How to have a difficult conversation

Materials chemist Jeffrey Moore, director of the Beckman Institute at the University of Illinois in the US, occasionally has to inform researchers that they have to move their labs out of the institute to departments elsewhere on campus to make space for new faculty members. ‘You can imagine sitting down with somebody who’s been part of the institute, maybe, for 25 years and saying, “I need you over the next six months to pack up your lab and office,”’ he says. ‘That’s a difficult conversation.’

Many people postpone discussions about workplace issues because they’re afraid of confrontation. ‘The longer you avoid them, the worse it gets later,’ warns Marvin Payne, an assistant professor and chair at the department of chemistry and biochemistry at La Sierra University in Riverside, California, US. ‘We need to train ourselves to take on the problems as early as possible.’ If you’re planning to have a difficult conversation with colleagues, consider the following advice.