When the Mic Gets Too Close

Leadership Starts to Screech

June, 2026

We’ve all experienced it.

A microphone gets too close to a speaker and suddenly the room is filled with that piercing, high-pitched screech. Shoulders rise. Faces wince. Hands instinctively reach for ears.

Technically, the sound coming from the speaker is picked up by the microphone, amplified, sent back through the speaker, picked up again and the loop continues.

We call it feedback.

And nobody likes it.

Maybe that is a fitting picture of feedback in leadership too.

Leadership has a long laundry list of competencies. But near the top should be this one: Can I hear the truth about myself without fighting it, dismissing it or being crushed by it?

What we “put out” as leaders is experienced by the people around us. Our words, decisions, tone, presence, and sometimes our absence all create an impact. Feedback is what happens when some of that impact gets returned to us.

The challenge is simple:

We know our intentions. Other people experience our impact.

And those two things can be worlds apart.

When the feedback is positive, we gladly receive it. When it is difficult, however, our instinct can look remarkably similar to standing beside a squealing speaker: cover our ears, pull away and make it stop.

It gets even harder when feedback touches something central to how we see ourselves. If I pride myself on being dependable and someone tells me I failed to show up when they needed me, I’m no longer simply hearing information about an event.

I may hear it as an accusation about who I am.

That is when leaders can become defensive explaining themselves, blaming circumstances or quietly dismissing the person offering the feedback.

But there is another response that shuts feedback down just as quickly: taking it in too deeply.

If every difficult comment leaves us defeated, ashamed or self-condemning, people soon learn that giving us honest feedback means they also must rescue us afterward. Eventually, they stop bothering.

Both reactions make honesty expensive.

When feedback touches us at our core, the work is to separate who we are from what we did.

Feedback is information, not a verdict.

We can ask:

“What part of this is true?”
“What do I need to own?”
“What can I learn?”
“What needs to change?”

One mistake, one interaction or one person’s perspective does not get to define us. But neither should we dismiss it simply because it is uncomfortable.

Healthy leaders learn to receive feedback without either fighting it off or being crushed by it.

And when people risk telling us something difficult and discover that we can hear it without punishing them, dismissing them or collapsing under it something powerful happens.

Trust deepens.

Loyalty strengthens.

People often become more willing to follow us wholeheartedly, not because we are perfect, but because we are open.

The opposite is also true.

When we consistently resist feedback, defend ourselves or become devastated by it, people begin to pull away. They go quiet. What they truly think and feel becomes separated from what they are willing to say in our presence.

Then one day the leader wonders, why didn’t anyone tell me?

Often, they tried.

That is why great leaders do more than become open to feedback.

They invite it.

They develop a posture that says, you can tell me the truth, and our relationship will survive it.

They ask:

“How did that land for you?”
“What am I not seeing?”
“What is it like to be led by me?”
“What could I do differently?”
“Are others experiencing this too?”

Power naturally makes honest feedback harder to give. The greater our leadership influence, the more intentional we must become about creating room for honesty.

People read the room. If there is no invitation, most will not risk saying what they really think, especially polite Canadians!

Without feedback, leaders can slowly become trapped inside the echo chamber of their own intentions.

Eventually, everyone else can hear the screeching except the leader.

That is the danger and loneliness of leadership without honest feedback.

The strongest leaders don’t turn down the feedback; they turn up their capacity to hear it.

Todd Rutkowski

Read more reflections like “When the Mic Gets too Close " in my free ebook called “Lifelines.” Get Lifelines