{"id":15161,"date":"2013-08-11T14:58:09","date_gmt":"2013-08-11T22:58:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/?p=15161"},"modified":"2013-08-11T14:58:09","modified_gmt":"2013-08-11T22:58:09","slug":"how-to-be-great-at-delivering-bad-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/how-to-be-great-at-delivering-bad-news\/","title":{"rendered":"How to be Great at Delivering Bad News"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>

<\/p>\n

One of the best scenes in the 2011 movie Moneyball<\/i> is when assistant Peter Brand, played by Jonah Hill, is tasked with trading Oakland Athletics baseball player Carlos Pena to another team.<\/p>\n

You can see the consternation and fear on Brand\u2019s face when he learns of this assignment. This is not a part of the job he wants to deal with.<\/p>\n

While the \u201cbad news\u201d scene of him trading this player is less than a minute long, we in the audience get to fully experience the discomfort (complete with long pauses and tense body language).<\/p>\n

We also get to observe somebody doing a great job delivering bad news.<\/p>\n

If you have ever had the unenviable task of delivering bad news, then you are familiar with this discomfort.<\/p>\n

I understand this discomfort. A couple of years ago I needed to fire an employee for insubordination.<\/p>\n

I have always hated that term, insubordination. The word makes the act sound more pretentious than it really is.<\/p>\n

In this case, the employee had a longstanding problem getting along with his lead. Over time the stress was beginning to affect general department productivity. I offered up some strategies in the preceding months, but the issues predated my arrival in the organization and seemed solidified. They just couldn\u2019t get along.<\/p>\n

One day it reached a tipping point as the employee lashed out at the lead. When I learned of the incident, I knew it was time to make a change.<\/p>\n

I remember feeling the dread of that upcoming meeting with the employee. I felt like Peter Brand learning of his assignment to deliver the bad news.<\/p>\n

My attempt wasn\u2019t as good as Brand\u2019s though.<\/p>\n

I had all the words, and I knew my intention, but the message was not as crisp as it should have been.<\/p>\n

Our meeting was a mess.<\/p>\n

Since then I have learned how to better handle delivering bad news. Some of the lessons I\u2019ve learned are below.<\/p>\n

Lesson 1 – Create one clear message<\/b><\/p>\n

Easy, right?<\/p>\n

Wrong.<\/p>\n

Clear messages are not diluted, and they are not sugarcoated. One clear message will be the focus of a bad news conversation.<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t use the criticism sandwich of good thing, bad thing, good thing. Bad news is bad news so get right to the point.<\/p>\n

In my meeting with this employee, we were all over the board. I was talking about what was going right, and what was going wrong, and why it wasn\u2019t working, and a number of other things.<\/p>\n

In retrospect, our meeting seemed to resemble a disjointed break-up conversation between two teenagers.<\/p>\n

I hadn\u2019t learned the lesson of clarity yet.<\/p>\n

Lesson 2 – Deliver the message and any supporting information, and then be quiet<\/b><\/p>\n

Peter Brand did this well. He spoke a few sentences and then was quiet (really uncomfortable, but quiet).<\/p>\n

Bad news, like all news, needs to sink in. I have witnessed bad news conversations where the deliverer was talking too much. The extra talking seemed to be an attempt to deal with the speaker\u2019s uneasiness.<\/p>\n

Being quiet in these situations is hard, but necessary. Let the tension be present in the quiet, it will reinforce your clear message.<\/p>\n

Lesson 3 – Provide honest answers (if you have them)<\/b><\/p>\n

Once the news has sunk in, there may be some questions. Answer them as best you can.<\/p>\n

If you don\u2019t know the answer, then say so.<\/p>\n

Again, resist the urge to talk too much. Too much talking can sometimes cloud the bad news message.<\/p>\n

Lesson 4 – End the meeting and move on.<\/b><\/p>\n

Once the bad news has been delivered, then what?<\/p>\n

It depends on the news.<\/p>\n

If you are terminating someone, then the meeting ends and you go your separate ways.<\/p>\n

If you are presenting poor financial numbers, then you may be leaving the meeting with some work to do and another meeting in the future.<\/p>\n

Just make sure to end the meeting as soon as reasonably possible.<\/p>\n

The longer the meeting drags on, the more likely your message may be blunted by the additional conversation.<\/p>\n

Moving on is also a part of this lesson. The clear message has been delivered and it\u2019s now time for you to refocus on the positive.<\/p>\n

It might take a minute to get going in the right direction again, but the sooner the better.<\/p>\n

To be sure, life is not a movie. Actors know the lines, the scene, and the story arc. In life, we don\u2019t always know these things. We don\u2019t know how the other person is going to react.<\/p>\n

Effectively delivering bad news is difficult to do. Getting through the bad news, though, is often a necessary first step to getting to the good news.<\/p>\n

BIO: Jonathan is the founder of The Red Cabbage<\/a> – a site dedicated to personal improvement (not vegetables).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Effectively delivering bad news is difficult to do. Getting through the bad news, though, is often a necessary first step to getting to the good news. Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12163,"featured_media":15210,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0},"categories":[2162],"tags":[2276,4641,4651,4652,4640],"yoast_head":"\nHow to be Great at Delivering Bad News - Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Effectively delivering bad news is difficult to do. 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