How To Apologize Properly

Most of us are terrible at apologies.
(Or should I have said that most of us would agree that other people are terrible at apologies?)

Often I’ll hear about someone’s “apology” and then hear them marvel at how it wasn’t accepted. Then when I ask a few questions, I find that they’ve usually done one of two things that negated their own “apology.”

The first is that they didn’t actually apologize for an action, they apologized for a reaction. In other words, they said something like “I’m sorry if I hurt you” or “I’m sorry if anyone was offended by this comment.” That’s not actually apologizing for something they did. That’s just uttering the words “I’m sorry” and then blaming somebody else for that. That’s not an apology. That’s what people say when they don’t want to apologize for their actions. This is a non-apology.

The second is they did apologize for their actions but then they tried to explain them away. They tried to apologize but then also tried to argue why that negative thing was their only choice. This is apologizing for doing the “right” thing.

Our human nature — our need to preserve a positive image of ourselves — makes us pretty bad at apologizing. But, if you’ve had a career for longer than a week, you’ve figured out that you’re going to make mistakes. The longer your career, the more…