Hardly a day passes without a business leader, celebrity, politician or military commander saying the S-word – ‘Sorry’ and offering an apology for a mistake or for something said or done that caused pain, offence or that let someone else or themselves down.
Most recently there have been a number of public apologies about the 1989 Hillsborough disaster when 96 Liverpool supporters tragically perished. David Cameron has made a statement of apology, while Mayor of London, Boris Johnson is “very, very sorry” for comments made in a 2004 Spectator article about Liverpool fans involved in the tragedy. One parent, Margaret Aspinall, who lost her son James, 18, in the disaster and is the Chairwoman of the Hillsborough Families Support Group, has condemned his words calling them “too little, too late”.
This latest high profile apology coming 23 years after a disaster, begs the several questions:
- what does the word ‘sorry’ actually mean?
- is our use of the S-word now so pervasive that it has lost all meaning?
- has that turned us into hardened, disbelieving sceptics when someone genuinely shows contrition?
When you were last on the receiving end of an apology, how did you feel? Did the person proffering the apology genuinely show remorse? Or did you feel they were just going through the motions – that their words were merely salving their guilty conscience? If the latter, what did it do to your level of trust for that person? And if you were offering an apology, did you really mean it? What damage is done to relationships in either case when the apology doesn’t ring true?
Now take the S-word into the workplace…
Here’s a not uncommon situation – when the CEO/director/boss/line manager is frequently late for meetings or cancels them at the last minute because of overruns and a heavy workload. Perhaps that’s you; I know it’s been me on occasions. Perhaps you’ve been on the receiving end and it was your 1-2-1 session or review meeting with your boss and they rescheduled or cut your meeting very short. Did you lose respect and trust him less, even if he said he was sorry? Did you become disengaged with a drop off in performance? Did you feel undervalued?
All too often, our apologies are just words. They trip off our tongue, even when they may be heartfelt. As the old adage goes – “actions speak louder than words” and two simple actions can help restore trust to damaged relationships and minimise disengagement to show we really are sorry:
- Either asking the injured party what we can do to put things right and then doing it
- Or offering them a solution and asking if that would put things right between us and then doing it.
Either option requires a degree of humility on our part. When our words of apology are not accompanied by either of these actions, then aren’t we simply being self-serving, massaging our own egos? Doesn’t the injured party see straight through this charade? What do you think?
For more on this subject, see June 2012 Harvard Business Review which coincidentally has an interesting article on this subject: Why “I’m sorry” Doesn’t Always Translate.
Leadership Insights 