Mistakes happen. No matter what some people may tell you (I once had a work colleague who told me he never made mistakes), we are all human and everyone makes them. When mistakes happen in your business, the way you handle them is really important — mistakes are usually forgivable but it is how you deal with them that determines what happens next and how you respond to them speaks volumes about you.
Etymology
The entry for the word sorry in the Online Etymology Dictionary reads:
Middle English sori, from Old English sarig “distressed, grieved, full of sorrow” (not found in the physical sense of “sore”), from Proto-ermanic *sairiga- “painful” (source also of Old Saxon serag, Middle Dutch seerigh “sore; sad, sorry,” Dutch zeerig “sore, full of sores,” Old High German serag, Swedish sårig “sore, full of sores“), from *sairaz “pain” (physical and mental); related to *saira- “suffering, sick, ill” (see sore (adj.)).
The spelling shift from -a- to -o- is by influence of (unrelated) sorrow. Specifically as “repentant, remorseful, contrite” by c. 1200. The meaning “wretched, worthless, poor” is recorded by mid-13c.
Language history shows us that saying sorry has never been easy. Saying sorry it seems really is the hardest word.
Psychology
When did the truth become such a rare commodity? Why does it increasingly feel as if the truth is something that has to be shoe horned out of people? Why is it so damn hard for people to say sorry? And it is not just individuals who struggle to apologise. You only have to listen to the news to see that apologies and the truth are in short supply with organisations and institutions too and rarely given at the time they should be — the Post Office scandal, the many women who forcibly had their babies taken away from them, the royal pardon for World War Two codebreaker Alan Turing, the Windrush scandal, children deported to Australia with the promise of a better life and the victims and survivors of historical institutional abuse.
In a TEDx talk, licensed psychologist, speaker and author Michael Ballard explains there are three reasons people find it hard to apologise.
- We don’t want to face the consequences of our actions — simply put, we do not want to get in trouble.
- Perfection — we believe we have to be good and right to be worthy and loved. Admitting fault diminishes our worth and value as a person.
- Pride — it whispers to us we are right and the other person is wrong. Who me? Me apologise?
Do you notice anything else? The reasons are all about how the person who needs to make the apology feels, rather than about the person who needs to receive the apology but while it may be uncomfortable to say you are sorry, whether your mistake was intended or unintended, it is still a mistake that has caused hurt, stress, inconvenience or disruption and as such it is important to apologise.
So how should you apologise
Own your error
If you have done something wrong it is best to own up fast, apologise and advise how you are going to fix things. Saying sorry takes bravery but the truth matters and it is better to come clean than to try and cover it up or blame others. Refusing to acknowledge a mistake does not make you any less at fault and continuing to argue you are right when contradictory evidence is put in front of you, trying to wriggle out of a mistake with phrases such as ‘sorry for any misunderstanding or confusion’ and only apologising because you have been told you have to is not cool either.
In the long run, if you apologise, people will forget your mistake and respect your honesty because you took responsibility at the outset but if you make excuses or try to cover things up you will just prolong the agony and get yourself in a pickle, not knowing what lie or partial truth you have told to who. And if someone hears about your mistake from another source, your reputation will suffer, possibly irreparably. So the sooner you admit your mistake, the sooner you can move on and things can get back to normal.
Make it good
Mistakes vary in size and effect, with some, say a typo being easy to fix but others, for example a mistake which has a financial impact or causes reputational damage, requiring time and effort to rectify. This is not the time to be an ostrich, burying your head in the sand and hoping if you keep it there long enough your mistake will go unnoticed. If you have made a mistake you need to step up and immediately ask yourself what you need to do to make things good. Words matter but without actions accompanying them to show you really mean what you say, your words are meaningless — you are what you do, not what you say you will do, so walk the walk, don’t just talk the talk.
Reflect and learn
Owning up to your mistakes and fixing them is the right thing to do but you also need to reflect on what went wrong:
- how and why did the mistake happen
- is there anything you need to change to stop the same mistake happening again
- is there something you need to start or stop doing
- is there a training requirement or a procedure that needs to be put in place, say a process that needs to be automated to eliminate human error
- if the mistake is one that has occurred over days, weeks, months or years, then you need to re-visit past work and put that right too.
To err is human
Mistakes are a part of life so:
- admit your mistake
- fix the error
- reframe the mistake as a learning opportunity
- implement changes to keep you from repeating your error
- say the words ‘I am sorry’, mean what you say and move on.
No one is perfect but no one is too big or too important to say sorry either, so when mistakes do happen you need to be your best self and show yourself to be trustworthy and professional, even if it hurts a bit.
And remember mistakes are not always a bad thing. Learning from our mistakes can help us find better ways of working — you may even find you come out of a bad situation with someone having an improved opinion of you, simply because you said three little words.
Further information and sources
- Online Etymology Dictionary: Sorry
- Ideas.ted.com: We all know people who just can’t apologize — well, here’s why
- Psychology Today: Why is it so hard for some people to apologise
- Today: Why is it so hard to say ‘I’m sorry’?
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