Clear Doesn’t Have to Mean Harsh

A lot of hard conversations get stuck between two bad options. You can say nothing and hope the problem sorts itself out, or you can say it so forcefully that the conversation becomes about how you said it instead of what needed to change.

There’s another option, and it’s the one most of us were never really taught: being clear and staying in the conversation at the same time.

Being too forceful often happens the first time you have to address something with a colleague or team member. You’re still learning about them, their style, and how they prefer to communicate, and you’re still building a working relationship. Earlier in my career, I started a new job, inherited a team, and had to address something difficult pretty early on, before we’d had time to build that professional relationship. I’ll admit I came in too hot. I let the subject drive the emotion I was delivering, when going softer and having more of a discussion, especially with someone I was just starting to work with, would have been the better route. It’s all about balance, time, and understanding the context.

Direct isn’t the problem

In my Say What You Mean workshop, we work through five common communication styles: assertive, passive, passive-aggressive, aggressive, and manipulative. Two of them get mixed up more than the rest. Assertive and aggressive communication are both direct. What separates them is what happens to the other person.

Assertive communication says what you need plainly and then actually listens to what comes back. You own your part of the message, you name the issue, and the other person still has somewhere to go. Aggressive communication can use almost the same words and land completely differently, because the goal has quietly shifted from solving the problem to winning the exchange. Jefferson Fisher, a trial attorney who now teaches communication, puts it simply: “Never win an argument—solve it instead.” When a conversation turns into a contest, people stop contributing. Their perspective doesn’t disappear. It just stops getting said out loud.

Here’s what that can sound like. “This report was a mess, and I shouldn’t have had to clean it up” is honest. So is “The report went out with errors I had to fix before the client call. I want to understand what happened and figure out what we change next time.” Only one of those leaves room for a conversation.

Having a strong opinion is fine, and so is confidence. Confidence helps you name what needs naming, set expectations, and keep a conversation from circling forever. It becomes a problem when it starts making decisions for everyone else in the room. A good gut check: are people responding to your idea, or to your delivery? Slowing down, asking what the other person sees, and checking your tone and body language won’t make you less clear. It usually makes your point easier to hear.

Avoiding the conversation isn’t the same as being kind

The opposite pattern is just as common, and it often looks nicer from the outside. Passive communication keeps the peace. You don’t want to create tension, so you let the missed deadline slide, take on the extra work yourself, or decide the issue isn’t big enough to raise.

For a while, that can work. But a concern doesn’t go away because you didn’t say it. It tends to come back as resentment, as a misunderstanding that grew because nobody corrected it, or as a good idea your team never heard because you kept it to yourself. Silence is still a choice, and other people live with the results of it.

Brené Brown says it plainly in Dare to Lead: “Clear is kind. Unclear is unkind.” One of her examples fits here almost exactly: not getting clear with a colleague about your expectations because it feels too hard, and then holding them accountable for missing those expectations anyway. That isn’t kindness, because the discomfort doesn’t disappear. Someone else ends up carrying it.

That doesn’t mean every concern needs to become a confrontation. It means the kind choice is often the clear one.

When and how you say it still matters

Even a message that needs to be said can land badly if the timing, setting, or delivery is off. Time, place, and manner is the one idea I most want people to leave the workshop with. Before a hard conversation, ask whether this is the right moment, whether it should happen privately, and whether you’re about to respond quickly because you’re frustrated. (I go deeper on this in Read the Room: Good Communication Starts Before You Speak.)

Clarity and care belong together

The full name of the workshop is Say What You Mean: Communicating with Clarity, Confidence & Care, and those three words are meant to work as a set. Clarity means the other person understands the message. Confidence means you’re willing to say it. Care means you’re still paying attention to the person, the context, and the relationship while you do.

You don’t have to make a message vague in order to make it kind. And you don’t have to make it harsh in order to make it clear.

Before your next difficult conversation, ask yourself two questions:

Am I being so indirect that the message could get lost?

Am I being so forceful that the conversation could get lost?

Then look for the space in between. That’s usually where the most useful communication happens.