At my first "real job" out of college, my boss once told (spluttered half-coherently, really--this guy was no champion of articulation) me it bothered him that I didn't "take responsibility" for my mistakes. And he was right, kind of right, in his faulty way. Because when I did something wrong, I would say, "such and such went wrong, and here are reasons that it happened," including other people along with me in culpability, if other people were involved in the error. The once or twice that I biffed completely on my own, I said something like, "such and such went wrong, I'm going to fix it."
What I never did was say, "I'm so sorry, this is my fault." And that's what he wanted to hear. Which I felt was a problem; I accepted that his opinion on this was correct, for a long time after. I felt like it was a failing in me. But here's the thing: I knew exactly where it came from, my not saying sorry. I still remember messing up when I was a kid, and saying, "oh, I'm sorry!" and my dad saying, "don't be sorry; just don't do it again."
So. . .possibly you think that's some sort of crazy rigid upbringing. But it happened, and I followed the teaching. I internalized it; it made sense. What good, really, does prostrating oneself upon a dozen mea culpas do? It doesn't change the past and it won't change the future. Only actions will change the future, and I suppose while it became understood to me that I don't like making mistakes and I don't repeat them, it wasn't--isn't--apparent to other people who don't know me. Although I feel like if I've been hired to perform a task, it should be obvious that I . . .don't intend to make mistakes, and regret any that are made.
'Cause after entering the working world, I discovered a lot of people are real big on apologies, and these are usually the people who make a lot of the same mistakes, repeatedly. I find these people kind of silly.
And I still find it kind of silly myself, apologizing outside of a "whoops, stepped on your foot/drove over your mailbox" kind of situation. I'm never sure exactly how much to say, how to word it--I feel like time taken out for apologias is time wasted, when I could be fixing whatever problem occurred. Is a "oh dang, sorry" sufficient? Is it flippant? Should I go on and on about the error and self-flagellate? Is that foolish? I don't make many mistakes, either, and I'm sure unfamiliarity compounds the problem. But I do it, because once the most ridiculous, unprofessional manager I ever had freaked out about it. About how I didn't make him feel Like A Big Bossman, or whatever.
Now that I think about it, it's kind of a silly reason. What do you do when you biff it at work? What do you want from people who've messed up?
Just for a data point, I was going to give an example of how I feel when someone apologizes/doesn't apologize to me in the workplace, but I honestly can't think of one time where that's happened. I can't imagine that it hasn't happened, and I know people have screwed up on me AND screwed me over, so I have to think that I'm at least not hypocritical about this, because I don't care if someone says "I'm sorry" either. I just want them to learn and not do it again!
Eh, I think I was going to say more on other topics, but this is a long enough entry already.
Comments
When I make a mistake at work, I immediately inform my bosses because I work in the legal field and mistakes can dramatically impact our clients. I don't bother to apologize because it's not going to change the situation and I figure telling them that I made a mistake is my way of making amends. I could easily pretend that I didn't know about the mistake and let them be blindsided by it. I tell them, help them fix it, and then figure out what went wrong so it doesn't happen again.
Instead, I'll say "I didn't ask so-and-so, I'll do that next time," or "I hadn't read that memo yet, I need to be quicker on that" or. . .whatever. I feel like it's more useful that I've identified the cause of my screw-up than that I feel rilly, rilly bad about it.
I don't know why, but that stuck with me. I guess what I try to do is combine a "sorry" with my plan of action. Some people see a lack of a "sorry" as a lack of responsibility.
That is not mature of me, and it mostly happened when I was younger and now usually happens when I'm screwed over my a corporation (hate you, Best Buy) and I get all, "I DEMAND AN APOLOGY!" in my head. Even though I'm never going to get an apology from a corporation, even if they are super-evil.
I know my ex-boss made his job too personal, which may have affected his attitude, but I wouldn't have thought that of your old manager. But I do wonder if it's a personal thing, at the end of the day. If you are your job, and someone else messes up your job, they mess up YOU, and you want them to feel bad, like you do.
I mean, I dunno. I do know, though, that I always feel like a bit of a charlatan when I give my apology then launch into my plan of action. Like the sorry isn't heartfelt. Because I guess it kind of isn't. What IS heartfelt is, "my plans to fix this, let me show you them."
Apologies also tend to be more succinct than reasons. I know when I'm stressed out I'd much rather hear "I'm sorry, I'll reprint now" than explain that my computer crashed, that the student workers were loud and distracting, I printed the wrong file, or that my mananger's revision was illegible.
(Should I stop leaving voicemails?)
Like. . .a reporter doesn't get to the interview spot on time, because they were relying on directions from me, and I was relying on directions from the establishment itself and mapquest, and it turned out that both were wrong, so in order to prevent that in the future I'll give reporters my phone number and an alternate route just in case.
In this instance, my responsibility was to make sure the reporter arrived happy and promptly, my mistake was not ensuring that would happen, and from it I've learned a way to better ensure the proper outcome.
That's convoluted, and I don't think it's ever exactly happened, but that's the kind of mistake I deal with more frequently, and it sort of seems like, in that case, "I'm sorry" would almost seem like, "oh well."
And the voicemails... I keep leaving 'em! *cry*
On my cell phone? I don't have any vms on my cellphone, except from my friend Tritia (oops. . .sorry, Trish). On my home phone? We're not supposed to have working vm on that line. What did they say? I left YOU a vm, yesterday!
I personally think that too many people say "I'm sorry" without actually MEANING it, thus rendering the apology useless.
To own responsiblity for your actions is what you've been doing - the way it sounds to me.
I think he just wants people to 'abase' themselves and make him feel better by hearing those words rather than actually accepting responsibility for their actions.
In those instances, all I can be is sorry, and there's nothing I can do to help the other person, so sorry is really all I can offer them. "Sorry, I see where you're coming from, your request is reasonable, but all I can do is comisserate."
My boss didn't care what the reasons were for my screw-up; it's my job to NOT screw up. If the error was completely out of my control, then giving the reasons is appropriate. But if I could avoid it (by preparing better, by doing a better job of proofreading, by being more aggressive in following up with people, etc), then I think an apology is appropriate. I was pretty proud of myself for making this change, because it's VERY hard for me to admit I've made a mistake, and I always tried to explain them away instead.
So this is what I told my aunts, and one of them responded, "It took me till I was 40 to figure that out. Be glad you got a 15 year head start!"
Long response, I know, but this happened like three weeks ago, so it's been on my mind!
In fact, I like that approach: "I'm sorry AND I'll fix it." Not "I'm sorry" as a preface to my real message, which is "I'll fix it", but both together.
I agree 100%. This stuff comes with time. I think when we're new to a job/career/etc we tend to take things more personally. After you gain confidence, however, apologies are less of a "hit."
I guess it DOES kind of seem like weakness to me in that it feels like taking the easy way out. Which might be weird of me to think. Like I said elsewhere, "I'm sorry" (to me) is the sort of thing I say when I can't actually help out or fix anything. The last resort!
From the employee, yes. From the manager, maybe not. :)
Wah. Two oicemails lost in the ether - and yes, to your cell phone :(
First, it's the money. Every time something is broken and we have to replace it for free, it means that the next 10 items are sold at a 10% discount. I'm in business, and so if they break something that costs me money, I'm annoyed. I don't take it out of their paychecks, but it does come off any bonus. I had one employee drop of a box of platters... which could have been sold for $360. And she said "oops".
Second, and this is specific to my store, but HOW RUDE! The coffee mug you just broke was made in Italy, shipped to my distributor, ordered by me, unpacked and put on our shelf, picked out by our customer, painted with care, and then, after all that, YOU BROKE IT?
I do make the employee who broke the item call the customer. They don't dare not apologize to the customer, but they still don't seem to apologize to me.
Wow, and now I'm going to apologize for making this so long.