The Ground-Truth Feedback Loop
Formal feedback is noise. Pull the real signal, prove you heard it, and publicly reward whoever gave it.
- Difficulty
- Moderate
- Time to result
- ~weeks to results
- Steps
- 5
- Confidence
- 90%
Singhal's position is that the more scaled the company, the more its formal feedback systems mislead — run the same question as a real conversation and the signal comes out dramatically different. The framework is a loop: create safety, pull feedback from a triangulated set of people, demonstrate you internalised it by articulating it back better than it was given, and then publicly credit the giver so more feedback arrives.
Origin
Singhal's own synthesis; he explicitly credits Jules Walter (a prior Lenny's Podcast guest) as one of the world's best at pulling feedback, and describes Walter's technique of repeating feedback back better than it was presented.
Core principles
- 01Formal feedback and ground truth diverge, and the divergence grows with company scale.
- 02Feedback is pulled, not received — the skill is on you, not the giver.
- 03Perception is reality; a piece of feedback you can explain away is still describing how you land.
- 04Safety is the precondition: people must believe there is no retaliation risk.
- 05Public recognition of feedback-givers is the cheapest engine for getting more of it.
How to run it
- 1
Discount the formal system
Treat performance-review and 360-tool output as a weak signal. Deliberately go around it: have a real conversation with peers about how things are actually going.
- 2
Triangulate your sources
Deliberately gather from people who see you constantly, people who see you rarely, and your peers. One vantage point is not ground truth.
Pro tip Also weight feedback from someone you trust and who you believe is giving it for the right reasons — that's the input most likely to actually land.
- 3
Kill the defence reflex
The universal failure: someone gives you feedback and your very next sentence explains why they're wrong, why they missed context, why the situation they cited wasn't what they thought. Stop. Do not justify.
Watch out Every justification you offer teaches the giver never to bother again.
- 4
Play it back better than they gave it
Restate the feedback more clearly and more harshly than the giver dared — 'so what you're saying is I interrupt far too often, almost to the point that it's annoying, is that a fair assessment?' This proves you both internalised it and value it, and it makes the giver feel safe enough to go further.
Pro tip Pair with the Jules Walter move: however much you're melting inside, say thank you — sincerely.
- 5
Publicly credit the giver
In your next staff meeting or standup, name the person who gave you the feedback and say it helped you see the challenge — whether it was about you, the project or the team, positive or constructive.
Pro tip The effect Singhal observes: people watch that and think 'I get recognized for giving this guy feedback — sign me up.' It breaks the barrier at team scale, not just one-to-one.
In the wild
Singhal's team ran experiments where they set aside the formal feedback outputs entirely and instead had candid peer conversations about how the teams were really performing.
→ The resulting signal was 'dramatically different' from what the formal system reported — the basis for his rule that formal feedback should not be trusted as ground truth.
Someone gives Singhal a piece of feedback. The following Monday in his staff meeting, he makes a point about it and names the person: this came from a great piece of feedback from X, and it really helped me see this challenge.
→ Feedback-giving becomes visibly rewarded rather than risky, and the flow of real feedback to him increases.
Common mistakes
Trusting the formal feedback system
At scale it produces a systematically different — and weaker — picture than a real conversation with peers. Acting on it means acting on noise.
Justifying instead of receiving
'No no, you missed this, let me tell you why that situation wasn't what you think' is the reflex that ends the flow of honest feedback permanently.
Collecting feedback but never closing the loop
If the giver never sees that it was internalised or valued, the incentive to tell you the hard thing goes to zero. Recognition is what sustains the loop.
Is it for you?
Best for
Managers and senior leaders who suspect they're being told a polite version of reality — especially anyone diagnosing a promotion block or a superpower shadow
Not ideal for
Environments with genuine retaliation risk or an active performance-management process, where 'safety' cannot honestly be promised
From the transcript
“the cheap answer is you have to get real feedback not formal feedback”
“you have to triangulate it from people like that don't see you all the time that do see you all the time your peers but…”
“I'll say well a lot of this came because I got this great piece of feedback from you know and I'll name the person”
“people hear that and they're like wow I get recognized for giving this guy feedback sign me up”
From the episode
Building a long and meaningful career
Nikhyl Singhal (Meta, Google)