When you use language that conveys respect and avoids an accusing tone, you protect your audience’s pride. This kind of communication etiquette is always important, but it demands special care with negative messages. Moreover, you can ease the sense of disappointment by using positive words rather than negative, counterproductive ones (see Table 8.1).

Choose your language carefully; it is possible to deliver negative news without being negative.

Using the Direct Approach for Negative Messages

A negative message using the direct approach opens with the bad news, proceeds to the reasons for the situation or decision, and ends with a positive statement aimed at maintaining a good relationship with the audience. Depending on the circumstances, the message may also offer alternatives or a plan of action to fix the situation under discussion. Stating the bad news at the beginning can have two advantages: (1) It makes a shorter message possible, and (2) it allows the audience to reach the main idea of the message in less time.

Opening with a Clear Statement of the Bad News

If you’ve chosen the direct approach to convey bad news, come right out and say it. However, even if the news is likely to be devastating, maintain a calm, professional tone that keeps the focus on the news and not on individual failures or other personal factors. Also, if necessary, remind the reader why you’re writing.

Providing Reasons and Additional Information

2 LEARNING OBJECTIVE

Explain how to use the direct approach effectively when conveying negative news.

In most cases, follow the direct opening with an explanation of why the news is negative. The extent of your explanation depends on the nature of the news and your relationship with the reader. For example, if you want to preserve a long-standing relationship with

The amount of detail you provide depends on your relationship with the audience.

The decision of whether to apologize depends on a number of factors; if you do apologize, be sincere.

an important customer, a detailed explanation could well be worth the extra effort such a message would require.

However, you will encounter some situations in which explaining negative news is neither appropriate nor helpful, such as when the reasons are confidential, excessively complicated, or irrelevant to the reader.

Should you apologize when delivering bad news? The answer isn’t quite as simple as one might think, partly because the notion of apology is hard to pin down. To some people, it simply means an expression of sympathy that something negative has happened to another person. At the other extreme, it means admitting fault and taking responsibility for specific compensations or corrections to atone for the mistake.

Some experts contend that a company should never apologize, even when it knows it has made a mistake, as the apology might be taken as a confession of guilt that could be used against the company in a lawsuit. However, several states have laws that specifically prevent expressions of sympathy from being used as evidence of legal liability. In fact, judges, juries, and plaintiffs tend to be more forgiving of companies that express sympathy for wronged parties; moreover, an apology can help repair a company’s reputation. Recently, some prosecutors have begun pressing executives to publicly admit guilt and apologize as part of the settlement of criminal cases—unlike the common tactic of paying fines but refusing to admit any wrongdoing.3

The best general advice in the event of a mistake or accident is to immediately and sincerely express sympathy and offer help, if appropriate, without admitting guilt; then seek the advice of your company’s lawyers before elaborating. A straightforward, sincere apology can go a long way toward healing wounds and rebuilding relationships. As one report on the issue concluded, “The risks of making an apology are low, and the potential reward is high.”4

If you do apologize, make it a real apology. Don’t say “I’m sorry if anyone was offended” by what you did—this statement implies that you’re not sorry at all and that it’s the other party’s fault for being offended.5 For example, when Sony’s PlayStation Network was breached and disabled by hackers, CEO Howard Stringer included the following statement in a post on the company’s blog: “As a company we—and I— apologize for the inconvenience and concern caused by this attack.”6 Note that he did not say “if anyone was inconve-

nienced” or “if the attack caused any concern.”

Recognize that you can express sympathy with someone’s plight without suggesting that you are to blame. For example, if a business customer damaged a product through misuse and suffered a financial loss as a result of not being able to use the product, you can say something along the lines of “I’m sorry to hear of your difficulties.” This demonstrates sensitivity without accepting blame.

Close your message on respectful note, being as positive as you can be without being insincere.

Closing on a Respectful Note

After you’ve explained the negative news, close the message in a manner that respects the impact the negative news is likely to have on the recipient. If appropriate, consider offering your readers an alternative solution if you can and if doing so is a good use of your time. Look for opportunities to include positive statements, but avoid creating false hopes or writing in a way that seems to suggest that something negative didn’t just happen to the recipient. Ending on a false positive can leave readers feeling “disrespected, disregarded, or deceived.”7

Use the indirect approach when some preliminary discussion will help your audience accept your bad news.

Using the Indirect Approach for Negative Messages

As noted earlier, the indirect approach helps readers prepare for the bad news by outlining the reasons for the situation before presenting the bad news itself. However, the indirect approach is not meant to obscure bad news, delay it, or limit your responsibility. The purpose of this approach is to ease the blow and help readers accept the news. When done poorly, the

indirect approach can be disrespectful and even unethical. But when done well, it is a good example of audience-oriented communication crafted with attention to both ethics and etiquette. Showing consideration for the feelings of others is never dishonest.

Opening with a Buffer

Messages using the indirect approach open with a buffer, a neutral, noncontroversial statement that is closely related to the point of the message but doesn’t convey the bad news. Depending on the circumstances, a good buffer can express your appreciation for being considered, assure the reader of your attention to the request, indicate your understanding of the reader’s needs, introduce the general subject matter, or simply establish common ground with your readers. A good buffer also needs to be relevant and sincere. In contrast, a poorly written buffer might trivialize the reader’s concerns, divert attention from the problem with insincere flattery or irrelevant material, or mislead the reader into thinking your message actually contains good news.

Consider these possible responses to a manager of the order-fulfillment department who requested some temporary staffing help from your department (a request you won’t be able to fulfill):

Our department shares your goal of processing orders quickly and efficiently.

As a result of the last downsizing, every department in the company is running shorthanded.

You folks are doing a great job over there, and I’d love to be able to help out.

Those new state labor regulations are driving me crazy over here; how about in your department?

Only the first of these buffers can be considered effective; the other three are likely to damage your relationship with the other manager. Table 8.2 provides several types of effective buffers you can use to tactfully open a negative message.

3 LEARNING OBJECTIVE

Explain how to use the indirect approach effectively when conveying negative news, and explain how to avoid ethical problems when using this approach.

A buffer gives you the opportunity to start the communication process without jumping immediately into the bad news.

Establishes common ground with the reader and validates the concerns that prompted the original request— without promising a positive answer

Establishes common ground, but in a negative way that downplays the recipient’s concerns

Potentially misleads the reader into concluding that you will comply with the request

Trivializes the reader’s concerns by opening with an irrelevant issue

Poorly written buffers mislead or insult the reader.

Build your reasoning in a way that signals the negative news ahead.

Whenever possible, don’t use “company policy” as the reason for the bad news.

Well-written reasons are

■Detailed

■Tactful

■Personalized

■Unapologetic if the writer is not at fault

■As positive as possible

An effective buffer serves as a transition to the next part of your message, in which you build up the explanations and information that will culminate in your negative news. An ideal explanation section leads readers to your conclusion before you come right out and say it. The reader has followed your line of reasoning and is ready for the answer. By giving your reasons effectively, you help maintain focus on the issues at hand and defuse the emotions that always accompany significantly bad news. An effective way to do this is to start with positive or neutral points and move through progressively negative points. Provide enough detail for the audience to understand your reasons but be concise.

Avoid hiding behind company policy to cushion your bad news. If you say, “Company policy forbids our hiring anyone who does not have two years’ supervisory experience,” you imply that you won’t consider anyone on his or her individual merits. Skilled and sympathetic communicators explain company policy (without referring to it as “policy”) so that the audience can try to meet the requirements at a later time. Consider this response to an employee:

Because these management positions are quite challenging, the human relations department has researched the qualifications needed to succeed in them. The findings show that the two most important qualifications are a bachelor’s degree in business administration and two years’ supervisory experience.

This paragraph does a good job of stating reasons for the refusal:

■It provides enough detail to logically support the refusal.

■It implies that the applicant is better off avoiding a position in which he or she might fail.

■It doesn’t apologize for the decision because no one is at fault.

■It avoids negative personal statements (such as “You do not meet our requirements”).

Even valid, well-thought-out reasons won’t convince every reader in every situation, but if you’ve done a good job of laying out your reasoning, then you’ve done everything you can to prepare the reader for the main idea, which is the negative news itself.

To convey bad news carefully

■Deemphasize the bad news visually and grammatically

■Use a conditional statement if appropriate

■Tell what you did do, not what you didn’t do

Continuing with a Clear Statement of the Bad News

After you’ve thoughtfully and logically established your reasons and readers are prepared to receive the bad news, you can use three techniques to convey the negative information as clearly and as kindly as possible. First, make sure you don’t overemphasize the bad news:

■Minimize the space or time devoted to the bad news—without trivializing it or withholding important information. In other words, don’t repeat it or belabor it.

■Subordinate bad news within a complex or compound sentence (“My department is already shorthanded, so I’ll need all my staff for at least the next two months”).

■Embed bad news in the middle of a paragraph or use parenthetical expressions (“Our profits, which are down, are only part of the picture”).

However, keep in mind that it’s possible to abuse this notion of deemphasizing bad news. For instance, if the primary point of your message is that profits are down, it would be inappropriate to marginalize that news by burying it in the middle of a sentence. State the negative news clearly, and then make a smooth transition to any positive news that might balance the story.

Second, if appropriate, use a conditional (if or when) statement to imply that the audience could have received, or might someday receive, a favorable answer under different circumstances (“When you have more managerial experience, you are welcome to apply for any openings that we may have in the future”). Such a statement could motivate applicants to improve their qualifications. However, you must avoid any suggestion that you might reverse the decision you’ve just made or any phrasing that could give a rejected applicant false hope.