The Labrador is looking at me like I’ve lost my mind because I’m standing in the middle of the training facility holding a yellow tennis ball and I cannot, for the life of me, remember why I picked it up. It is that specific, jarring blankness that happens when your brain disconnects from your physical intent. It occurs 27 times a week for some of us, but in the world of professional management, this cognitive dissonance is a permanent state of being. We walk into conference rooms with a specific goal-to improve a direct report’s performance-and we walk out 47 minutes later having accomplished nothing but the consumption of oxygen and the distribution of profound confusion.

I’ve spent 17 years training therapy animals, and if there is one thing a 107-pound Rottweiler will teach you, it is that ambiguity is a precursor to disaster. Animals do not understand subtext. They do not understand the nuance of a ‘soft launch’ for a correction. If the dog is jumping on a patient, you do not tell the dog it has beautiful fur, then suggest it stop jumping, and then conclude by mentioning how much you enjoy its presence in the room. You address the jump. You address it with a clarity that leaves no room for interpretation. Yet, in the carpeted cubicle farms of the modern workforce, we have decided that humans are more fragile than dogs. We have embraced the ‘feedback sandwich’-that soggy layering of praise, criticism, and more praise-as if it were a breakthrough in human psychology rather than what it actually is: a white flag of surrender from a manager too terrified to lead.

This communication style is a symptom of a culture that fears psychological discomfort above all else. We treat our colleagues like infants who will shatter if they are told their work isn’t meeting the standard. In doing so, we strip them of the opportunity to actually grow. Growth requires friction. It requires the discomfort of realizing a gap exists between current performance and expected results.

Stripping Away The Acoustic Clutter

This reminds me of the logic behind Slat Solution, where the focus is on clean lines and the elimination of unnecessary noise. In architectural design, you don’t hide a structural flaw behind a pile of decorative pillows. You address the structure. You ensure the lines are straight because if the foundation is crooked, no amount of aesthetic fluff will keep the building standing. Corporate communication should function the same way. We need to strip away the acoustic clutter that prevents the message from being heard. We need to stop pretending that being indirect is the same thing as being polite.

Manifestations of Cowardice

• The ‘Ghost Correction’: The manager mentions a problem vaguely, assuming the employee thinks it refers to someone else.

• The ‘Delayed Drop’: Waiting 37 days after an incident until context is completely lost.

• The ‘Passive-Aggressive Post-it’: Critical feedback delivered via sticky note or Slack at 4:57 PM on a Friday.

These methods create a permanent state of anxiety. When feedback is never direct, employees start searching for hidden meanings in every sentence. You can only experience true psychological safety when you know exactly where you stand. If you always sugarcoat the bad news, the good news becomes meaningless. It’s just more sugar.

The Courage to Be Boringly Direct

I’ve noticed that the most effective leaders I’ve encountered-those who manage to retain 97 percent of their staff over a decade-are the ones who have the courage to be boringly direct. They don’t use metaphors. They don’t use sandwiches. They say, ‘The report you turned in today was missing the 7 core metrics we discussed. I need you to redo it by tomorrow morning. Do you have what you need to get that done?’ There is no emotional weight attached to it. It’s not an indictment of the person’s soul; it’s a correction of a specific output. This level of precision allows the employee to fix the error without having to navigate a labyrinth of social cues.

It strikes me that we have forgotten how to handle the weight of another person’s gaze. We look at our phones, our laptops, or the 777-page manual on HR compliance rather than looking someone in the eye and saying, ‘This isn’t good enough.’ We are terrified of the silence that follows a hard truth. But that silence is where the work happens. By filling that silence with ‘But we really value your energy!’ we are stealing that moment of reflection from them.

Acoustic Honesty and the 17-Second Rule

We need to adopt a philosophy of ‘Acoustic Honesty.’ Just as a well-designed space removes the echoes that distort sound, our communication should remove the emotional echoes that distort the truth. We should strive for a directness that is so consistent it becomes invisible. If directness is the baseline, it ceases to be scary. It just becomes the way things are. We should aim for the 17-second rule: if you can’t state the core of the problem and the required solution in 17 seconds, you haven’t thought about it enough yet. You are likely still trying to figure out how to hide the pill in the cheese.

You cannot build a high-performing team on a foundation of fluff. You cannot foster trust through avoidance. The next time you have to deliver a hard truth, skip the bread. Skip the ‘energy’ and the ‘potential’ and the ‘we really value you.’ Just deliver the meat. It will be uncomfortable for 97 seconds. You might see a flash of defensiveness or a moment of sadness. But on the other side of that discomfort is a clear path forward. And that, in the end, is the only thing that actually builds a career worth having. We owe it to our people to stop being so afraid of them. We owe it to ourselves to stop being so afraid of the truth. If the lines aren’t straight, call them crooked. Then, and only then, can you start the work of fixing them.