Difficult Conversations at Work: A Practical Guide for UK Managers

A difficult conversation at work is any exchange where you expect resistance, upset or conflict, and where avoiding it makes things worse. Handle it by preparing one clear message, opening with the specific behaviour and its effect, listening properly, and then agreeing on what changes and by when.

Most managers know how to have these conversations in theory. What stops them is the two minutes before the door opens, when the whole thing feels loaded and the safest option is another week of saying nothing.

This guide covers the preparation that makes the difference, a structure you can run in your head, wording for the four conversations managers avoid most, what to do when the other person cries or gets angry, and the point at which UK law says an informal chat has to become something else. That last part matters more from January 2027 than it did last year, and we’ll come to why.

What counts as a difficult conversation at work?

Anything you’ve been putting off. That’s the working test.

More precisely, these fall into four groups, and they need different handling:

Performance. Someone isn’t meeting the standard. Deadlines slipping, quality dropping, errors repeating.

Behaviour and conduct. How someone treats colleagues. Sharpness in meetings, a comment that landed badly, and someone talking over consistently.

Personal and sensitive. Hygiene, health, bereavement, a colleague who’s clearly struggling. The ones where getting the words wrong feels worst.

Structural bad news. Restructure, redundancy, a refused promotion, a pay decision you can’t change.

The reason to sort them first is that only the first two are really about behaviour change. The third is about care. The fourth is about honesty and dignity, since nothing you say will make the news welcome. Managers get into trouble by running all four the same way.

There’s also a cost to skipping them. Replacing an employee typically runs to tens of thousands of pounds once you count advertising, agency fees, management time and the productivity dip while someone new learns the role, and people leave because of relationships far more often than because of pay. Silence isn’t neutral. It’s a decision to let the problem compound while everyone else on the team watches you not deal with it.

Why handling difficult conversations badly is about to cost UK employers more

This is the part most guidance on this topic skips, and it changes soon.

Under the Employment Rights Act 2025, from 1 January 2027 the qualifying period for ordinary unfair dismissal drops from two years to six months. Employees who already have six months’ service on that date are protected immediately. The same commencement removes the statutory cap on compensatory awards for unfair dismissal, so tribunals will assess compensation against actual loss.

Read those two changes together, and the practical effect is this. A far larger group of your workforce can bring a claim, and the financial exposure when a dismissal is handled badly is no longer capped.

Every one of those cases is built on a paper trail that starts with a conversation. Was the person told clearly what wasn’t working? Was it recorded? Were they given a real chance to improve with support? A manager who has been avoiding the conversation for eight months has no trail at all, which is a much worse position than having had an uncomfortable chat in month one and written it down.

The Acas Code of Practice on disciplinary and grievance procedures sits alongside this. Where an employer unreasonably fails to follow it, a tribunal can increase an award by up to 25%. Acas has confirmed an updated Code is expected in 2027 to reflect the Act’s changes.

None of that means you should run informal conversations like disciplinary hearings. It means the informal conversation is worth doing properly and worth a two-line note afterwards.

How to prepare for a difficult conversation

Preparation is where these are won. Ten minutes beforehand is worth an hour of improvising in the room.

Decide on your one message. If the person remembered a single sentence, what should it be? Write it down. If you can’t get it to one sentence, you’re not ready, and you’ll deliver three half-messages instead.

Separate what you saw from what you concluded. “You’ve missed the last four Friday deadlines” is an observation. “You don’t care about this job” is a story you’ve built on top of it. Take the story out. If your story turns out to be right, they’ll tell you.

Check what you don’t know. Assume there’s a reason you haven’t heard. Caring responsibilities, health, a problem with a colleague, a system that keeps failing. If you go in certain, you’ll interrogate instead of asking.

Ask what you’re contributing. Were the expectations clear? Did you give them the training? Have you said anything about this before, or is this the first they’ll hear of a problem you’ve been sitting on for months?

Pick your moment properly. Private room, enough time, not late Friday, not straight before they present to a client. Give a short heads-up so they’re not blindsided, without giving so much detail that they spend two days rehearsing a defence. “I’d like twenty minutes tomorrow morning to talk about how the Henderson project is going” is enough.

Know your outcome and your limit. What does ‘good’ look like, and what are you prepared to move on? If nothing is negotiable, say so honestly instead of pretending to consult.

A structure for having a difficult conversation

Five stages. You can hold this in your head.

Open plainly. Name the topic in the first fifteen seconds. Long warm-ups make people anxious and make you sound evasive. “I want to talk about the missed deadlines on the Henderson project. I’ve noticed a pattern, and I want to understand what’s going on.”
State the specific and its effect. Behaviour, then impact. Facts, dates, examples. Skip the character assessment. “Four of the last five Friday deliverables came in on Monday. It’s meant Priya has been reworking her section over the weekend.”
Stop and listen. This is the stage manager’s rush. Ask an open question and then leave silence. Count to five if you have to. Most of what you need arrives in the pause after you think they’ve finished. Don’t defend, don’t fix, don’t fill it.
Acknowledge before you respond. Say back what you heard, accurately enough that they’d agree with your version. Acknowledging isn’t agreeing. “So the brief’s been arriving Wednesday afternoon, and you’ve been getting two days for something scoped for four” is a statement of their position, not a concession.
Agree what changes and write it down. Specifics, owners, dates, and what support you’re providing. Then a short email that day: what we discussed, what we agreed, and when we’ll review. That email is the single highest-value thing you’ll do, both for the relationship and for the file.

Wording for four conversations managers avoid

Scripts aren’t lines to recite. They’re a starting sentence for when your mind goes blank.

Underperformance: “I want to talk about your last few reports. Three of the last four have needed significant rework before they could go out, and I don’t think I’ve been clear enough with you about the standard. Can you talk me through how you’re finding them?”

Note what that does: it names the specific, it accepts your share, and it hands them the floor.

Behaviour towards a colleague: “In Tuesday’s meeting you cut across Amara twice while she was presenting. I don’t think you intended anything by it, but it stopped her finishing, and it’s happened before. What was going on for you in that meeting?”

Impact does not equal intent, and saying so out loud lowers the defensiveness by a lot.

A personal or sensitive issue: “This is an awkward one, and I’d rather say it badly than not say it. A couple of people have mentioned a smell around your desk area, and I wanted to raise it with you directly instead of letting it go around the team. Is there something going on I should know about?”

Naming the awkwardness is the trick. It signals you’re not enjoying it, which is what the other person most needs to know.

Bad news: you can’t change “I’ve got a decision to give you, and it isn’t the one you wanted.” The role’s gone to someone else. I’ll explain the reasoning and answer anything you want to ask, but I want to be straight that this part isn’t up for discussion.”

Do not soften a final decision into something that sounds negotiable. False hope is crueller than the news.

Dealing with difficult conversations when they go wrong

Preparation doesn’t stop reactions. Here’s what to do with the four that throw people.

What happens	What to do	What to avoid
They cry	Pause. Offer a tissue and a few minutes. Ask if they want to continue or reconvene. Stay in the room unless they ask otherwise.	Rushing on, apologising for raising it, or withdrawing the point
They get angry	Lower your volume and slow down. Acknowledge the feeling out loud. If it escalates, stop the meeting and reconvene.	Matching their energy, or defending yourself point by point
They deny it flatly	Return to the specific evidence, calmly, once. If they still disagree, record the disagreement and move to what happens next.	Piling on more examples until they concede
They say “this feels like bullying”	Stop. Say you take that seriously, end the conversation, and involve HR before continuing.	Carrying on to prove it isn’t

Two more worth knowing. If someone asks to bring a colleague or union rep to an informal chat, you don’t have to agree, since the statutory right to be accompanied under section 10 of the Employment Relations Act 1999 applies to formal disciplinary and grievance hearings. Refusing flatly is usually a mistake anyway. And if someone starts recording, ask them to stop, and note that they asked. Covert recordings have been admitted as evidence at tribunals often enough that you should manage every conversation as if it might be.

Two techniques worth dropping

Both are staples of this topic, and both do more harm than good.

The feedback sandwich. Praise, criticism, praise. It’s taught everywhere, and it has two failure modes. Either the person hears only the praise and leaves with no idea there was a problem, or they learn that your compliments are a warning sign and stop trusting any positive feedback you give them. Be straightforward about the concern, and give praise separately, and mean it when you do.

“Communication is 93% non-verbal.” This comes from Albert Mehrabian’s research in the 1960s, and Mehrabian himself has been clear it’s been misapplied. His studies looked at how people read attitudes and feelings from single spoken words when the tone and expression contradicted them. It was never a general claim about communication. Body language matters in a difficult conversation, but if you spend your preparation worrying about your posture instead of your one clear message, you’ve optimised the wrong thing.

Are courageous conversations the same thing?

Broadly, yes. Courageous conversations, crucial conversations, challenging conversations and fierce conversations are all labels for the same territory, and if you’re searching for one, you’ll find the others.

There’s a slight difference of emphasis worth knowing. “Difficult conversation” centres the discomfort, which is honest but frames the thing as an ordeal to survive. “Courageous conversation” centres the choice to speak up, and tends to get used for the wider category that includes challenging a decision, raising a concern about a senior person, or naming something about race or inclusion that everyone in the room has noticed and nobody has said.

The skills are the same. The label mostly tells you which book the trainer read.

When an informal conversation has to become formal

Knowing where the line sits protects both of you.

Move to a formal process when the informal route has been tried and hasn’t worked, when the allegation is serious enough to justify disciplinary action, when a grievance is raised, or when the conversation touches a protected characteristic under the Equality Act 2010 in a way that suggests possible discrimination or harassment.

Once you’re formal, the Acas Code applies. That means investigating properly, putting the allegation in writing, giving the employee the right to be accompanied at the hearing, letting them respond before any decision, and providing a right of appeal.

One more thing to know about. Section 111A of the Employment Rights Act 1996 allows a “protected conversation” about ending employment on agreed terms, which can’t normally be referred to in an ordinary unfair dismissal claim. The protection is narrower than people assume: it doesn’t apply to discrimination or automatic unfair dismissal claims, and improper behaviour strips it away. Take advice before you use it. Managers who open with “this is off the record” and assume that covers them are frequently wrong.

This section is general information, not legal advice. Take proper advice on your specific circumstances.

Frequently asked questions

What is a difficult conversation at work?

Any workplace conversation where you expect resistance, upset or conflict and have been putting it off. The common types are underperformance, someone’s behaviour towards colleagues, personal or sensitive issues such as hygiene or health, and unwelcome news like a restructure or a refused promotion.

How do you start a difficult conversation?

Name the topic in the first fifteen seconds, then give one specific example and its effect. Something like, “I want to talk about the missed deadlines. Four of the last five came in late, and it’s meant for Priya to rework her section at weekends. ” Then stop and ask an open question.

How do you handle a difficult conversation without upsetting someone?

You often can’t, and aiming for no upset usually means the message gets softened until it’s lost. Aim for fair and clear instead. Stick to observed behaviour and its effect, avoid character judgements, listen properly before responding, and be explicit that you’re raising it because you want it resolved.

What should you avoid in a difficult conversation?

The feedback sandwich, character judgements, “you always” and “you never”, raising several issues at once, doing it in an open-plan office, and softening a final decision until it sounds negotiable. Also avoid promising confidentiality you can’t keep.

When should a difficult conversation become a formal process?

When informal attempts haven’t worked, when the allegation is serious enough for disciplinary action, when a grievance is raised, or when possible discrimination or harassment under the Equality Act 2010 is involved. At that point the ACAS Code applies, and the employee gains the right to be accompanied at hearings.

Should you record what was said?

Yes, briefly. Send a short email the same day covering what was discussed, what was agreed and when you’ll review. This matters more from January 2027, when the unfair dismissal qualifying period falls to six months and the cap on compensatory awards is removed, since a documented, fair conversation is the evidence that the process was reasonable.

What if the conversation goes badly?

Stop instead of pushing through. If someone becomes very distressed or angry, acknowledge it, offer a break, and reconvene. If they say they feel bullied or raise a grievance, end the conversation and involve HR before going further. Reconvening is not a failure, and it’s usually the better decision.

Building the confidence to have these conversations

Managers rarely avoid difficult conversations because they don’t know the theory. They avoid them because they’ve never practised, and the first real one is the one that matters.

Goldmark Training delivers leadership, communication and conflict management training to housing associations, local authorities, charities, care providers, education and private sector organisations across the UK. Sessions are built around the conversations your managers are actually avoiding, with practice instead of slides, and they’re designed by a qualified psychotherapist who spends her working life in difficult conversations.

Call 07476 988566 or book a chat.

About the author. Tahira Hussain is the founder and director of Goldmark Training. She is a qualified cognitive behavioural psychotherapist registered with the BABCP and the British Psychological Society, with nineteen years of experience across social work, mental health, housing, community development and the charity sector. She designs and delivers Goldmark’s leadership, wellbeing and inclusion programmes and is a TEDx speaker.

Sources. Employment Rights Act 2025 and government implementation timetable (July 2026); Acas guidance on the Employment Rights Act 2025; Acas Code of Practice on disciplinary and grievance procedures; Employment Rights Act 1996, section 111A; Employment Relations Act 1999, section 10; Equality Act 2010; Mehrabian, Silent Messages (1971).