Concept
Honest appreciation first
Carnegie's rule for correcting someone: begin with honest appreciation, because a person who feels attacked defends and a defending person does not learn. Honest is the operative word: Carnegie calls flattery counterfeit, and people usually see through it.
Carnegie's principles for correcting people include beginning with honest appreciation, talking about your own mistakes first, letting the other person save face and making the fault seem easy to correct. Arranged as a sequence, with the correction in the middle, they form a complete method. The first step is not a softener; it changes what the conversation is. Genuine appreciation of something specific in the person's work establishes that you have seen the work, that you are not their prosecutor, and that the correction which follows is about one thing and not about them. The praise sandwich, which mechanically wraps criticism in two compliments, fails because most people see it coming; the appreciation has to be true and the correction has to be clear. If you cannot find something you genuinely value, you are not ready to give the feedback.
A real-life example
A designer opens feedback on a junior's overlong client presentation with the thing that was true: the concept was the strongest in the meeting. Then his own first client presentation, which ran forty minutes. Then the slide count, then the plan for next time.
How to use it
- 1Find one specific thing you genuinely value in their work; if there is none, wait.
- 2Say it first and mean it, then move to the observation.
- 3Do not wrap the correction in a second compliment; keep it clear.