What am I doing wrong?

What am I doing wrong?

Combined with other methods of stimulating innovation, quite simply, yes. Talent is (and has always been) there. The “know how” is missing in most cases.

[Do we really want baby start-up’s in this way or is it more valuable to help them develop thick skin?]

AA start-up teams should be pledged – completely broken down and then built back up with extreme amounts of love.

Every startup community would benefit from having a “Yossi Vardi”.

As for your specific question, my vote is on all “honest” feedback… good or bad.

Lets talk about the web/graphic design perspective as a small example. When I started designing websites back around '96, I would hang around in webmaster communities. I was always the only black girl, so these weren't black-targeted communities. We would review each other's websites, and like you said, we would analyze them inside and out, and point out both the good and the bad. However, for the negative for the feedback, we would still give tips on how one could better them because we wanted everybody to succeed. We were confident enough in our own craft enough to not feel threatened by someone else getting better. Whenever I would ask for a review, I would get nothing but love from them, and it made me want to design even more.

As more and more blacks started designing websites/graphics, I got excited about it, and I started hanging out in black-targeted design groups too. The majority of the time, it was either a lot of views, but no response, or nothing but negative feedback (with no explanation as to why), and it could be influenced by how they felt about you personally. For example: If someone thinks you're stuck up, or see you as a potential threat, they will give nothing but negative feedback, no matter what you produce. But the thing about it is, it still made me better, even after the fact that I was never given tips on what could make my style better.

That's how it tends to be in our community. We don't want to help each other; everybody is too busy wanting to compete, or wanting to be better than the next. We're too busy rolling our eyes, sucking our teeth, and hoping that potentially great start-ups would just die. That is the last thing that we need to be doing.

It seems like the only time we get good compliments from people in our community is when it's from people who aren't even in our field. Although that's nice, it would also be nice to get tips from people who ARE in our field, and maybe exchange tips on how we can strengthen our craft.

However, I don't mind 100% negative feedback at all. Although it could possibly hurt, it makes me better at what I do. That's why when I ask for feedback, I want it raw, and non candy-

Lets talk about the web/graphic design perspective as a small example. When I started designing websites back around '96, I would hang around in webmaster communities. I was always the only black girl, so these weren't black-targeted communities. We would review each other's websites, and like you said, we would analyze them inside and out, and point out both the good and the bad. However, for the negative for the feedback, we would still give tips on how one could better them because we wanted everybody to succeed. We were confident enough in our own craft enough to not feel threatened by someone else getting better. Whenever I would ask for a review, I would get nothing but love from them, and it made me want to design even more.

As more and more blacks started designing websites/graphics, I got excited about it, and I started hanging out in black-targeted design groups too. The majority of the time, it was either a lot of views, but no response, or nothing but negative feedback (with no explanation as to why), and it could be influenced by how they felt about you personally. For example: If someone thinks you're stuck up, or see you as a potential threat, they will give nothing but negative feedback, no matter what you produce. But the thing about it is, it still made me better, even after the fact that I was never given tips on what could make my style better.

That's how it tends to be in our community. We don't want to help each other; everybody is too busy wanting to compete, or wanting to be better than the next. We're too busy rolling our eyes, sucking our teeth, and hoping that potentially great start-ups would just die. That is the last thing that we need to be doing.

It seems like the only time we get good compliments from people in our community is when it's from people who aren't even in our field. Although that's nice, it would also be nice to get tips from people who ARE in our field, and maybe exchange tips on how we can strengthen our craft.

However, I don't mind 100% negative feedback at all. Although it could possibly hurt, it makes me better at what I do. That's why when I ask for feedback, I want it raw, and non candy-coated.

re: your blog post. I was president of a small business incubator for five years. We focused on small businesses owned by women and people of color. My observation is that Black businesses get enough negative feedback. I like the Israeli model of giving TRUTHFUL feedback in a positive manner rather than the way I've seen it done for our community's entrepreneurs and business owners.

Thanx for sharing this article and oppt'y to dialogue!

peace, Villager