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By Stephen Milexperience.In some experiments, we gave participants hypothetical jobs, responsibilities, and yearly accomplishments and then showed them their manager%u2019s review of their performance from the year. Some participants received numerical feedback, some narrative, and some a combination of the two. We then probed which of these was considered the most fair, which gave them a sense of how to improve, which provided greater motivation to do better, and more. We also ran studies to determine if these perceptions changed when reviews were positive or more negative or whether they were tied to monetary gains, like bonuses. Finally, we ran an experiment asking participants to actually complete a task %u2014 providing customer support to a complaining client at a made-up furniture company %u2014 and gave them feedback in one of the three formats based on their performance.Here are our key findings:Narrative feedback is perceived as the fairest.Across our experiments, narrative-only feedback was consistently rated as the fairest among the three formats tested. Employees responded positively to the detailed, contextual information provided in narrative feedback, which often included specific examples of behaviors and actions linked to performance outcomes. This format allowed supervisors to convey not just what was achieved but how it was achieved, enabling a deeper understanding and appreciation of the feedback among employees, without the distraction of numbers. Importantly, narrative-only feedback was seen as less arbitrary, and the employees likely viewed it as more reflective of the entire performance spectrum, addressing both strengths and developmental areas in a balanced manner.We found that when feedback included numbers, showing room for improvement %u2014 in both numerical-only and combined formats %u2014 people seemed to assume that the manager was unfairly focusing on their negative aspects. This was true even when the content of the feedback in the combined format was the same as that given to the narrative-only feedback group. In these instances, narrativeonly recipients did not seem to find the content unfairly focused on the negative. Employees who received the narrative-only feedback likely thought it was the most fair because they felt the least negatively evaluated by it.A narrative component is essential to motivate employees.We also found that the motivational impact of narrative feedback was substantial. Employees reported having more understanding of how to improve and reported feeling more inspired and driven to improve when feedback