DEV Community

Discussion on: Feeling excluded and sad for not getting positive feedback - How should I react?

Collapse
 
bytebodger profile image
Adam Nathaniel Davis

It's important to compartmentalize the feedback you receive (or don't receive) alongside where the feedback is originating from. In other words, if you are bothered by the lack of positive feedback (or any feedback) from the client, then I'd respectfully tell you that you might need to readjust your goals/objectives. Because most clients (i.e., end users) have little-to-no understanding of what happens on the backend of an application.

Think about it like this: You may tour a gorgeous home. And you have high praise for the interior designer who laid out all the aesthetic niceties. But would you go out of your way to find the plumber, or the roofer, or the electrician who really made the house "work" and praise them for their efforts?? Probably not.

Unfortunately, some PMs are no more understanding of the "plumbing" than the client. They may be embedded in your team. But too many of them are only grokking the effort based on what they can see (i.e., the frontend bells-and-whistles). I'm not saying that a PM shouldn't be including you in their praise. But for some PMs, it's extremely difficult for them to recognize or appreciate all the backend effort.

This isn't to say that you shouldn't care about (or seek out) feedback. But you might be able to improve your own mental state by ensuring that you're soliciting feedback from those who can actually assess/appreciate your efforts. I've worked on projects where I really couldn't care less what the PM/client said about my work - because I knew that they couldn't really "grasp" it. But I still wanted/sought feedback from others in the company who did, in fact, understand the nature of my work.

If you work in a very small company, on a very small team, it's theoretically possible that no one in the company actually understands your contribution. Under that scenario, you need to make the conscious decision to either A) work autonomously and "unplug yourself" from the natural human desire for praise, or B) move to another company where there are more backend/technical people who can assess your contributions and praise them when appropriate.