Fall on the sword
Let’s learn from Dale, not from Shaggy
“If we know we are going to be rebuked anyhow, isn’t it far better to beat the other person to it and do it ourselves? Isn’t it much easier to listen to self-criticism than to bear condemnation from alien lips?”1
With the same enthusiasm I bring to convincing you not to say “I’m sorry,” I’ll apply to teaching you the power of the phrase, “My bad.”
Today’s tip from the battlefield: call out your own missteps, mistakes, misunderstandings, and shortcomings → learn to say “Oh, that was my bad.”
I’m working with a client right now, and recently I caused a non-trivial headache with some sloppiness and poor communication (who me!?!? Yes, me): the team was hiring for one role actively, and another future role opportunistically. Instead of organizing things properly, I saved all the candidates to the same job req in the system. As a result, several interviewers were confused, and a number of interviews were nearly compromised.
When the Head of Talent addressed it to the team, he did so without pointing fingers or calling out names: “Hey, everyone, when you have an opportunistic interview, please make sure you’re saving the candidate to an ‘Exploratory’ req, not the core reqs – we had interviewers confused and it causes confusion and commotion.”
Honestly, I could have stayed quiet, slinked away from blame, or responded with an emoji. Instead, I posted publicly: “Thanks for flagging, and this was my bad for missing it proactively: [explanation for what happened] [how we’re correcting for the future ++ big thanks to teammates for clearing things up and admin support for the new solution].”
This approach:
Shows self-awareness
Builds trust
Reduces internal swirl
Maximizes context… AND
Invites others to ACK their own misses in the situation (come on in, the water’s warm!)
So next time you F up, avoid “It wasn’t me” (remember: “defensiveness doesn’t help”2), and learn to say “That was my bad,” then learn from it, brush off the battle scar, and move on.
HTWFAIP, pg. 129
Ruchika Tulshyan, BRIDGE framework (https://brenebrown.com/podcast/inclusion-on-purpose/)