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So how do you give bad news?

The HR director’s chair is one of the hottest seats in corporate life right now. You face difficult decisions almost daily. You’re slashing budgets left, right and centre. You’re balancing the future employment of many hundreds, if not tens of thousands, in your hands.

And as part of the senior management team, every day, every week, every month, you must consider and advise the board on how to solve that, now ubiquitous, corporate riddle: how to do more with less.

In unguarded moments, HR directors admit it is stressful, too. These aren’t just the ‘human resources’ you’re moving around like pawns on a corporate chessboard, these are real people. People with lives and families – and mortgages – outside work. People who you might just need to sack.

And in case you’d forgotten that you’re part of the same cash-strapped organisation – and therefore part of the potential overhead problem, too – you’re also living with the knowledge that your own name is probably on a cost-reduction list somewhere.

But amid all the grimness and pressure, if you ever have a chance to take a deep breath, you might also be aware that this could be one of the most important, exciting and potentially career-defining moments in your professional life.

It’s a time when the reputations of HR directors and managers could soar. There will be some among you whose standing will be set for the rest of their career. They will be the ones who are holding it together now, at the height of economic adversity. The ones keeping employees motivated and engaged, while still playing a critical part in one of the biggest periods of cost-cutting in a century.

What are the skills these stars share? A cool head under pressure, certainly. An ability to see the bigger picture, naturally. An ability to understand, and help implement, corporate strategy will be a must, too.

But there is something else these HR leaders will have: an instinctive grasp of the nuance of communication.

The truth is, there’s no tougher test of a leader’s communication skills than the ability to deliver bad news, and then to keep their audience’s goodwill afterwards. The managers who can do this are likely to have an instinctive understanding of what needs to be said when it comes to communicating bad news – and, more importantly, how to deliver it.

And these are likely to be the HR managers and directors who understand that bad news isn't to be dismissed as merely an obstacle to overcome. They instinctively understand that bad news can be a terrific opportunity, too. Those who strike the right balance in tone and content of employee communications have an opportunity to earn and keep the respect of the workforce – not just in the downturn, but in the years to come. And that respect could help to keep staff motivated, focussed and engaged in the difficult days and months ahead.

And it could help to make sure you earn the respect of the boardroom as you deliver a more engaged workforce on little or no extra resources.

But there is a flipside to this opportunity. Get the balance wrong and you risk losing credibility and, just as importantly, the faith of employees. This air of suspicion and mistrust could hang around for a long, long time to come.

Of course, not all great communicators are born that way. Many pick up the tricks of the great communicators’ trade and file them away. And that’s where The Writer comes in. We help our clients by sharing the secrets that the best communicators use all the time. Tools that writers have been using since long before the birth of the printing press – since the birth of bad news in fact.

So, here are our top 10 tips for telling bad news, and still keeping your audience on your side.

  1. Ditch the jargon. The HR industry has come a long way from its foundations as a support and administration role. It now has a well-earned place in the boardroom. But from a language point of view, it has lost something along the way. To be taken seriously, HR has emulated the language of the MBA – ‘leveraging intellectual capital’, ‘optimising resources’, ‘creating leadership frameworks’. That’s fine for the board – they need to know HR speaks their language. But it’s terrible for employees. Using jargon serves to alienate the very people whose hearts and minds you most need to win over – and it is particularly counterproductive for bad news. So drop it.
  2. Beware the silence. Communicate little and often. If the news flow is steadily bad, then the worse thing you can do is allow a silence to emerge. The rumour mill will be working over time. If you have a monthly newsletter, then consider giving staff a shorter weekly update, too.
  3. Treat your audience as people – not human resources. Think of a colleague outside the HR department. How would you explain these issues to them over a coffee in the canteen? Chances are that’s the way you should be communicating to everyone. It might even help to imagine that conversation and record what you’d say on a dictaphone. Then transcribe the recording. There’s your first draft.
  4. Think about tone of voice and stick to it. How do you want your department to be perceived within the organisation? Do you want to be seen as remote and impersonal? Or do you want to be seen as clear, supportive and sincere? Your tone of voice is critical. Do you say ‘it is with deep regret’ or do you say ‘we’re very sorry’? Which strikes you as more sincere?
  5. Think of your communication as part of a wider conversation. Pay careful attention to the responses from your audience members – and allow them to help you shape the next communication you have. Do this and you will get better at serving up bad news painlessly.
  6. Do not lie – ever. It sounds obvious but there’s one thing that is guaranteed to vaporise trust overnight: getting caught telling a whopper. It matters not one jot that the lie may have been made to protect people. The facts – however tough – are all that count.
  7. Don’t over promise. There is no certainty in this economic world. You know it, and employees know it. So don’t pretend there is. If you can’t guarantee something don’t say you can.
  8. Be consistent. It’s better to admit uncertainty than to change tack each time you learn something new. Inconsistency makes people doubt the truth of what they’re hearing.
  9. Always acknowledge the cynics. It’s an odd quirk of community life that the most cynical members of an audience are often the most idealistic. This means they’re almost always the most vociferous, too. And this can be dangerous if you want to keep your audience with you. Given free rein, the cynics’ views can drown out your side of the story. This means you need to head off their objections swiftly and directly.
  10. Think about language before and after you’ve used it. Look hard at the way you and your team communicate. Try to imagine yourself in your audience’s shoes. How would they respond to this communication? What specific reaction might these words generate? You can’t anticipate everything an audience thinks when it hears bad news, but you can take the sting out of some announcements by choosing your words carefully. And because this is a conversation, you can learn for next time by considering what effect you had.
  11. And one final tip? If you’re in any doubt, call the professionals. That’s us. At The Writer we’ll help you work out what your best approach to telling bad news should be, we’ll train you and your team to do it and, for larger, more complex projects like newsletters, we’ll even help you write them, too.

Would you like a copy of The Writer’s 10 writing tips, all published in a neat little black book? The Writer has reserved copies for the first 200 Powerchex readers to get in touch. Email martin@thewriter.co.uk for your copy.

Biography

Martin HennesseyMartin Hennessey is a former print and broadcast journalist - so he loves bad news.

He founded The Writer in 2000. He has worked on communication strategy for the likes of BT, Barclays, Deutsche Bank and Close Brothers. He's also a founder member of business writers' group 26, and a former judge of the Writing for Design category at the D&AD Awards. He is co-author of the Investor Relations Handbook and was oh-so-nearly a scriptwriter on the first Bridget Jones movie (just don’t get him started on what he thought of the final film).

The Writer does three things.

Brand language. We help define brands, develop tone of voice, and come up with names.
Training. We train people to become more effective and creative writers at work.
Writing. We write almost anything, find specialist writers, and manage writing projects.

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