Framing feedback

When my boss got to the weakness section of the review he had already won me over with his insight, so I listened attentively. He told me that I needed to be more discreet when I want to disagree with him. And he gave me examples of ways that I had disagreed with him over the past year, and ways that I could have done it without publicly undermining him. He also explained to me how to make sure that people don’t do that to me, their manager, now that they have seen me do it to my manager. In ways like this, my boss let me know that he really wanted me to succeed, and he was going to help me to make sure it happened.

-- from How to Give a Good Performance Review at Penelope Trunk's Blow

Its a great article overall... but the notion of (re)framing negative feedback so its intention is to show "how to succeed" rather than showing "how you failed" really struck me. I've been using it every since and can't wait to try it on some actors. Seriously. As a director, your job isn't to point out mistakes to actors, its to lead them to success.