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Cameron,

In my opinion feedback is good and I almost always open to hear it. But my own experience is that students can't really evaluate what was being done at a structural (methodological) level. They can give feedback on how they felt, what they liked or didn't liked, which is important and useful but not as important since sometimes we might aim for people to not like us or to feel uncomfotable as a trigger of specific things.

(special note for any meta monsters out there: very few students can evaluate the structure so it is not really an universal statement just a generalization)

I worked for coca-cola for a couple of years. After training over 2000 people my avarage score was 9.8 out of 10 and feedback from 2000 people told me very little. Some would say "I would cut your hair" or "I wouldn't use that joke" and yet most would say "I loved it, you are great, blah blah blah" but none had a clue what was really going on. My own evaluation from that specific work was a 3 out of 10 because I did know what was missing and what was not being accomplished. I followed up my work.... and while 70% did something with what I taught them... 0% did enough with it (in my opinion).
But then again I am far harder to please than anyone else I know. Even Richard! Two years ago he was happy with the program we ran in Puerto Vallarta... I thought it sucked! Not only what I did but also what he did. But then again I aim very high and do know what can be done by me and by him.

I am a big fan of the question "why". why did something work or didn't work? why something worked how it worked? why people do/feel/say/think what they do/feel/say/think and don't do/feel/say/think what they don't do/feel/say/think? why are we asked to avoid asking why? this last one leads into great answers and also nice conspiracy theories!!!!

I think feedback being useful or not, depends on exactly what are you aiming to get from it.

I am sure Richard was great (because I know he is in great form now) and I am also sure every opinion counts and is true for the person who has it. And I am sure I would still find things to complain about as not being perfect. But that is not really a statement about the event being great or not, that is about ME and how I think about pretty much everything.

Hope my thoghts and opinions are useful or amusing to someone out there. Back to writing one fo the many books I haven't finished.

Gabe

How would you design a feedback structure to supply you with the information you feel is most important ? This is really a very tough problem that plagues social scientists, marketers, poll takers, those who design psychological tests... it seems easy to probe and acquire relevant information (the kind that will allow you to make the maximally beneficial change in yourself or you business processes) until one sets out do accomplish this.

Have you noticed, which I'm sure you have, that most feedback forms are too abstract, sort of boring and tangential, or ask overly general questions that one is expected to place a numerical value on (making large assumptions about general abilities to translate subjective experience into an integer) ?

And often the feedback form is the last thing presented to the audience when they are tired and rushing to get out of the door. There is no incentive to place much mental energy into the feedback. And yet for the presenter, the most valuable information comes from that fedback.

However, if one makes the feedback process more integral to the training, such as beginning the training by asking the group to submit questions they would like to be asked, some may seem unusual or highly unexpected, "how did you like the way the trainer moved his hands" ?, "how good were the trainer's stories" ?, "did the trainer deal with stupid questions well" ?, "did the chairs give you a sore butt after five days" ?, "did the trainer's breating patterns have an effect of your breathing patterns" ?... these SEEM to be maybe facetious, or overly specific, yet good (phenomenally successful retailers, chains like Starbucks, ad agencies running multi-million dollar or pound campaigns) DO pay close attention to every aspect, even the silliest or least obvious, because very often they find that an accumulation of these nonobvious but subliminally impactful nuances IS what distinguishes the top tier-major league players from the mediocrities...