Taking the Fear Out of Fucking Up
A complete & realistic guide to the professional apology
EEEEK! 👻 It happened.
Your heart hammers against your ribs as reality settles in… you fucked up at work.
Now what?
As humans, we are fallible. Mistakes are bound to happen — whether you’re an intern or a C-suite executive. Maybe you snapped at a coworker, missed a deadline, or misprinted a phone number that rings a phone sex line instead of the sales department (this mistake lives on as lore in a Baltimore, MD, financial office.)
Don’t panic! You have the power to rectify the issue through an earnest apology and simultaneously demonstrate integrity.
Shit happens. How you handle it determines the impact. Keep reading to learn how to apologize professionally.
Photo by Sabina Music Rich
Why are apologies important?
Trust is at the core of all relationships, including those between you and your coworkers.
Even when unintentional, mistakes fracture the foundation of trust among team members. Healthy work environments are built on trust! Responsibility, ownership, and respect are key factors in an enjoyable and healthy team structure, of which trust is the core.
According to a Harvard University pamphlet, an apology “says that:
you share values regarding appropriate behaviour towards each other,
that you have regrets when you don’t behave according to those values (intentionally or unintentionally),
and that you will make greater efforts to live up to your shared standards of behaviour.”
A sincere apology can repair fractured trust and restore respect.
Before the apology
While urgency tends to accompany fuck-ups, it’s important to recognize the benefits of a thoughtful and intentional apology. Take some time, even if just ten minutes, to prepare.
Incorporate these four steps into your apology to ensure clear communication and a productive conversation.
1. Take ownership of your actions
Ownership is essentially taking initiative. If you notice the mistake before anyone else, it’s crucial to kickstart the corrective process. If the error was brought to your attention, taking ownership means stepping into action to reconcile the situation.
The very first step is admitting responsibility to yourself and coming to terms with the consequences.
Consider who you need to inform of the mistake and how the blunder may impact other team members. Maintaining a big-picture mentality will allow you to understand the scale of your error and develop an appropriate response.
2. Come up with solutions
By understanding the big-picture and owning the impact of your mistake, you can develop possible solutions.
Bringing corrective recommendations to the conversation will bolster your apology, demonstrating forethought and confirming your commitment to the team.
Including solutions and the next steps in your apology helps showcase your forethought and commitment to learning from your mistakes.
For example, I once coached a new hire that moved forward with a deliverable even though she didn’t fully understand the requested directive. She did her best to answer her own questions, which led to a cramped timeline with a full re-do in order. It happens to the best of us.
Together, we identified how she could take control of her skills gaps through candid conversation and constructive feedback from her manager. She also showed initiative by enrolling in a relevant course with her professional development funds. Her proactive approach to solving the problem allowed her to own her assumptive mistake and ensure she wouldn’t fumble the next deliverable. Progress is everything!
3. Own the consequences
Whether the mistake is yours alone or a collective team folly, taking responsibility for the resulting consequences is crucial.
Don’t blame or finger-point; that won’t benefit anyone. Name your role in the error and how it has (or will) impact others.
Naming the consequences showcases your empathy and understanding of how the error impacts those around you. Rarely does anything exist in a vacuum — usually, actions have a ripple effect, shifting the surrounding environment.
4. Focus on accountability
Accountability is a foundational value of integrity and centres followthrough.
Being accountable isn’t only admitting your faults; it’s delivering on commitments you make to others.
Demonstrate that you’ve learned from your mistake by acknowledging how to avoid similar blunders in the future — and then don’t make the same mistake again.
Accountability requires time and initiative, so in the meantime, name exactly what you’ve learned from the mistake and how it informs your actions moving forward.
Lack of accountability will only frustrate your team and lead to future (perhaps repetitive) problems. Once, I worked with someone who refused accountability for an error relating to the termination of an employee (MAJOR eek). She pointed fingers at members of other teams even though the mistake was clearly hers alone. By doing so, she eroded the trust of her teammates — not because she made a mistake, but because she wouldn’t recognize it and help us move forward and prevent future errors of this sort. Instead, we learned to simply exclude her from sensitive projects.
Photo by Febe Vanermen
Time to apologize
Now that you’ve developed the foundational blocks of an effective apology, it’s time to actually voice your mistake and face the consequences.
Find a good time to speak privately with the person you owe an apology. Be considerate of their schedule, mood, and responsibilities. (But don’t wait for the “perfect moment,” I promise that doesn’t exist and will only delay resolution.)
If possible, an in-person or video meeting is ideal for your apology. A written apology leaves too much to interpretation and implied tone, so if you can’t secure a visual meeting, a phone call is the next best option.
The language of apology
The words you use and the tone of your voice matter A LOT. They can dramatically change the impact of your apology — for better or worse.
When delivering your apology:
Be calm
Use an approachable and respectful tone of voice
Don’t use the word “but”
Use “I” statements to reinforce your position and perspective
Center the experience of those your mistake impacted most
The simplest way to ensure an effective apology is to be direct, genuine, and empathetic.
Remember, a genuine apology isn’t centred around you and your emotions. Your focus should be on ensuring clear and concise communication.
Here are some tips to keep your own emotions out of the equation:
Don’t cry. This isn’t about posturing or depicting strength; it’s about centring the apology around the recipient. The apology isn’t about you! If you burst into tears, then the recipient is forced to comfort you, centring the situation around your feelings rather than the impact of your actions. This can be challenging for us office-criers, but becomes easier with practice.
Be direct and concise. Make your point and apologize only once. Rambling or repeated apologies have a similar effect as tears: it makes the recipient feel as though they need to comfort you. When that happens, your apology has failed.
Generate courage. Emotions are natural in a conflict situation. Feeling nervous, upset, or dejected after a workplace blunder is understandable. To ensure you can manage the apology with grace and confidence — generate courage! Listen to a pump-up song, do a breathing exercise, or take a quick walk to expel some nervous energy. You got this.
Maintaining a healthy work environment is incredibly important for everyone in the organization. So much so that much research has been conducted on conflict management and impactful apologies.
The International Association for Conflict Management (IACM) published a 2016 study exploring the structure of effective apologies.
They discovered that the most meaningful apologies followed this format:
The Do’s and Don’ts of a professional apology
A quick reference guide! Feel free to save this and keep it handy for future fuck-ups.
Steal this chart!
After the apology:
Phew, you’ve apologized and can focus on the future once again. It’s never fun and often awkward, but you can rest easy knowing you’ve owned your actions and the resulting consequences. Congrats on being a decent human being!
Now, make sure to follow through on the corrective steps you’ve outlined and remain accountable.
An apology is only worth the action that backs it up.
Find this interesting? Share it with your friends and teammates. Or, passive aggressively send it to someone who did you wrong (not really).
