Can bad news be delivered well?

No one wants to be told they’ve lost their job, or that their entire department is disappearing, but the way that message is delivered can have consequences - both in the short term and sometimes years into the future.

We hear the best techniques for delivering negative tidings; and some clangers. Elizabeth Hotson gets tips and advice from Heather McGregor, entrepreneur author and Dean of Heriot Watt Business School, hears about a very awkward conversation from former Chairman of the airline Jet Blue, now Stanford professor, Joel Peterson, and from Neal Hartman, a professor at the Sloan School of Management at MIT, specialising in communications and leadership.

Presenter: Elizabeth Hotson Producer: Sarah Treanor

(Picture: Woman on a laptop with a headache. Credit: Getty Creative)