Have you ever been so terrified of how someone might take the news that you just don’t give it?  I have!

The sweaty palms, the fast heartbeat, the anxiety of imagining their reaction, the second guessing: “Well, do I really know this to be true?” or “Maybe they didn’t mean to undermine me, so I just won’t say anything.” Bad patterns and habits get in our way, but mostly it’s fear.

Fear can stop us in our tracks. Fear gets in the way of progress. Fear keeps us from changing.

Let’s say I get undermined by a colleague in a meeting. Their statement about my “needing to revise the report so much that it kept us from meeting the deadline” was not accurate. Here is one way I could approach the conversation:

Me: I can’t believe you said that in there!

Them: What are you talking about and stop yelling!

Me: You made me look like an idiot in there with your comment about my revisions.

Them: Well, I told you it was taking too long but you didn’t listen and now we look bad in front of the client!

Me:  Fine! (exiting with enough snarky tone and explosive body language to fill the Grand Canyon)

Them: She’s always like this!

Now, the first thing to notice is that I am reacting, not responding to my colleague. My emotions are leading this moment, not my logical, thinking brain.

There is a better way to prepare for these uncomfortable moments and Leann Renninger shares an amazing and easy to use four step process for us to build our skills in giving feedback or handling difficult conversations.

In her TED video, Ms. Renninger offers four steps to delivering feedback well:

The Micro-Yes: This is a question that invites the person into the conversation and also signals to them that feedback is coming.

The Data Point: Be specific with what happened or what was said. This is not the time for blaming or shaming the person.

The Impact: How did their actions impact you?

The Question: By closing with a question, you invite them to offer their point of view and participate in the problem solving.

Using these four steps, let me try that earlier conversation once more:

Micro-Yes: Do you have five minutes to talk about what happened in the meeting just now?

Data Point: “The detail you gave about my performance wasn’t accurate.”

Impact: “I’m worried that people will see me as unreliable as a result of your comment and that frustrates me.”

Question: “Can you share what led you to say that?”

This version is much more effective than the earlier one because it comes from a place of calm, is specific as to what went wrong and the impact that it had. It also sets up a dialogue by wrapping it up with a question. The earlier, reactionary version is probably more satisfying in the moment, but using this structure when faced with a challenging conversation can work wonders for how you are perceived by others and how effective you are at communicating difficult messages.

For other great Elephant Journal reads on this topic, check out Kate Fleming and Carin Reeve.