Naming and Taming the Feedback Monsters: The Emotional Work of School Leadership

Feedback can be hard for school leaders to listen to. Not because we don’t value it, and usually not because we lack skill or goodwill. Feedback is hard because it summons things inside us that we would often rather keep at bay.

Shame. Defensiveness. Anger. Self-doubt. The impulse to withdraw, explain, or regain control.

As Douglas Stone and Sheila Heen remind us, “Feedback is not just information. It’s information about us, and that’s why it’s so hard to hear.” Feedback does not land on an abstract role. It lands on a person, carrying identity, history, responsibility, and care.

But not all feedback summons uncomfortable monsters.

Sometimes it awakens pride. Relief. A sense of being seen. Encouragement that restores energy just as doubt is starting to creep in. These, too, are monsters of a kind. Warm, affirming, and quietly powerful in how they shape our behaviour and beliefs. Positive feedback can steady us, but it can also unsettle us. Praise can feel fragile. Validation can raise expectations. Warmth can create pressure to live up to a version of ourselves we are not sure we can sustain.

The challenge is that we rarely talk about either side of this emotional spectrum.

When opinions are solicited in schools, whether through surveys or conversations, feedback rarely arrives as neutral data. It quickly gets tangled up with our identity and sense of responsibility. A parent’s concern can feel like a judgement on our values. A teacher’s frustration can feel like a verdict on our leadership. A student’s honesty can unsettle the story we are telling ourselves about the school we are trying to build.

These reactions are not leadership failures. They are human responses to exposure.

In our work with school leaders and their teams around the world, gathering feedback on the experience of school, one pattern appears again and again. Effective leadership is not only about deciding what to do next. It is about taking the time to listen, particularly when listening activates the monsters inside us. The challenge is rarely understanding the words being spoken. It is staying present when something in you wants to defend, fix, dismiss, or move on quickly.

Many leaders learn to respond fast when feedback arrives. They clarify. They reassure. They explain context. They take action. Sometimes this is necessary. Often, though, speed is a way of escaping discomfort, whether that discomfort comes from criticism or from being seen too clearly.

But when feedback is rushed past, it does not disappear. It lingers. It resurfaces later as distance, mistrust, or suspicion. The issue is rarely the feedback itself, but the unacknowledged reaction it triggered.

This is why naming and taming the feedback monsters matters. Not to dramatise them, but to recognise what they are doing. Defensiveness often protects something tender. Anger often signals a perceived injustice. Withdrawal often reflects overload rather than indifference. Pride can signal alignment. Relief can signal trust. Encouragement can restore momentum.

Until these reactions are noticed, they quietly shape how feedback is heard, interpreted, or avoided.

This does not mean indulging every feeling or suspending judgement. It means accepting that feedback cannot be separated from emotion, and that ignoring the emotional response, whether pleasant or painful, only gives it more power.

Over time, leaders who learn to meet their own monsters differently change how feedback is experienced across the school. Not because they agree with every critique, but because they can listen without collapsing, retaliating, or clinging too tightly to affirmation. Others sense this. They speak more honestly. They take fewer precautions. Feedback becomes less charged because it no longer has to fight to be heard.

Schools will always generate feedback that stirs emotion, because schools are complex, human places.

So the question is not whether feedback will summon monsters. It is whether leaders are willing to notice the ones it summons in themselves, and stay present long enough to learn from what people are really trying to say.

If you have enjoyed this post and you’re curious to explore these monsters more concretely, we’ve captured them in a simple resource that helps leaders recognise what different kinds of feedback tend to awaken, and how they might respond more intentionally.

Photo by Nicolas HIPPERT on Unsplash.