{"id":454,"date":"2017-04-12T10:14:12","date_gmt":"2017-04-12T14:14:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/?p=454"},"modified":"2021-04-19T16:01:06","modified_gmt":"2021-04-19T20:01:06","slug":"public-apologies-are-tough-to-get-right","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/2017\/04\/public-apologies-are-tough-to-get-right\/","title":{"rendered":"Public Apologies Are Tough to Get Right"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two apologies are evolving in this week\u2019s news cycle: from White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer<\/a>, regarding his comparison of Syria\u2019s use of chemical weapons to Hitler\u2019s, and from\u00a0United Airlines CEO\u00a0Oscar Munoz<\/a> regarding the passenger who was forcibly removed from a plane this week. Each man has offered successive apologies, after his original apology was rejected. It goes to show how difficult it is to make a good apology, especially a public one. <\/span><\/p>\n

In each case, I think the problem with the original apology was that the speaker was still trying to save face just a little: Spicer was still trying to emphasize the unique horror of a leader dropping bombs of lethal gas on his own people, and the United CEO wanted to imply that the passenger was at least partly at fault for what happened. Each had a point; but an effective apology needs to take full responsibility. The further explanation can come later. <\/span><\/p>\n

Each man\u2019s apology would\u2019ve been better had it started with a gasp. If Spicer had reacted with shock when the reporter pointed out what he had just communicated, and said something like, \u201cOh my, I really blew it, that\u2019s not at all what I meant to say,\u201d he might have been forgiven. Might. If the United CEO had started off with a huge statement of regret about the whole incident — \u201cWhat happened was horrible and I will make sure it never happens again\u201d –, he might have had a chance to minimize the damage. Might. The statement Munoz issued today comes closer to a good apology, but it’s his third try.<\/span><\/p>\n

It\u2019s tough to make a good apology.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Two apologies are evolving in this week\u2019s news cycle: from White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer, regarding his comparison of Syria\u2019s use of chemical weapons to Hitler\u2019s, and from\u00a0United Airlines CEO\u00a0Oscar Munoz regarding the passenger who was forcibly removed from a plane this week. Each man has offered successive apologies, after his original apology was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-454","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-apologies"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/454","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=454"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/454\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":455,"href":"https:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/454\/revisions\/455"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=454"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=454"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=454"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}