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Michael Hyatt: Our success as leaders often comes down to one thing. Not our planning, not the market. No, I’m talking about the conversations we lead.

[Video]

Steve Jobs: There is one more thing.

But there is one more thing.

There is one more thing.

But there’s one more little thing.

There is one more thing we wanted to talk about today.

[End of video]

Michael Hyatt: Most people think of Steve Jobs as a visionary and a master persuader, but the late founder of Apple and Pixar wasn’t always so good at capturing a room. In fact, he managed to get kicked out of one. The embarrassing expulsion happened a few years after Apple was founded. Jobs drove from a disappointing board of directors meeting to a charity event, a planning meeting for a foundation to help restore sight to poor people blinded by cataracts.

Now you might think that would be a hard meeting to get kicked out of, but Jobs pulled it off. First, he sniped at all the ideas others in the room had for how to get word out. Then he made his own pitch by saying, “You guys don’t know diddly about marketing.” Lastly, he insisted that this organization hire his favorite marketer. Otherwise, he claimed, they would never make an impact.

Well, then things got heated. Jobs wouldn’t back down until they agreed to hire this guy. The organizer warned him to stop it several times. Finally, he said, “Steve, it’s time to go,” and he physically walked the hotheaded young CEO out of the building. Well, that story comes to us from the biography Becoming Steve Jobs by journalists Brent Schlender and Rick Tetzeli. As the title suggests, Jobs was very much a work in progress.

About 25 years later, Jobs was negotiating with Disney over the future of Pixar, the groundbreaking computer animation studio he founded. This time he was absolutely masterful, so self-controlled he seemed like another person entirely. The original distribution deal between the two companies had been stacked against Pixar, but their deal was up for renegotiation.

Then Disney CEO, Michael Eisner, was known for playing dirty, even leaking potentially negative information to the press to help his negotiating position. Jobs, however, kept his cool and his powder dry. An exposé was being written on Eisner’s troubled leadership at Disney, and the author wanted people from Pixar to dish. Jobs sent word around that “Whatever we do, we don’t talk. They get nothing from us for this book.”

Jobs’ goal in negotiations with Eisner was to strike a better deal for Pixar. When talks stalled, he didn’t sweat it. He simply talked to other movie distributors and explored Pixar’s options. That weakened the Disney CEO’s position so much that a shareholder revolt brought him down. Eisner’s successor called Jobs, attempting to put a Disney/Pixar deal back together. Jobs took a moment and said, “Well, I think I owe you the right to prove that you’re different. If you want to come up and talk about that, then that’s what we should do.”

Jobs’ patience and confidence resulted in a $7.4 billion stock deal that amounted to Pixar taking creative control of Disney Animation Studios and theme parks. The deal put Disney back on top of its game and ensured that Pixar was in a good place when Jobs died of pancreatic cancer in 2011. How do we get from there to here? How did a young CEO, who couldn’t even get through a simple meeting, go on to so masterfully and profitably secure an important part of his legacy years later?

The secret lies in what happened after Jobs had been escorted from that embarrassing meeting. After the event organizer had walked Jobs out and got back to business, an aid told him that Jobs was still outside in the parking lot in his Mercedes, crying. “Maybe somebody should go calm him down.” “I’m sorry; I’m too wound up,” Jobs explained to the organizer between sobs. “I know I was out of order. I just wanted them to listen. I’m going to go in and apologize, and then I’m going to leave.”

Jobs took an important lesson home with him that day. When we have crucial conversations about the future of our organizations, there are emotional hurdles in the way. The higher the stakes, the higher the emotion, and the tougher it is for us to control ourselves. But that self-control is precisely what we need in order to see clearly, to put our egos to the side and break through.

[Video]

Buzz Lightyear: To infinity and beyond!

[End of video]

Exactly. Hi, I’m Michael Hyatt, and this is Lead to Win, my weekly podcast designed to help you win at work, succeed at life, and lead with confidence. In this episode we’ll explain how to successfully navigate difficult conversations. I’m here with my cohost, COO of Michael Hyatt & Company and eldest daughter, Megan Hyatt Miller. Hey, Meg. Thanks for joining me.

Megan Hyatt Miller: Hey, Dad. It’s great to be here with you.

Michael: I’m super excited about this topic. We are going to get into some really nitty-gritty of having these difficult conversations.

Megan: As you mentioned, our topic today is the Anatomy of a Tough Talk. You’ve broken these exchanges down into three phases. Working through each one enables us to navigate even the most challenging of conversations, no matter how anxious we feel. And let’s be honest. Sometimes these conversations can be pretty stressful.

Michael: Yeah, totally. I think there are few things that people dread more than tough conversations. I don’t care if it’s with family, friends, or coworkers. It’s never easy.

Megan: I totally agree. Okay. Let’s jump in and talk about phase one.

Michael: Phase one is before the talk. It’s easy to overlook advance preparation and to kind of go into these conversations without having done some preparation, but as Sun Tzu says, every battle is won or lost before it’s ever fought. That’s certainly true with tough conversations. We recommend taking five actions before a tough talk so you’re prepared to handle it well.

Megan: The first action is to believe that it matters. The conversation, that is. You have to cultivate the right mindset. First of all, you have to believe that it is even worth doing in the first place, and it’s only worth doing if it really matters. If you’re struggling with whether or not to say something, generally, that’s a clue that you need to speak up. You’re seeing or sensing something important that needs to be said, and it’s not going to get fixed or work better unless you do. Right?

Michael: Yeah. It’s like a catalyst. Without a catalyst, nothing will change. You’re choosing to become that catalyst by having this conversation or initiating the conversation. The person you’re confronting is an ally, not the enemy. I think that’s a key distinction, because oftentimes we see them as the opposition or somebody we’re squaring off against, and that’s not the case.

Megan: I totally agree. I think that’s a really important point that if you don’t acknowledge at the beginning can really derail you. Another thing is that difficult conversations are not only necessary; they’re inevitable. If you’re a leader…heck, if you’re a person engaging with other people in any capacity, there will always be a need for these kinds of conversations, no matter how mature or skillful you become. It’s kind of easy to think you might age out of this. Right?

Michael: True.

Megan: As Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton, and Sheila Heen point out in their book Difficult Conversations, we don’t outgrow difficult conversations or get promoted past them. That’s too bad. The best workplaces and most effective organizations have them. The loving family down the street that everyone thinks is perfect has them. Loving couples and lifelong friends have them. In fact, we can make a reasonable argument that engaging well in difficult conversations is a sign of health in a relationship.

Michael: That’s a great point. Beyond the resolution you’re aiming for, the skill and the habit of constructive confrontation matter in and of themselves. The authors of the book Crucial Conversations (a great book, by the way) by Kerry Patterson, Joseph Grenny, Ron McMillan, and Al Switzler point out that companies with employees who are skilled with crucial conversations (get this) respond five times faster to financial downturns and make budget adjustments far more intelligently than less skilled peers and are two-thirds more likely to avoid injury and death due to unsafe conditions and save over $1,500 and an eight-hour workday for every crucial conversation employees hold rather than avoid. If you think about it, people spend a lot of unproductive behavior, a lot of hours trying to avoid these conversations, so that one totally makes sense.

Megan: Don’t ask us how we know this, by the way.

Michael: Here’s another one: substantially increase trust and reduce transaction costs in virtual work teams, and then influence real change in colleagues who are bullying, conniving, dishonest, or incompetent. The bottom line is that braving a tough talk can yield powerful results, so you have to believe it matters. That’s the place to start.

Megan: I’ll tell you what. If you’re on the fence about whether to have a difficult conversation, just read that list a few times. I’m going to put this in Evernote so I can gin up the courage next time I need to have one of these conversations.

Michael: I know; it’s a great list.

Megan: So the second action before the conversation is to identify the type of conversation you need to have. There are basically four primary types of tough talks we’ve identified. First, the most obvious, is when you need to fire someone.

Michael: I hate those.

Megan: Everybody hates those. Second is coaching performance, third is delivering bad news, and fourth is setting boundaries.

Michael: Interestingly, these can all go in multiple directions: downward to a subordinate, upward to a superior, or even laterally to a peer. For example, you can fire an employee, a client, even a boss by quitting. You can coach your boss, a colleague, or certainly a member of your staff, and we’ve all had to deliver bad news in all three of these directions before. The same goes for setting boundaries, which is also an important conversation.

Megan: That is so important. Firing is the conversation type people tend to struggle with the most. Do you know anyone who likes this?

Michael: No, and don’t trust anybody who does.

Megan: Fair point. There’s no one I know who speaks to the necessity of certain endings better than our friend Dr. Henry Cloud, author of the book Necessary Endings and founder of Leadership University. Listen to what he had to say.

Dr. Henry Cloud: One of the most difficult things that anyone faces, whether it’s personally or professionally, is when you realize it’s time for something to end. I love that famous passage out of Ecclesiastes where it says, “To everything there is a season,” and there are some times to plant things and some times to uproot what has been planted. It gives a lot of examples in there. Sometimes it’s time to embrace, and sometimes it’s to refrain from embracing.

Life is about a lot of seasons, and there are beginnings and there are endings. Sometimes it’s not because anything has gone wrong. Sometimes in some kinds of relationships there is a season… Did you marry your prom date? Well, there was an ending to that relationship. It was probably at midnight on that night. There are seasons that certain relationships or certain positions or certain product lines are right and good, and then sometimes that season ends and it’s time for a necessary ending.

Sometimes it’s nothing bad; it’s just the world has changed or a company has changed or whatever it is. There has to be an ending. But at some point you come to a realization that if we continue this hope I have for it to get better… That’s not hope; that’s really just a wish, because hope has an objective reason to ground itself in.

Now if you determine, “We can hope. We can give this another quarter, but here are the objective reasons we’re going to give it another quarter, because we’re bringing in this consultant or we’re bringing in this new hire or we’re bringing in this coaching,” or whatever it is, then you don’t have to have a necessary ending. You just have to have a necessary ending to whatever you’ve been trying that’s not working.

At some point, you realize, “There’s nothing new or different that I can do from my side, and that person has, for whatever reason, self-selected out that either this position is beyond them or they don’t want to listen to the feedback or they don’t want to do the work required.” You realize you’ve done everything you can from your side and that the requirement you have for this relationship is not being met, and that’s when you’ve gotten clear. The emotion is out of it.

You bled off the rage and the “I’m being betrayed. Nobody is listening. I’m mad at this person.” You’ve gone and beat up a pillow or something to get rid of that first, because this is a conversation about what’s required. When you go into it that way, you can have respect for the other person. You can have well wishes for the other person. You can have hope that whatever it is works out for them, but what you’re clear about is that you can no longer expose yourself or the organization to that chair or that position or that side of the relationship not bringing to the relationship what’s needed.

Really, ultimately, it’s not about them; it’s about you, and it’s about you as a leader deciding, “Whoever sits in that VP chair, whoever sits controlling that department or that team, I need A, B, and C. This organization needs A, B, and C from that chair, and we’re not getting it.” You’ve made that clear. You’ve given every possibility for it to change, and you realize, “You know what? I can’t see a reason to think or hope that this will get better. It’s just a wish on my part.” At that point, it’s necessary that we have an ending or you’re going to have the same problem a year from now.

Michael: So that’s the second action. The third action is clarify the outcome you hope to achieve. Now that you know the type of conversation you’re pursuing, it’s time to get crystal clear on the outcome you want. In other words, you need to set your intention. You’re taking a stand for the greatness of the other person.

Now sometimes we share for all kinds of different reasons, like we want to get it off our chest, we want to correct that other person, we want to fix a problem, but the best motive, the best intention is taking a stand for the greatness of the other person. You want to see them reach their full potential. After all, if they could see it on their own they would already have made the change. The lack of change indicates a blind spot, and that’s where we need one another. They need your eyes and voice to get to the next level.

Megan: I think this is really a big breakthrough for a lot of people. Most of the time, when we’re about to have a difficult conversation, we’re focused on our own anxiety and stress and whether we’re going to do it well or not or whether we’re confident enough, which we’ll talk about in a little bit. I think this is a big mind shift for people to think about the fact that there’s something at stake for the other person that if we don’t take action could be lost.

Michael: Well, it’s a little bit like public speaking. When you’re focused on yourself you’re going to be nervous and tentative. When you start focusing on the other person and what you’re about to give to them and for their greatness, then all of a sudden the focus is off you. You’re going to be less nervous. You’re going to be more confident.

Megan: Absolutely. So the fourth action we want you to take before you step into a difficult conversation is to prepare on paper. This may be a little bit counterintuitive for some of you guys, but you don’t want to enter a conversation that’s challenging, where emotions are high, without a written set of talking points. I know, for myself, I have a lot of emotions. I feel deeply about things. I, like a lot of people, feel anxious before these conversations, and I’ve found that if I will just write down my thoughts point by point it gives me so much more confidence walking into these kinds of conversations.

Michael: I agree.

Megan: It also gives you a point of reference to reflect on after a conversation, which is really helpful. One of the things that happens for a lot of us in a difficult conversation is that we can lose track of where we are. It can kind of get thrown because people respond differently than we might have anticipated, and we forget certain really critical points that if we have written down we can come back to, almost like a compass that can guide us in those talks.

Michael: Yeah, so you make sure you end up at the right destination instead of getting offtrack and ending up at a different conclusion you didn’t think about.

Megan: Absolutely. You can even rehearse these talking points out loud, which I’ve done and I know you’ve done too. One of the things that’s helpful, too, is if you anticipate that the situation is going to be really emotionally charged, having a set of talking points can help you communicate clearly but also in a calm manner, especially if you anticipate that you might feel angry or that the other person might feel angry.

For some types of conversations, such as a disciplinary meeting or a firing, you’ll also need to have additional documentation besides talking points at the ready. You want to gather those materials too, and of course your HR department can be helpful with that.

Michael: According to a survey of British workers by the Chartered Management Institute, two-thirds of workers are seriously stressed when they know a difficult conversation is coming up. In fact, 11 percent get persistent nightmares and awful sleep leading up to any office confrontation. That’s why our final pre-conversation action is so critical.

Megan: I totally agree. This has happened to me. I don’t know about you.

Michael: It has me too.

Megan: I have lost many a night of sleep over a difficult conversation, and when I write talking points in advance it helps to calm me down.

Michael: This is one way to guarantee a good night’s sleep before a difficult conversation. Okay, that brings us to the fifth action: trust that you both can handle it. So often we see other people as fragile, and we’re afraid that if we somehow speak up they’re going to shatter into a thousand little pieces or they might fly off the handle or the whole situation may get out of control, but this is absolutely usually not true.

Megan: That’s right. So often we can catastrophize and run this movie reel through our mind of worst-case scenarios, and they rarely come true. We need to think of people as giants. They really can handle it, especially if we take care with our own words and we speak the truth in love. By the way, this does not mean you can’t set firm boundaries or be authoritative in the way that you communicate. We need to have the confidence to do that too in the right situations and the confidence that we can handle it, not just the people we’re talking to.

Michael: I’ve done this dozens of times, where I’ve gone into a meeting and thought of that other person as less than a giant, as somebody who’s fragile, and that hasn’t gone well, because you often get what you project. If you see them as small, you’re probably going to have a small conversation. Worse, the other person sometimes doesn’t get the point, because you’re kind of withholding and not being as direct or as forceful as you should, so they’re left wondering, “What was that meeting about?” instead of getting a clear and direct message.

When you think of them as a giant, as someone who is able to handle it, that frees you up from having to pad the truth. You can speak the truth in love, be very direct, at the same time being very kind, and actually accomplish what you want to accomplish. I guess the bottom line is how we perceive that other person really does matter in terms of how the conversation is going to go.

Megan: I totally agree with that. I think it also works in the other direction about ourselves as the initiators of those conversations, because when we’re confident we have the ability to be a catalyst for change in the lives of other people, and conversely, when we lack confidence or when we don’t think we can handle these difficult conversations our leadership very often is ineffective, and we under-serve the people we’re called to serve.

Michael: Yes, totally agree. So, all that was phase one: before the talk. Before you ever get in a room with another person, these are the things you need to do. That leads us to phase two: during the talk.

Michael: This is the most obvious place that we’re looking for guidance. I think the conversation itself is where the majority of our anxiety resides, so we need some strategies to help us navigate that. I think you have seven for us today.

Michael: Yep, actually seven steps. The first step is check the weather. What do I mean by that? Well, it’s not just about the way you communicate. It’s not even what you communicate. It’s everything surrounding, the environment, the external factors that affect how your tough talk is received. It would include things like how busy the day or the week is at work. If it’s really busy and people’s attention is elsewhere, it’s going to be really hard to get focused on this tough talk. Or relational equity you’ve built up with that person, where and at what time of the day you decide to talk. I don’t like to have these conversations at the end of the day, especially a busy day, when everybody is tired.

Megan: For example, one of the things I’ve learned from you is that you never want to fire someone or have a really difficult conversation on a Monday, for example. You want to do that at the end of the week at the end of the day, because the collateral damage to the team and to that person and their own dignity is far less when it’s at the end of a week rather than at the beginning.

Michael: Yeah, so beware when you’re called into a meeting at the end of the day on Friday with a supervisor.

Megan: Yes.

Michael: We’re only half kidding. Also, who is or is not present for the conversation, whether there are superiors or peers or subordinates. You have to be aware of these factors and, to the best of your ability (you can’t always control it), time the conversation for maximum receptivity.

Megan: Yep, that’s great. The second step during the conversation is to be humble. No matter which direction you’re communicating, humility and tact go a long way. Yes, the person you’re communicating with has faults, but so do you. A difficult conversation is not the time for pride or anger or really digging into some soapbox you have. If you’re communicating upward, asking permission is also important as an aspect of presenting yourself with humility.

Michael: I’ve been in that situation where I’ve been the boss, where somebody has met with me. In fact, I think this has happened a few times with the two of us. You’re always really good about asking my permission. What that does is it gives me the opportunity to participate in it and to really listen. I usually know it’s serious, like I’m kind of bracing myself, but at the same time I think it gives you the freedom to speak freely.

Megan: It’s always important to remember that the person you’re talking to…even if you’re, in this case in your example, managing up…feels anxious too, feels worried about what you’re going to say. Everybody feels nervous, not just the person delivering the difficult conversation or the difficult message.

Michael: That’s an important point. The third step is start with the conclusion. There’s nothing worse than being called into a meeting that you know is going to be difficult, and the other person is beating around the bush. They just don’t get to the point, so you’re thinking to yourself, “Did somebody die? Am I about to get fired?” You’re thinking of all of these worst-case scenarios.

Why not just get it out there, and then everyone can relax, at least relax in the sense that they know what the conclusion is, and then you can move on in the conversation from there. I think it’s important to start with the end in mind and, once you state the conclusion, to let it sink in for a minute, because sometimes, especially if it’s a firing or a disciplinary action, it does need to sink in. People need to absorb it, not just intellectually but emotionally.

Megan: It’s also important if it’s not a firing and it’s a coaching rather than a disciplinary conversation that you’re clear what it’s not. You really need to say at the beginning, “Hey, just to let you know, this is coaching. This is not discipline. You’re not getting fired,” whatever it may be, because the other person is probably already in 911 mode in their own head, and if you don’t say it, it’s not obvious to them, and they’re kind of waiting through the whole conversation to find out the conclusion. So not only do you need to be clear when the news is really bad, but you also need to be clear on the front end when it’s not.

Michael: I think this is really important in high-performance organizations, high-growth organizations, where everybody feels a little bit of the imposter syndrome, that they’re playing a little bit above their head. I remember even after I was promoted to the CEO of Thomas Nelson I felt like, “It’s only a matter of time before they figure out I don’t know what I’m doing.” So if anybody called me into a meeting, I thought, “Okay, they finally figured it out. I’m about to move out of the office.”

Megan: I feel like a lot of people who are listening right now are raising their hand in their car, like, “Me too.” That whole imposter thing. The fourth step is to put it in context. Now you want to backtrack and put the conclusion in context. In a coaching scenario, this is a good opportunity to affirm the value and positive qualities of the person you’re speaking with.

It can be easy to rush ahead and you just get right to the conclusion and then try to wrap it up, but you don’t really explain and affirm the person you’re talking to, and that’s a critical part of having your message being taken well. It’s also a good moment to explain why acting on this coaching is in their best interest. For example, let’s say you’re talking to your boss. “I know that collaboration is one of your highest values, but when you cut me off mid-sentence it makes me want to withdraw and not participate.”

Michael: That’s a great example. The fifth step is be clear and concise. Here’s the reason. Conversations like this are often emotionally charged, and that can easily blur your core message and kind of spiral the meeting off topic. This is why we’ve written out the talking points in advance: so when it gets emotional, when we tend to go offtrack, we can stay on script. So keep your language plain, and be as concise as possible.

Megan: And if you feel yourself emotionally getting swept out to sea, come back to those talking points to put you back on course. That’s really important.

Michael: Exactly.

Megan: The sixth step is to make sure to listen.

Michael: Huh? Sorry.

Megan: Talking is only half the equation. Honor the other person you’re speaking with by listening attentively. This is really tough. Sometimes when you are anxious, when you’re in a conversation that is charged, you can just plow through your agenda and completely forget that the other person across from you is not an observer; they’re actually a participant with thoughts of their own.

Michael: I don’t know where I heard this or read this, but so often, when we think we’re listening, all we’re really doing is thinking about how we’re going to reply instead of actually listening to the other person.

Megan: So we need to make sure we’re paying attention, listening carefully, and also taking notes sometimes if we need to. Stone, Patton, and Heen underscore this in their book Difficult Conversations. They say people inevitably have different views on priorities, levels of investment, measures of success, and exactly what correct implementation should entail. With everyone taking for granted that their own view is right and readily assuming that others’ opposition is self-interested, progress quickly grinds to a halt. That’s why pausing to really listen is so crucial.

Michael: The seventh step is define the path forward. In other words, at the end of this conversation you want to finish it by outlining next steps or next actions. So detail your exact expectations and clearly explain what’s going to happen next. Again, this could be a firing, it could be a coaching session, but you want to be clear about this, and then after the conversation there should be no ambiguity about where you’re headed.

Megan: That’s right. In their book Crucial Conversations, Patterson, Grenny, McMillan, and Switzler point out that dialogue is not decision making. They go on to explain that a resolution to a tough talk must clearly address all four of these considerations: 1) who, 2) does what, 3) by when, and 4) how will you follow up.

Michael: Love those.

Megan: I do too. You want to make sure to clearly define these items when you’re concluding your conversation.

Michael: Most people assume that the tough talk is over once they’ve left the meeting. However, if you’re operating on that assumption, you’re missing a key phase for successfully navigating the conversation and bringing it to a successful outcome.

Megan: Definitely. Before we get into the final phase, I want to pause for just a minute to talk about a new resource you’ve created to help guarantee we grow as leaders. Can you tell us a little bit about it?

Great. I hope all of you will check it out. Now let’s dive back into our discussion on tough talks.

Michael: Okay. That was phase two: during the talk. Now we want to move to phase three, our final phase: after the talk. Dropping the issue the moment you leave the room rather than following through is a major misstep in navigating difficult conversations. However, it’s certainly not the only one. Listen to this from my friend Jim Thomason, who was my head of HR at Thomas Nelson Publishers.

Jim Thomason: In my professional practice, the most common mistake that I see leaders make in having difficult conversations is talking about themselves and really thinking about themselves too much, and that manifests itself in such things as telling the other person how this makes you feel or giving some war story that has some remote context to the situation at hand, maybe some similar experience, or happens to be beating around the bush.

The person comes in the room, and they can feel the weight in the room. They know something is up, but you talk about everything in the world and just raise the tension to the point that their eventual reaction to your bad news is not as positive as it would have been. And ending the meeting with a lack of clarity, not having a good understanding about what the next actions are, something like “Do better,” or what have you.

The root causes of these, in my experience, have been a number of things; most commonly, the leader not being comfortable with conflict. I’ve had to be wingman for a lot of supervisors, a lot of leaders who were trying to have these difficult conversations and just could not get the words out of their mouth without someone there to help them along. I find a lot of times that haste, a lack of preparation has a lot to do with it.

Maybe having that difficult conversation in an emotional moment instead of waiting until you’ve had a chance to really think through the whole process and what you’re wanting to get out of the conversation. Also not getting the counsel of your peers or your HR resource or maybe even your boss to really know what it is you’re wanting to get done. All this ends up with approaching the conversation with a level of self-consciousness over how this makes the leader look to the staff member.

How you want to approach this is with the same type of love and support for your staff member that you would have for one of your kids. That’s not to say for a moment that you want to treat your staff members like children, but I’m talking about if you had a teenager who was really on the wrong path and you had to have a tough conversation with them, you wouldn’t fail to have that conversation for fear that they might think less of you.

The idea that you have in those conversations is that you tell them something for their own good, and you know it may be a thankless task, but you do it anyway. I would recommend that same type of love and support for your team member in your approach to difficult conversations.

The antidote for the types of things that go into talking about yourself too much during a difficult conversation is approaching with a clarity of purpose. What do you really want to get out of this conversation? What’s your desired outcome? Also, you know the person well enough to be having a tough conversation with them, so what are their likely retorts and talking points? Prepare for those mentally.

Also, setting an appropriate time and place to make sure you’re not interrupted, so that you’re in private, so that you can focus, and then most importantly, get right to it. You don’t make them feel better by dragging this out any longer than it has to be. Mostly, just approach it with the same type of selfless love you would have for your own family members when you want to have a conversation that’s all about your team member.

Michael: To ensure you don’t fall into the trap of no resolution, let’s review the three essential actions you’ll need to take after the talk.

Megan: The first action is to document decisions. Again, these discussions tend to be pretty emotional, and very often people hear what they want to hear or maybe hear what they’re afraid they heard, but they don’t actually hear what you said regardless, and that can be a problem. So it’s essential to document your commitments and decisions from the meeting. If it’s an official issue, like a disciplinary meeting or a firing, you may also need to have somebody present from HR. In that case, additional documentation of course will be required.

Michael: This is one of the great things about having some pretty detailed talking points. I can remember one time I was sitting down with a guy who worked for me, and he was awesome, but he was very sensitive. He tended to be super responsible, so I knew he was going to beat himself up after the meeting and probably attribute to me a harsher tone than maybe I thought I was having in the meeting, so I just shared my talking points.

I edited them a little bit, but I shared my talking points so that it could objectify the encounter for him and help him understand not only what I said but what I didn’t say, so that when those voices went off in his head and he was trying to remember what was said in the meeting it wouldn’t be clouded with the emotions but he would get to the truth, and the talking points helped objectify it.

Megan: I think that’s a great idea.

Michael: So that’s the first action. The second action is follow through. Whatever the outcome of the meeting, you want to make sure you follow it through to its completion. For example, if it was coaching, make sure you’re monitoring progress, and then schedule a follow-up meeting. Critically important. If it was disciplinary, there may be some kind of remediation, some kind of checkpoint in the future that’s required.

If a tough decision or a delegation was made, you want to follow up to ensure that your directive is properly executed. You don’t want to be guilty of abdication, which is very different than delegation. Or if boundaries were set, you need to ensure that they’re enforced, and you may also need to notify other interested parties of the outcome of the discussion. Whatever the case, make sure to follow through.

Megan: It’s so important. The third action is to practice honor. No matter how difficult a conversation is or what the result was, we can always choose to continue to honor the other person as a matter of personal integrity.

Michael: Yeah. If you’re trying to cultivate or create a culture of respect, I don’t think you want people wondering how you’re speaking about them when they’re absent, so to speak well of them is really important.

Megan: Yes. Fortunately, it’s possible in all of the scenarios we mentioned earlier. Even if you’ve had to fire an employee or quit your job, you can commit to speaking respectfully about them in the future. If you’re coaching someone, you can commit to monitor their progress and affirm their improvement. If you’ve had to deliver bad news, you can aim to mitigate the damage or at least restore the tone of your relationship, and if you’ve had to apply boundaries, you can focus on continuing to engage with that person in a healthier way.

Michael: In 2009, when we laid off so many people during the recession when I was the CEO of Thomas Nelson Publishers, one of the things we committed to… We got in a room with the executive team and we said, “What do we want the outcome to be as a result of this? Obviously, this is going to be very difficult for these people and for their families, and we want to follow through. We want to follow up.

We want to make phone calls to these people after they’ve been let go. Not just sort of abandon them and hope it goes away and we don’t have to confront that unpleasantness anymore, but to follow up and make phone calls and just ask, ‘How is it going? Do you have any leads? Is there anything I can do to help you?’” We did that, and I think it really made a difference.

Megan: I’m sure it did. It was so brave, and it reminds me of our conversation earlier about remembering that the people you’re talking with are giants but that you’re also a giant, that you can handle the discomfort of those kinds of conversations, especially the ones that technically you don’t really have to have after the fact, and that’s a great example.

Michael: Some of those people I had those conversations with… Now I can greet them in public, and there are no hard feelings. It’s not awkward, because I was there for them after they were let go. In fact, one of those just happened a couple of weeks ago, where somebody thanked me. He said, “That was actually the best thing that ever happened to me, because I wasn’t really in my sweet spot when I was working for you, but I was able to get into my sweet spot, and now I love my job. So thank you.”

Megan: I love that story. I especially love it because you didn’t have to follow up with those people. I mean, for all intents and purposes, you were done. You had been generous. You had taken care of people. But you really went the extra mile and had another difficult conversation that was even more generous in a pretty grand way. It reminds me of episode 3 that we just talked about recently with frustration tolerance, which is all about the ability to embrace and sit with uncomfortable emotions; in this case, for the benefit of those you serve.

Michael: This is kind of a mark of effective leadership: your ability to handle discomfort. Anybody can handle the comfortable stuff, but the discomfort is kind of what separates the real leaders from the ones who are the faux leaders.

Megan: It’s kind of what we get paid for at the end of the day.

Michael: Exactly.

Megan: So today we’ve covered what to do in each of the three phases of a tough talk: before, during, and after the talk. As we come in for a landing, I want to circle back to that great story about Steve Jobs that we opened with.

Michael: Wasn’t that awesome?

Megan: It was so great. His story gives us a vision of what’s possible, and it shows us that we can improve. Our hope is that today’s episode has given you a clear action plan on exactly how to improve. Any final thoughts for today?

Michael: The book about Steve Jobs, the one we’re quoting from, is called Becoming Steve Jobs, and I think it’s a subtle reminder that all of us, in a way, are becoming, that we don’t have to be naturally good at this, that it takes practice, but if we have a strategy and follow the system we can get better at this. If we lean into these tough conversations, it’s not that they’ll become easier, but we’ll become more effective, and honestly, this is the measure of our leadership. Leadership is not all about strategy and vision and all that fun stuff. A lot of times it comes down to our ability to navigate these really tough conversations and bring them to a successful conclusion.

Megan: Before we close, I want to remind you about LeaderBox. It’s automated personal development in a box. Check it out at leaderbox.com. If you’ve enjoyed today’s episode, you can get the show notes and a full transcript online at leadto.win.

Michael: Thanks again for joining us on Lead to Win. If you like the show, please tell your friends and colleagues about it, and also please leave a review of the show wherever you listen to podcasts.

Megan: This program is copyrighted by Michael Hyatt & Company. All rights reserved. Our producer is Nick Jaworski.

Michael: Our writers are Joel Miller, Mandi Rivieccio, and Jeremy Lott.

Megan: Our recording engineer is Matt Price.

Michael: Our production assistants are Mike Burns, Mike Boyer, and Aleshia Curry.

Megan: And our intern is Winston.

Michael: As Steve Jobs was famous for saying…

[Video]

Steve Jobs: We’ve got one more thing.

[End of video]

We invite you to join us for our next episode, where we’ll be discussing the gratitude advantage and how it can help you achieve more in life and work. Until then, lead to win.