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Unless you’ve been living alone in a cave most of your life, you will have had to conduct a difficult conversation with someone. If you’re a leader of people, tough talks are a job requirement. You can avoid them, but it will be at your own peril. Sooner or later you’ll need to address that difficult situation.

How to conduct a Difficult Conversation:

Step 1 – Prepare and Anticipate

• Prepare in advance – anticipate responses. Make sure you are dealing with complete information
• Explain but don’t defend
• Make sure any issue you are dealing with does not have legal ramifications (termination, harassment, violence in the workplace etc.)
• Don’t think it’s not going to be uncomfortable. Mentally prepare for the discomfort the situation may cause you.

Step 2 – Focus on Facts and Observable Behaviors

• Focus on observable behaviors and facts, not the person. “People don’t like you”, is much different than “People don’t like it when talk loud on the phone.”
• Focus on the issue at hand – don’t get dragged into irrelevant parallel issues.

Step 3 – Showtime: Manage the Confrontation

• Get to the point – eliminate the small talk, and move to your point quickly. Often the best course of action is to make it clear in your first sentence what the other person should expect.
• Do not engage in any tough talk if you are emotionally compromised at the moment. Adjourning the conversation is a legitimate course of action if either party is excessively emotional, but keep in mind that by deferring the conversation you are prolonging an unpleasant event.
• Stick to your guns unless emergent facts cause you to want to reconsider. If the recipient is feeling badly, that does not count as an emergent fact.
• If there are specific behaviors required of the other person, ensure those are well understood.

Learn Even More About ‘Difficult Conversations’

Wily Manager members, click here to access the members-only area for this topic (you must be logged in).  In the members-only area, you can:

• Listen to the ‘Difficult Conversations’ Podcast (15 minutes)
• Download the ‘Difficult Conversations’ Audio (mp3)
• Download the ‘Difficult Conversations’ Slides (ppt)
• Print or save the ‘Difficult Conversations’ Cheat Sheet (pdf)
• Click through to Related Topics:
  • The One on One Meeting
  • Handling Emotional Behavior
  • Dealing With Difficult Employees
  • Top 10 Manager Challenges: Part A (Managing Conflict)
  • Giving Quality Feedback
  • Good Boss, Bad Boss: Be a Better Boss
  • How to Manage Conflict

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Become a Wily Manager member and get instant access to even more information about Difficult Conversations.  And don’t forget to sign up for our FREE Management Cheat Sheet Collection

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