YOU ARE WRONG!

Learn the four steps to correcting people without offending them.

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Hi this is John with this week’s Developing Skills - Skills for Developers looking to develop their careers.

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Tip of The Week: Learn To Correct People Without Offending Them

As I returned from the kitchen with a fresh cup of coffee Simon ran out of the office in tears. What was that about? I looked at his fellow junior engineers questioningly, wondering what had happened. They looked embarrassed and uncomfortable then away.

As I put my coffee down, I noticed a private message flash up on my laptop from one of the senior engineers: “Hey John, poor Simon has just been torn apart by Bob. Sure Simon was wrong - hey, he’s a junior it’s gonna happen - but Bob was pretty harsh every time he corrected him.”

When I went outside and spoke to Simon he confirmed it, Bob has been correcting him all day and it was undermining his confidence. He wanted to quit his job right then.

Like Bob, it’s inevitable that at some point in our career we will have to correct someone. It’s an unavoidable part of being in a healthy, growing team. After all, we can’t all know everything, so we should be able to correct each other and lift each other up.

When it’s done well, correcting someone can change their behaviour, helping them achieve better results and strengthen your relationship with them. Yet too often we do it badly, damaging the relationship and causing resentment. Like Bob did.

Here are four steps you can take to avoid that.

1. Be like Elsa from Disney’s Frozen and “let it go” - a lot of the time it really doesn’t matter if someone is wrong. So before you rush to correct them, take a moment and ask yourself - does it really matter if they are wrong? Is there anything important at stake here if you don’t correct them? If not, let it go.

2. If you really do need to correct them, correct them in private - it’s human nature to be embarrassed when we’re wrong. We’re even more embarrassed if we’re wrong in public. So, to limit that embarrassment correct people in private. If you really need to correct in public take care to minimise the impact. For example if someone is presenting a plan that you believe is flawed, don’t pick it apart publicly, instead slow things down and offer to help. For example:

Thank you for the work you’ve done on this proposal. There are a few suggestions I’d like to make, perhaps we can get together after this meeting and work on it together?

You’ve stopped the current issue and can later in private constructively correct them and help refine the proposal.

3. When you are correcting someone, focus on the behaviour or outcome, not the person - when you focus on the person, it becomes personal and intended or will feel like a personal attack. That is going to make the other person defensive, damage your relationship and lead to a negative outcome.

Instead focus on the observable behaviour or outcome and not on them. For example:

I noticed some errors in the proposal, I would like to see them addressed before we review it with the team again.

Be sure to then provide specific examples of the issues that need to be corrected.

4. None of us like being corrected, we’re embarrassed by our mistakes so when you have to correct someone, soften the blow - don’t just knock them down and then keep kicking them, instead praise what you can. Offer some positive feedback and support.

You can do this well by beginning with a positive statement about their work or behaviour and some praise for their achievement so far. Then provide the correction and follow it up with a reminder of the praise and wrap up on a positive, supportive note.

For example:

Thank you for taking on this difficult challenge, I really appreciate you stepping up and volunteering to work in the proposal. Especially as I know you’d rather be writing code than documents. I really appreciate the teamwork.

I noticed some errors in the proposal, I would like to see them addressed before we review it with the team again. List specific examples...

This was a difficult task, so I really appreciate you taking it on and getting us to where we are today. Thank you for stepping up. Please let me know if I can help with the revisions in any way.

Unfortunately, this was very early in my career, when I wasn’t experienced enough to give Bob this advice. Instead we had a frank discussion in private, but without me having the experience to cushion the blow and stick firmly to talking only about the behaviour.

Sadly that meant Bob felt wronged too.

Therefore his behaviour didn’t change and a few weeks later he was fired. The working environment improved for those that remained, but it was a net loss for all of us. Bob lost his job, we lost his expertise.

So please don’t be like Bob or I were, learn from our mistake.

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