I wasn't trying for any gotchas, my point was -- and remains -- that in this case the word "improvement" is likely to be understood differently by different people.

I am not passing any moral judgments or making insinuations about anyone's character.

By the way, if you're aiming for accuracy, the verb Gleb used was "cringe". You chose to render it as "reluctance" which, I think, also changes the flavour albeit in another direction. It's up to you to decide whether cringing and still writing "would reflect negatively on his character" :-P