Constructive Criticism

Constructive criticism to many people means rather than saying “this paper sucks” he should say “this paper can be improved in the following way.” Miraculously, weaknesses are transformed into growth areas and problems become challenges. This misses the whole point of constructive criticism, which is not meant to be criticism delivered nicely.

Constructive criticism is meant to construct, i.e. to help a person build from what they have. If a paper is handed to you by a colleague and you want to be constructive, then you should do the following. You should outline the parts that you don’t like about it, or that you think are weak. Then, you should come up with a few ideas of how those areas can be strengthened. Then you should offer both to your colleague.

To be valuable as criticism, the recipient has to be able to do something immediately with what you’ve told him. It has to be actionable to be valuable. If you are not thinking, how will he use these edits?, then no matter how nicely you spin what you say, your criticism will not be constructive.