Delivering bad news: Choosing the medium
Delivering bad news is a tough job all around. We frequently struggle to find the right words to say. (Each week, at least a dozen people find my article, “Delivering bad news,” using some variation of “bad news” as a search term.) Then we have to scrape up the courage to come out and say it. And then there’s the question of what medium to use.
Well, according to a Harris Interactive poll sponsored by WhitePages.com, most people say they’d rather deliver bad news face-to-face, rather than use e-mail, instant messaging, or even the telephone.
According to the online poll of 2,395 U.S. adults 18 and older, a majority of people prefer talking in person when it comes to giving and getting bad news, expressing anger or admitting a mistake.
The reason? Etiquette, for one thing. But most said face-to-face conversation is the most direct. And the hardest to mess up. On the other hand, 80 percent described e-mail as easy to misinterpret. (Who among us hasn’t erroneously used the CAPS LOCK function? Or gone a little heavy on the exclamation points!!!!)
I have to question whether the number of people who say they prefer face-to-face conversation for bad news stays as high when they actually have to do it. Like I said, it’s tough to “screw your courage to the sticking point” and do the deed. Still, given the overwhelming preference to giving and receiving bad news in person, it makes the choice easier, and it will help the message go over a bit better.
Roy Jacobsen
in Good advice from here and there
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