Anonymous feedback benefits

Cate Hall says:

Seek real feedback

It’s hard to overstate how overpowered this one is. If you aren’t trying to get real feedback from people who know you, you’re cooking without tasting. This is, like, the lowest hanging fruit for self-improvement, but few people really try to pick it.

In many contexts, the way to get good feedback is to give people a way to provide it anonymously. Anything else creates friction by layering on social dynamics. To get honest feedback, you want to make it as comfortable as possible for people to give it. You also want to make it easy to find -- I have a link to my feedback form in my Twitter bio, and get a few comments a week through it.

I imagine resistance from some people on the grounds that anonymity frees people to be assholes, but in my experience they rarely are. 90% of what I get in my inbox is either nonsense or nice -- I get lots of “keep up the good work!” type messages. In over a year, I’ve gotten maybe two messages intended to hurt my feelings. Once in a while, I get a message that’s a gut punch because it calls my attention to a real issue -- but then I get over it and get to work fixing the issue. (I wish people gave me more feedback -- I had to learn about my uptalk from YouTube comments.)

I don’t fully get it, please develop her argument a bit more. What are some kinds of people who might not want to criticize me to my face but might do so anonymously? I can only think of people who don’t really know me well, since then I’d question that they’re qualified to criticize me, but that’s a point against allowing anonymous criticism, not in favor.

Cate Hall’s point is that anonymity mainly removes the social and power-dynamic costs that keep people who actually know you from being fully candid. Below are several groups that often do have useful insight but will sometimes bite their tongues unless you give them a friction-free, anonymous channel:

Who might stay silent?	What holds them back face-to-face?	Why their feedback still matters
Direct reports / junior teammates	Fear of retaliation, stalled promotions, or being labelled “not a team player.” In most orgs the power imbalance is real.	They see your leadership habits daily; their vantage point is uniquely valuable for improving management style. Research on employee surveys shows anonymity encourages “the silent” to speak up candidly (business.com).
Peers & cross-functional colleagues	Social-capital risk: honest critique could strain a collaborative relationship or expose them to reciprocal criticism. People default to “polite but vague.”	They understand your work context and inter-dependencies better than outsiders; you learn how you’re impacting partner teams.
Mentors, higher-status contacts, or senior execs	It can feel awkward—or politically unwise—to punch down with direct criticism, especially if you’re junior or outside someone’s reporting line.	Their feedback is often the most experienced and strategic, but they have to feel 100 % safe to deliver a “hard truth.”
Friends & family	Emotional cost: they don’t want to hurt your feelings or spark conflict at Thanksgiving.	They observe long-term patterns (communication quirks, blind spots) you won’t see yourself.
Students, community members, or anyone who benefits from you	Gratitude or dependence can create a “gratitude tax”: criticizing might feel ungrateful.	They’re end-users of your teaching, content, or leadership and can flag issues you’d never notice.
Online followers / customers	Public criticism risks backlash from your fan base or other customers; private DM still isn’t fully safe.	They experience the output of your work directly and can report real-world impact.

Why anonymity flips the cost-benefit equation

1. Removes fear of retaliation or judgment – multiple workplace studies show people give more honest, detailed feedback when names are hidden (Lattice).
2. Reduces social-desirability bias – even peers who could speak up often soften the message to avoid awkwardness; anonymity lets them transmit the unfiltered signal (feedbackfruits.com).
3. Encourages participation from the quiet majority – in surveys, the people who rarely speak in meetings are the ones most likely to use an anonymous channel (business.com).
4. Makes it easy to “taste while cooking” – by lowering friction (a short form link), you collect a continuous trickle of observations instead of sporadic performance-review dumps.

Handling quality concerns

• Noise & trolls: yes, you’ll get “nonsense or nice,” as Hall says. Filter for patterns—three independent comments on the same issue beat one exquisitely argued email.
• Qualification of the critic: ask for context in the form (e.g., “How do you know my work?”). That lets you weigh comments from close collaborators more heavily without revealing their identity.
• Follow-up: aggregate feedback into themes you can act on—then tell your circle what you changed. When people see results, the quality of submissions improves.

Take-aways

• The very people whose opinions you should care about often have the most to lose socially by being frank; anonymity lowers that cost.
• Anonymous feedback isn’t a replacement for direct conversation, but a complementary “early-warning radar.” Use it to spot issues, then decide which ones merit a live discussion.
• Treat every anonymous comment as a data point, not a verdict—look for converging signals across many submissions.

Framed this way, anonymity isn’t about empowering random strangers; it’s about liberating credible insiders to help you “taste the dish” before you serve it.

Note: The source for what Cate Hall said is here.