after immigrating to the United States.

And Kaufman’s guidance counselor didn’t understand the limitations of what the IQ test meant. He had incomplete information.

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We typically refer to others’ perceptions as feedback, however reaction may be a better word.

Marcus Buckingham offers a helpful distinction between feedback and reactions.

He is not a fan of feedback, because it comes with the implication, either explicit or implicit, that you need to change something according to what has worked for someone else.

Someone’s reaction, however, belongs to them, and they aren’t offering you advice with their reaction, they are simply having a reaction to your performance.

Then you get to decide what you do with that person’s reaction. You can look back at your specific actions that caused their reaction, and decide if you want to make any changes moving forward.

Ultimately, you get to decide. 

And in order to decide, you need to hone your internal compass.

A few questions to help you:

1. What do I value? 

What does my organization value? 

Are these values congruent? 

If not, can I change my values to align with theirs? 

If not, maybe this organization isn’t a good fit.

2. Is this person’s opinion consistent with others’ perception of me, or is it an outlier?

If others share this perception, then likely you need to consider what changes you could make to improve your performance. 

With one caveat.

There might be a situation where you are in a role that doesn’t play to your strengths, and it is reflected in your performance. If this is the case, consider a new role that will capitalize on your strengths rather than expending a ton of energy trying to manage a weakness. 

Only you know what strengthens and energizes you, and what drains you of energy. 

3. Consider what assumptions the person with the reaction has. 

Are they missing key information that would cause them to reach a different conclusion?

Can you help fill in the gaps for them?

I recently spoke with someone who received feedback in her annual appraisal that she “is hard on herself” when mistakes happen. This person told me, “that was true 5 years ago, but not today. I’ve really grown in this area.” They had a productive conversation where she was able to help this person update their perception to present day.

4. And finally, the first two of Byron Katie’s four questions can be helpful when considering what to do with someone’s reaction:

1) Is it true?

2) Can you absolutely know it’s true?

What reactions are you getting on your performance? And what will you do with them?

Love,

Audrey