# What Is Feedback? Definition, Types and Examples | Siempre Feedback

Source: https://siemprefeedback.com/what-is-feedback

## By definition

Feedback is **information or a reaction given to someone (or a system) about their performance, behaviour or a process**. Its main purpose is to help the receiver evaluate what they did, make adjustments and improve future outcomes.

The term comes from engineering. A [feedback](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feedback) loop is created when the output of a system is routed back as an input so the system can correct itself. A thermostat is the classic example: it measures the room, compares the reading with the target temperature and switches the heating on or off. People, teams and businesses improve in the same way. Something happens, a signal comes back, and someone acts on it.

## Three types of feedback

Feedback usually falls into one of three types (a framework popularised by Douglas Stone and Sheila Heen in *Thanks for the Feedback*):

- **Evaluative** looks backward to assess how someone or something performed against a goal or standard. Ratings, scores and “how was your visit?” are evaluative.
- **Coaching** looks forward, offering actionable advice and suggestions on how to improve.
- **Appreciative** provides recognition and motivation. It tells people their effort is seen and valued.

All three are useful, but they do different jobs. Confusion often starts when someone expects coaching and receives an evaluation, or wants appreciation and gets advice.

## Other ways to describe feedback

- **Solicited or unsolicited:** feedback you ask for (a survey, a question at a counter) versus feedback people volunteer (a complaint, an online review).
- **Quantitative or qualitative:** a score or a rating versus comments in people’s own words.
- **Real-time or delayed:** given in the moment, or days or weeks later. Delayed feedback is shaped by memory, which tends to remember the most intense moment and the ending rather than the whole experience (the [peak–end rule](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak%E2%80%93end_rule)).
- **Positive or negative:** what went well versus what went wrong. Negative experiences usually weigh more heavily in people’s minds ([negativity bias](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negativity_bias)), so they are often reported more readily.

## Where feedback is used

Feedback shows up almost everywhere people or organisations try to get better:

- **At work:** performance conversations, peer feedback and team retrospectives.
- **In business and marketing:** customer satisfaction, the [voice of the customer](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voice_of_the_customer) and brand perception.
- **In products and services:** usability, quality and ideas for new features.
- **In education:** teachers and students guiding learning.
- **In public services:** how citizens experience a counter, a service or a public space.

## What makes feedback useful

Research by John Hattie and Helen Timperley suggests that good feedback answers three questions:

1. **Where am I going?** What is the goal?
2. **How am I going?** How does the current performance compare with that goal?
3. **Where to next?** What should change?

Useful feedback is also timely, specific, about the task rather than the person, and followed by action. Feedback that is collected but never acted upon quickly teaches people to stop giving it.

## Our focus

Siemprefeedback.com focuses mainly on **evaluative feedback**: capturing how an experience felt, in the moment it happens. For forward-looking feedback, such as learning what customers want next, we offer a sister platform: [Rekvestor, a platform that helps you better understand what your customers want](https://rekvestor.com/).

## Learn more

For the history and research behind feedback, from Deming’s improvement cycle and Toyota’s andon cord to what decades of studies say about when feedback helps and when it backfires, read [Feedback and Continuous Improvement: What the Research Shows](https://siemprefeedback.com/blog/feedback-continuous-improvement-research/).

## Frequently asked questions

### **What is feedback?**

Feedback is information or a reaction about someone’s performance, behaviour or a process. Its purpose is to help the receiver adjust and improve future outcomes.

### **What are the 3 types of feedback?**

Evaluative (assessing how something went against a goal), coaching (advice on how to improve) and appreciative (recognition and motivation).

### **What is a feedback loop?**

A feedback loop is a cycle in which the result of an action is captured, compared with a goal and used to adjust the next action. A thermostat is the classic example; in business it means collecting feedback, acting on it and checking again.

### **What is the difference between positive and negative feedback?**

Positive feedback highlights what went well; negative feedback points out what went wrong. Both are useful when they are specific and focused on the task rather than the person.

### **Why is real-time feedback more accurate?**

Feedback given days later is shaped by memory, which tends to remember the most intense moment and the ending of an experience. Feedback captured in the moment reflects the experience itself.

### **What makes feedback effective?**

Effective feedback is timely, specific, focused on the task rather than the person, and followed by visible action.