Throughout my career, I’ve fallen victim to “interrogative” questioning by senior managers when I needed to share project updates. As I was going through key insights, one of the managers had a reputation to intervene with questions like “How did you get to this number?” and trying to drag me into defensive mode explaining every Excel formula behind each calculation.
Clearly not being OK after such meetings, I decided to meet with several people who experienced similar situations in the past, and who learned to escape them gracefully while maintaining trusting relationships. They told me that as with everything else in life, this is a skill that I needed to learn. Some people are natural at it, and some are not, so I was definitely in the latter group.
The wise colleagues shared powerful frameworks on how to give bullet-proof updates to managers, especially when you don’t have much time to dive into the details.
Framework: Answer-Explain-Example
Answer — quickly state a positive or negative outcome. For example, “The results of this study are positive”.
Explain — give a bit of context behind your answer — “we’ve seen a sales growth last month”.
Example — share a key insight or data point that managers care about the most — “For example, when looked at furniture category which is a top priority this quarter, we noticed a 40% spike in sales compared to last month, which was primarily driven by a promotional campaign in San Francisco”.
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How to avoid embarrassing yourself giving updates to managers
Paul Cardell
Paul Cardell
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3 min read
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Aug 9, 2020
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Photo by Christina @ wocintechchat.com on Unsplash
Throughout my career, I’ve fallen victim to “interrogative” questioning by senior managers when I needed to share project updates. As I was going through key insights, one of the managers had a reputation to intervene with questions like “How did you get to this number?” and trying to drag me into defensive mode explaining every Excel formula behind each calculation.
Clearly not being OK after such meetings, I decided to meet with several people who experienced similar situations in the past, and who learned to escape them gracefully while maintaining trusting relationships. They told me that as with everything else in life, this is a skill that I needed to learn. Some people are natural at it, and some are not, so I was definitely in the latter group.
The wise colleagues shared powerful frameworks on how to give bullet-proof updates to managers, especially when you don’t have much time to dive into the details.
Framework: Answer-Explain-Example
Answer — quickly state a positive or negative outcome. For example, “The results of this study are positive”.
Explain — give a bit of context behind your answer — “we’ve seen a sales growth last month”.
Example — share a key insight or data point that managers care about the most — “For example, when looked at furniture category which is a top priority this quarter, we noticed a 40% spike in sales compared to last month, which was primarily driven by a promotional campaign in San Francisco”.
If you are short on time until the meeting’s end and a curious manager suddenly wants to jump into the details, you should resist a temptation to do so, and instead steer the conversation by offering a gentle follow-up after the meeting. Other managers would thank you for it. Below are a few examples of what to say in this situation.
· Acknowledge. “Ok, I hear you. Right now, we’re focusing on X, so I’d prefer to continue the conversation here”.
· Offer time to discuss later. “Sara, I will schedule time with you, and we can chat about X in our one-one-one. Alternatively, you can say “I’ll follow up with you afterward via email, and we can see if it makes sense for us to have a separate conversation”.
When unsure about the answer, do not under any circumstances, try to wing it, or even worse, provide an assumptive answer that could potentially diminish your credibility if it turns out to be wrong. Instead, state assertively “I don’t know”, but don’t just end the sentence right there. Offer an option of following-up and finding out a concrete answer by a specific deadline.
Here is a more effective example of stating “I don’t know” that focuses on the next steps you would take to find out an answer — “I don’t know, and I will go and find that information and follow up with you afterward”.
Finally, it’s hard to sound confident and polished when challenged by a manager. Hence, preparation is the key. I recommend using index cards to memorize and practice specific sentences/phrases according to a specific situation. You can start with writing down your update’s main finding/point on each card plus 2 bullets with details/examples. And add a few cards that address the manager’s desire to drag you into the weeds.
I hope you found these frameworks and examples useful, and if there are any other effective ways of communicating with senior stakeholders, please share in the comments below.
