How many times has it happened to you? Someone at your workplace/home gave you feedback. It can be related to anything. From how you deal with a particular situation at home to a colleague sharing how he felt bad when you tried highlighting a systemic problem with the executive leadership team. Feedback and advice/suggestions come in various different formats through various different people.
The one pattern I have inevitably noticed time and again; feedback/suggestions from individuals who trust you, consistently have performed better when taken into consideration and worked upon.
Let me give you few concrete examples for you to understand this concept in depth. I will take mostly examples from my work. Since life is work (different story, for a different day. But if you are curious I explain how I look at work watch till 0:49 secs).
I upload these YouTube videos, similar to how I write content on this website. Or post my thoughts on LinkedIN or other social channels. This time around, I uploaded a 30 min long video, my longest video till date (till now I have been able to upload 23 videos). I am on a experiment to see what happens if I end up posting 100 videos on YouTube.
While on this journey, yesterday, i.e. 22nd April, 2026, I upload this video. Its about community business. But it is a long video, with no visual/audio effects, with a flat tone, me on a monologue delivering a message. These words I wrote is not my words, its from a colleague who trusts me. He knows I always wishes well for him. That’s why when he gave feedback I listened, ardently. Like a 10year old toddler listening to a story being shared by the grandmother.
“Even when I know you, how you share your thoughts, how you mix various things and at the end of it all converge them… Even when I know so much about you, still I was finding hard to have my attention on the video. It was nit having any troughs and ebbs in the way the message was getting delivered.” – shared my colleague who was sitting in Mumbai. We connect over teams call.
While he was sharing his feedback, I was making quick mental notes. I quickly acknowledged the feedback and thanked him for the same.
Feedback from another colleague as to why I should get paid more, his coaching on how one should go ahead on the negotiating table when having salary discussions is invaluable. I question things a lot. I have a lot of “WHY’s”. I why I always had, which I feel confident enough to start sharing these out there, why does a colleague want your betterment? How do you gain the trust of a fellow colleague whom you know you don’t meet everyday, as you are based in different cities, different work timings? Because as I wrote before, time and again I have noticed a peculiar particular pattern emerge. Whenever a colleague trusts you, feels you want well for them, they start overflowing with trust back towards you. Suddenly you are getting great feedback which will help you and others grow exponentially.
Another example of transactions of trust.
Thanks
DB
April 23rd 2026.