Correct, Don’t Just Critique: Shortening the Feedback Loop

 I’ve often wondered why organizations don’t improve. We can all see the problem — so why doesn’t it get fixed?! One of my favorite books is Practice Perfect: 42 Rules for Getting Better at Getting Better. Rule 8 is a concept that really clicks with me because pricing work lives or dies by the quality of its feedback loops. Rule 8 is a concept the authors call “correct instead of critique.” What they mean is simple but powerful:

• Critique is just telling someone what went wrong.
• Correction is naming the mistake and having the person repeat the action until it’s done right.

That idea connects beautifully to the concept of a feedback loop.

A typical feedback loop looks something like this: you’re asked a question or given a project. You collect the information you need, you analyze and plan, and then you implement. You let it run for a while and give it time to play out.

Then you come back to gather feedback and see how you did. You make adjustments, refine your approach, and repeat the process (if you have the bandwidth).

What I’ve noticed is that the faster this loop runs, the faster improvement happens. But there’s another layer: the quality of the feedback matters just as much as the speed. If all you ever get is critique—“this is wrong”—without correction—“here’s how to fix it, now try again”—progress slows to a crawl.

In pricing, this is especially true. I often see feedback loops that take weeks, months, or even years. How quickly you improve depends on how often you change prices, how often you go back to analyze results, and how often you adjust and repeat. In my world, that loop can be anywhere from three months to a full year.

To see what this looks like in the real world, let’s talk about something we’ve all experienced: the twice‑a‑year trip to the dentist to have our teeth cleaned.

You walk in, chat with the receptionist, and then the hygienist brings you back. They clean your teeth, maybe comment on how you’ve been doing, and then the dentist comes in, looks at your X‑rays, and tells you the state of your teeth.

That visit is a feedback loop. Every six months, you get an update on how well you’re taking care of your teeth. For dental health, six months is a pretty reasonable timeline.

But here’s the key question: are you getting critique or correction?

If the dentist just says, “You’ve got a couple of cavities; we’ll need to fill them,” that’s critique. You know something went wrong, but you don’t really know what to do differently. On the other hand, if the hygienist shows you where they had to scrape more, explains what that means, and gives you specific instructions—“focus more here when you brush,” “try flossing like this”—that’s correction. It’s feedback you can immediately act on. Better yet they watch you make those changes and give you direction in the office.

In pricing, waiting six months for feedback is like waiting six months to find out whether you’re brushing wrong. Six months in the pricing world can be an eternity. And too often, we don’t even get that—we get critique (“pricing is off,” “margin is down”) without correction (“here’s what to change, let’s test it now”). I’ve seen teams wait nine months to discover a mistake that could’ve been fixed in a couple of hours.

Part of the problem is how we think about our jobs. We act like we’re always “in the game,” with no time to practice. But pricing—like any skill—needs to be treated as constant practice. That means:

• Shortening the feedback loop as much as possible
• Asking not just “What went wrong?” but “How do we fix it?”
• Being unsatisfied with critique alone and actively seeking correction

So here’s a question for you:

In whatever important process you’re working on right now—at work or in life—how long is your current feedback loop?

Once you have an honest answer, try this: cut it in half.

Double the frequency with which you get feedback. And when that feedback comes, don’t stop at critique. Ask for correction. Ask, “What exactly should I do differently?” Then practice it immediately. If we improve by 1% each day for a year you don’t just get 365% better you get 3,600% better.

Don’t be satisfied with knowing something is wrong. You already know that. The real progress comes when you practice the fix.