How to Give Good Feedback
Whether you’re a creative collaborating on a project or a client giving feedback, giving good feedback and critiquing well are important to the development of a project. Good feedback and critiquing starts with internal conversation. Ask yourself questions like, “What do I like about this?”, “What do I dislike?”, “Why do I like/dislike this?”. Stepping back and outside of your own personal preferences is key to giving good feedback that is both useful and of sound logic.
We’ve seen changes made to projects because of personal preferences and not what was right for the project or audience. Seeing beyond the outward appearance of a project and starting at the core is the first step to giving good feedback. Often times you’ll see feedback revolve around personal taste and opinions of one individual rather than a target audience. Just because you might not like a particular look doesn’t mean that your consumers, users, or clients agree. Refer back to market research when deciding whether or not to keep something or whether it should change. Training yourself to objectively critique a project takes time, but in the end is extremely beneficial for your project’s audience, and for self development.