How to deliver bad news when it's not your fault
People tend to shoot the messenger. Here's how to avoid the negative halo of bad news.
đ Hey, itâs Wes. Welcome to my weekly newsletter on managing up, career growth, and standing out as a high-performer. For more, check out my new intensive course: Executive Communication & Influence for Senior ICs and Managers
I originally published a version of this essay in September 2018. Enjoy.
Read time:Â 6 minutes
As much as we donât want to shoot the messenger, we often associate negative feelings with people who tell us bad news.
Work is hard enough as is. You donât need that negativity associated with you, especially if a situation was out of your control.
For example, letâs say you and a partner organization submitted a proposal and were waiting to hear back from a major client. The client tells you that another company out-bid you with a lower quote.
Now, you have to tell your colleague that they have to re-submit a bid. You feel terrible because they put a lot of work into the bid. You could have set better expectations, so youâre feeling a little guilty for not having done that.
This happened to one of my clients, and he made the mistake of sounding overly negative in the email to his colleague. We fixed it, but itâs a valuable lesson for anyone whoâs had to share negative news at work (which is all of us at some point).
If you have to deliver bad news that wasnât your fault, keep these principles in mind:
1. Avoid negative words, like "howeverâ and âunfortunately.â
Small changes in word choice can impact your audience's perception, for the better or for the worse. According to George Lakoff, a professor in cognitive science and linguistics at University of California, Berkeley, you should use language that evokes imagery and strengthens your point.
You should especially be careful about using negative words that could lead your audience to catastrophize. Andrew Newberg and Mark Robert Waldman, the co-authors of Words Can Change Your Brain, said:
âAngry words send alarm messages through the brain, and they partially shut down the logic-and-reasoning centers located in the frontal lobes.â
There's rarely a need for unfortunately, and other heavy-sounding words. It makes everything sound more dramatic than it needs to be. Your goal is to minimize drama.
More about why to avoid incepting negative ideas.
2. Avoid giving too many details.
When we feel guilty, we tend to over-explain. We secretly hope that by explaining, the person will understand and absolve us of guilt. Donât give in to the temptation to explain everything in excruciating detail.
First, itâs selfish: youâre only doing it to make yourself feel better.
Second, it complicates the actual message. Recipients wonât know when the facts end and your own narrative begins.
Third, you owe it to your recipient to be direct.
Respect your audience enough to give them the key information they need to make a smart decision. If they have additional questions, theyâll ask. This opens up dialogue instead of overwhelming them.
3. Don't accidentally accept blame.
Obviously, if youâre responsible or even partially responsible for what happened, you should take responsibility.
But thereâs a difference between empathizing (âI acknowledge this is frustratingâ) and accepting fault (âI should have done X and Y, but I didnât.â).
As the messenger, thereâs no point in inviting your audienceâs wrath for no reason.
When you review your message, ask yourself: âWould my recipient accidentally think Iâm admitting fault based on my phrasing and word choice?â
An upset colleague or manager might project anger onto you as a way to cope with negative feelings. The danger of accidentally accepting blame is it legitimizes your audienceâs negative perceptions, even if they were inaccurate and misplaced to begin with.
Youâre essentially inviting them to project onto you. This erodes trust in your working relationships and tarnishes your credibility. If it happens too many times, it could stall your career because youâre associated with failed projects.
4. Get to your point quickly.
Warren Buffett told Berkshire Hathaway shareholders, âWe only give a couple of instructions to people when they go to work for us: One is to think like an owner. And the second is to tell us bad news immediatelyâbecause good news takes care of itself. We can take bad news, but we don't like it late.â
Contrary to what you might think, adding too much preface makes things worse. The tension builds and the person is imagining the worst thing that could possibly happen.
Cognitive psychologist Dr. Albert Ellis describes why we mentally escalate scenarios to the most extreme and negative conclusion. When your audience finally hears the bad news, they might think, âOh, that wasn't so bad.â
Even though they got a pleasant surprise, relatively speaking, they just spent several minutes letting their imagination spiral into catastrophe. Thatâs cruel of you to let happen.
Preface as little as you can, so you can share the meat of what they need to know.
5. Remind the person of their own agency.
In a speech at USC Business School in 1994, Charlie Munger said, "If people tell you what you really don't want to hearâwhat's unpleasantâthere's an almost automatic reaction of antipathy."
When people get bad news, they want to blame someone for their frustrationâdon't let that someone be you.
Our natural reaction is to shoot the messenger, but you can combat this by reminding your audience that they were involved in the situation, too. Chances are, they had a role to play in what happened.
Reminding people of their agency can be useful here. Behavioral economics research shows that when people remember they have the freedom to choose what to do, it encourages them to behave more generously.
Applied to the example we started with, you want to remind your colleague that you were both aware of the risksâand jointly decided to proceed anyway:
You both knew the result might not work.
Youâre on the same team and working toward the same goal.
You want to figure out together what to do going forward.
Of course, put a soft wrapper around your message because a sarcastic remark wonât land well.
đ« âWe both knew this might not work. Don't act so surprised now.â
â âLast month, we talked about how we had a 1 in 10 chance of winning this bid. We decided to pursue it given the high payoff. At this point, if we choose to continue in the process, we could submit another proposal. I know it takes a lot of effort on your part, so it might or might not be worth the time. I can discuss with my team, too. Thanks for working on this together. Letâs check in on this next week on what we want to do.â
Accepting responsibility is important. If thereâs any doubt that you are responsible, you should proactively address that. These principles are for times when you're simply a messengerâand just as surprised by the news as your recipient is.
In situations like these, use the principles above to protect yourself and help your recipient understand with minimal drama.
Have you been blamed for something that wasnât your fault? Could you have framed the news differently when you shared it? Hit reply because Iâd love to hear from you.
Thanks for being here, and Iâll see you next Wednesday at 8am ET.
Wes
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This:
"Small changes in word choice can impact your audience's perception"
and this:
"you should especially be careful about using negative words that could lead your audience to catastrophize"
...reminded me of your signposting articles.
Does that help in this scenario?
I hesitate because it may be a bit too much like 'leading them' to how they should react. And as you say, they have agency to decide what to do.
Thanks Wes.
I was about to send an email but you just saved my day! đ«¶đ»