Managers face many cases in which they have to report bad news. Delivery of bad news is emotionally painful, complex and harms many parties. The presentation offers a metaphor to ease this process.

1. Ali Anani, PhD
METAPHORS FOR
DELIVERY OF BAD NEWS

2. Bad News Are Everywhere
Doctors telling patients they have
a chronic disease

3. Bad News Are Everywhere
Pain of change

4. Bad News Are Everywhere
Costly Ads that failed to be
rewarding

5. Bad News Are Everywhere
Dispensing of employees

6. Bad News Are Everywhere
Reporting falling profits or even
making losses

7. Bad News Are Everywhere
Employees expecting high
evaluations or students expecting
high grades, but proved to be
failing expectations

8. Bad News Are Everywhere
Examples are almost endless

9. Bad New Delivery as Stressors
Bad news are stressing for all parties
The deliverer
the receiver
The family
The co-workers the community
media find bad news like fertile seeds
worthy of dispersing

10. Bad New Delivery as Stressors
Bad news becomes a complex issue
to handle because of the
involvement of many parties

11. Metaphors for Bad News
Delivery of drugs for bad pains
sounds a good metaphor for Delivery
of bad news

12. Shared Perspectives
Bad pains versus bad news
Delivery of drugs versus delivery of
bad news
Phases of pain are similar for body
pain or bad news pain

13. The Metaphor Discovery
Journey Starts

14. The Three Acts of Body Pain
http://www.stepawayfromthecake.com/2013_03_31_archive.html
Pain 2
Pain 1
Pain 3
Pain Curve

15. The Three Acts of Body Pain
Pains are unequal
Ladder of Pain
Pain 2
Pain 1
Pain 3
Pain Curve

16. Pain Curve
Management Pain Ladder
The greater the pain is, the more
challenging its managing is
Pain 2
Pain 1
Pain 3

17. Pain has a story structure
regardless of its source

18. Pain is a signal from our body
that something is not right.

19. Pain is a signal from our body
that something is not right.
Organizational pain is a signal
coming from dissatisfied
customers, Increasing customers’
attrition, customers’ complaints
on the web, bad mouths,
decreased customer loyalty

20. Pain is a signal from our body
that something is not right.
Organizational pain is a signal coming from
dissatisfied employees, such as
high employee turnover rate, employee
disengagement ….

21. Pain is a signal from our body
that something is not right.
Organizational pain is a signal coming from
dissatisfied employees, such as
Work environment with toxic blame culture,
Worsening economies,
Increasing costs of living…..

22. Pain is a signal from our body
that something is not right.
Organizational pain is a signal coming from
dissatisfied employees, such as
Technology makes products obsolete
Technology increasing customers’
expectations,
Technology that makes targeting customers
easier for your competitor……

23. Pain is a signal from our body
that something is not right.
Organizational pain is a signal coming from
dissatisfied employees, such as
Immersing company in the red ocean
Failing to capitalize on ideas or
requests of customers
Forgetting that the older the company gets, the
more difficult it is to heal pain. Still,
management procrastinates on early healing
Changing business direction fast
Riding the wrong horse…..

24. Delight/Pain Ratio
Increasing delight while reducing the pain of
customers is a recipe for success

25. Selling requires buyers. The latter used to base
their decisions on benefit/cost ratio.
Now, thanks to Dr. Rod King, it is delight/pain.
Free offers serve as an example. The delight of
having something free, no matter how small,
when divided by pain (zero in free offers) gives
infinite pleasure. Giving upfront delight is a
magical formulae for success. This is one
example of what I referred to as creative
emotions that drive sales.

26. Maximize delight by
maximizing the alignment of
your offer with the values of
your customers
The pain of negating your customers’ values
is chronic and is very painful

27. Not all pains are
the same

28. Not all pains are the same
Organizational pains, like body
pains, are not all the same

29. Medical Ladder of Pain
Organizations Ladder
of Pain

30. How MDs deliver bad news to their patients
in doses starting with mild ones
And in
changing drugs from mild to stronger ones,
depending on response rate and degree of
badness
Managers to deliver bad news in a
likewise manner

31. MDs use different methods
of delivery of drugs
Drug delivery technologies modify drug release
profile, absorption, distribution and removal for the
benefit of humanizing product worth and safety, as
well as patient effortlessness and fulfillment

32. So, managers may vary
bad news delivery
techniques such as
Face to face encounters, Use of e-mail.
Use of letters…

33. Medical Bad News Delivery
Preparing the
patient for the
bad news
Alleviating the
impact of bad news
on the patient and
family
Delivering
the bad
news

34. Preparing the
employee for the
bad news Delivering
the bad
news Alleviating the
impact of bad news
on the worker, family
and co-workers
Organizational Bad News Delivery

35. Targeted Delivery of Drugs
More effective and less side effects, but
can be costly in money

36. Targeted Delivery of
Organizational News
Target news to certain employees, but
watch the cost of unhappy employees if
they feel alienated

37. Aftermath of Delivering
Bad Medical News
Watch out for emotional arousal that may
lead to “emotional Burning”

38. Aftermath of Delivering
Bad Organizational News
Watch out for emotional unrest that may
lead to “emotional Burning”

39. The husband of a lady died suddenly. Her friends were
hesitant how to report the news to her.
One friend volunteered. She went to her and told the
newly-widowed lady
“I am sorry to report that your husband married again”
The wife started screaming and cursing her husband.
Her mouth uttered many curses.
The friend told her
“let me now tell you the real news. Your husband didn’t
marry again- he died”.
The widow responded “Oh great- I feel better now”.
Delivery of a Painful Story
to a Wife

40. Managers can learn a lot from
medical doctors on how to
treat and manage pains