Wharton professor reveals the most underrated career skill, but research says it takes more than you to master it

Time of India

23-06-2025

In the age of ambition, where résumés sparkle with credentials and LinkedIn feeds overflow with courses completed, Wharton's top-rated professor
Adam Grant
has dropped a hard truth, and it isn't about learning more, but about listening better.
In a now-viral post on X from May, the renowned organizational psychologist wrote: 'The most underrated career skill is the ability to receive tough love. Acquiring knowledge is easy. Obtaining
constructive criticism
is hard. If you can't handle the truth, people stop telling you the truth.'
While most people scramble to gather degrees, certifications, and the latest buzzword-filled competencies, Grant argues that one core skill quietly separates professionals who stagnate from those who soar: the ability to digest, and act upon, negative but well-meaning feedback.
— AdamMGrant (@AdamMGrant)
When Tough Love Feels Like a Punch
This isn't the first time Grant has spotlighted this paradox. On a 2018 episode of his hit podcast WorkLife, he described what happens inside us when feedback hits a nerve. 'Negative feedback sets off alarm bells,' he explained. 'Your mind races. You start to put up shields and mount a counterattack.'
This automatic defensiveness is what undermines growth. And Grant's not alone in making this case.
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Research published by psychologist Naomi Winstone in the Journal of Experimental Psychology found that most people remember evaluative feedback about what they've already done, but struggle to engage with directive feedback; the kind that helps improve future work. In other words, we hear the judgment louder than the advice.
You Can't Do This Alone
But here's the twist: even if you're open to feedback, your workplace has to make it safe, and worthwhile to receive it.
Industrial psychologist Lisa Steelman, in findings presented at the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology, showed that feedback flourishes in environments where support, empathy, and credibility are built into the culture. In workplaces that actively foster psychological safety and mentorship, people improved their performance significantly more than in unsupportive settings.
So yes, being feedback-receptive is a superpower, but only if your ecosystem encourages and rewards it.
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Feedback Is a Team Sport
According to a article titled 'Constructive criticism that works' from American Psychological Association, New York University's Jay Van Bavel practices what he preaches in his Social Identity and Morality Lab. He not only shares draft papers with students but invites open critique, flipping the traditional top-down feedback model. This normalization of mutual feedback builds trust, and resilience in receiving hard truths.
Wharton's Adam Grant would agree. 'The people who grow the most are the ones who take feedback the best,' he wrote, affirming that our
professional development
depends not just on being corrected, but on welcoming correction with humility and from environments that make it possible.
From Pain to Progress
Of course, constructive criticism is never fun. But what if, instead of seeing it as a bruise to our ego, we reframed it as a bridge to better?
Grant, a bestselling author whose books like 'Think Again' and 'Give and Take' have become modern leadership manuals, has long preached the value of rethinking of changing your mind when faced with better evidence. And what is feedback, if not a form of evidence?
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In his words, 'If you can't handle the truth, people stop telling you the truth.' Which begs the question: In your career, how many truths have you missed simply because you weren't ready to hear them?
Sometimes, the most underrated skill is knowing when to shut up and listen.