I've been trying to schedule a dentist appointment for the past several days. A simple enough task, right?
So I thought. Yesterday marked day #4 into trying to book an appointment. When I checked my phone at 12:30pm yesterday afternoon, I noticed that over the past hour, I had missed three calls from my dentist's office. I immediately called them back thinking that they had finally managed to schedule me an appointment. And they had! Except...they had booked an appointment for me for 12pm that day and never bothered to let me know until they started to call less than an hour before the time I was scheduled to come in.
When I spoke with the person in charge of booking the appointment, she simply said, "I don't know what happened. I think maybe I forgot to call you yesterday to tell you that I had booked an appointment for you today at 12pm." You think maybe, or that's exactly what happened?
Mistakes happen everyday in every aspect of life. I, myself, make mistakes all the time. This blog alone probably has several errors in it. Most of the time, I don't care when an error is made. It provides all of us with the opportunity to learn where we went wrong and correct it for the future. The example with the dentist's office is just a minor thing. Luckily, I'm not in an extreme amount of pain and waiting until next week isn't a major issue. But why couldn't the dental assistant just apologize for forgetting to call me and admit her wrong?
I encounter this type of behavior day in and day out in the workplace and everyday life. When I used to teach, I thought the reason I heard excuses all day long was because I interacted with teenagers most of the time. But I've been in the corporate world for several years now, and the "deflecting blame game" is just as prevalent among adults as it was amongst my students.
I still remember the moment that it really sank in that just admitting fault and apologizing was the best solution. I was shocked when it really did make things better. Though I admit that this is not always the case, it definitely is the majority of the time. Not surprisingly, it still took several years to get better at admitting I was wrong. Even now, especially if I've really messed up, I still hesitate and feel sick to my stomach before taking a deep breath and coming clean.
But then the most incredible thing happens. I actually feel better. I don't have to spend hours obsessing over whether or not they'll figure out it was really my fault or that I'm trying to cover my ass or how to prove to them that I really don't make these kinds of mistakes. The conversation that may have droned on for hours or days is over in just a few minutes because the other party doesn't need to try to get me to fess up or drill it into my head what I did wrong. Instead of making excuses, I recognize what it is that I've screwed up and explain whatever it is I need to do to fix it immediately and in the future. If I'm really not sure, I ask.
Shouldn't we all have learned this lesson by now? That just saying, "I'm sorry, that's my fault," goes much further than trying to act like we aren't the ones that screwed up? Haven't we figured out that the other people involved usually know it was really us all along?
I challenge anyone who is reading this who is still scared to admit when they're wrong to swallow your pride and confess. You'll likely be surprised at how much better the situation goes when you admit your fault. Your coworkers and loved ones will respect you more, and, at the very least, you'll feel much better!
