Escribe el guion de cualquier conversación laboral difícil antes de entrar
Why this prompt matters
A poorly delivered difficult conversation rarely just fails once — it tends to recur, and each repeat costs more. Gallup has tied disengaged, poorly-managed teams to roughly 18% lower productivity and significantly higher voluntary turnover; replacing a mid-level technical employee typically runs 50-200% of their annual salary in recruiting, onboarding, and lost-productivity costs. Beyond the direct cost, an avoided or mishandled confrontation lets the underlying behavior calcify — the blame-shifting in this scenario, left unaddressed, tends to spread to other team members within a quarter, and by the time it reaches HR it's a formal complaint rather than a coaching conversation. Managers who wing these conversations also disproportionately trigger the two worst outcomes: the employee feels blindsided (which reads as unfair and drives grievance, even litigation risk in termination scenarios) or the manager backs off mid-conversation and nothing changes at all.
What we use it for
You're a mid-level engineering manager and you have a 1:1 scheduled for tomorrow morning with a senior team member who has missed three consecutive sprint deadlines and has started publicly blaming other teams for the delays in front of the group. You've never had to confront someone senior about both a performance pattern and a trust-damaging behavior in the same conversation, and you're worried about either being too soft (letting the pattern continue) or too harsh (damaging a working relationship you still need).
Prompt
Act as an experienced workplace mediator and executive communication coach who has prepared hundreds of managers for high-stakes conversations, including layoffs, performance confrontations, and conflict resolution. Context: I need to have a difficult conversation at work. Here are the details: - Who I'm talking to: [THE PERSON YOU'RE TALKING TO — name/role] - My relationship to them: [YOUR RELATIONSHIP TO THEM — e.g., direct manager, peer, skip-level] - The situation: [THE SITUATION — describe what happened and what needs to be addressed] - What makes this sensitive: [ANYTHING THAT MAKES THIS SENSITIVE — e.g., prior history, emotional stakes, legal/HR considerations, power dynamics] - What outcome I want: [WHAT OUTCOME YOU WANT — the ideal result of this conversation] - When this is happening: [TIMING — e.g., tomorrow morning, end of this week] Task: Write a complete conversation script I can use to prepare for and guide this conversation in real time. Constraints: - Keep the tone honest and direct, never falsely soft or euphemistic — avoid corporate jargon that obscures the message. - The opening line must state the purpose within the first two sentences; do not bury the point. - Anticipate realistic pushback based on human psychology (defensiveness, denial, anger, bargaining), not generic objections. - Every prepared response must acknowledge the pushback before redirecting — no dismissiveness. - Keep the entire script deliverable in under 10 minutes of actual talk time. - Do not suggest recording the conversation or bringing in a witness unless the situation explicitly involves formal HR/legal process. Output Format: 1. **Opening Line** (1-3 sentences, exact wording to say first) 2. **Key Points** (3-5 bullet points, the core message in the order to deliver it) 3. **Anticipated Pushback & Responses** (2-4 pairs: the likely reaction, and exactly what to say back) 4. **Closing & Next Steps** (how to end the conversation and what happens after) 5. **One-Line Reminder** (a single sentence to keep in mind if the conversation goes off script)
Result
Scenario used for this example: You are a mid-level engineering manager. A senior developer on your team, Priya, has missed three consecutive sprint deadlines and has started publicly blaming other teams in stand-ups for the delays, which is damaging cross-team trust. You need to address the pattern directly, tomorrow morning, in a 1:1.
1. Opening Line
"Priya, I want to talk about the last three sprints and how we're communicating about delays with other teams — this isn't a performance review, it's a conversation I need to have now before it becomes a bigger problem."
2. Key Points
- The team has missed three consecutive sprint commitments, and the pattern is now visible to stakeholders outside the team.
- In the last two stand-ups, the delays were attributed to the platform team and the design team without first checking with them — that's created friction I've had to smooth over twice this week.
- I need to understand what's actually blocking delivery — whether it's scope, dependencies, or something else — so we can fix the root cause together.
- Going forward, any blocker involving another team gets raised to me first, so we can verify it and raise it jointly instead of attributing blame in a group setting.
- This is fixable, and I'm not looking to punish you for it — I need us to reset how we handle blockers as a team.
3. Anticipated Pushback & Responses
- Pushback: "The platform team really has been slow, I'm not wrong about that."
Response: "You might be right that they're a bottleneck — I'm not disputing the facts, I'm addressing how it was raised. Calling it out in stand-up in front of five other people isn't the way to solve it. Bring it to me and we'll escalate it properly." - Pushback: "It feels like I'm being singled out — other people miss deadlines too."
Response: "This isn't about singling you out, it's about a three-sprint pattern with your name on it and its effect on other teams. If I see the same pattern elsewhere, I'll have this same conversation there." - Pushback: (goes quiet, disengages)
Response: "I know this isn't a fun conversation to be in. Take a moment — I want to actually hear what's been getting in the way, because I'd rather solve it than keep having this talk."
4. Closing & Next Steps
"Let's agree on two things before you go: first, any inter-team blocker comes to me before it comes up in stand-up. Second, let's set a check-in this Friday to see where the current sprint stands. I'll send a two-line summary of what we agreed on right after this so we're both working from the same page."
5. One-Line Reminder
"Stay on the pattern and the impact, not on Priya's character — if the conversation drifts into 'you always' or 'you never,' pause and come back to specific sprints and specific stand-ups."
La mayoría de los consejos sobre conversaciones difíciles te dicen qué sentir — mantén la calma, sé empático, escucha activamente. Rara vez te dicen qué decir realmente cuando la otra persona se resiste, se queda en silencio o se pone a la defensiva en la sala. Este prompt cierra esa brecha: en lugar de consejos genéricos, produce un guion palabra por palabra construido alrededor de tu situación específica.
Por qué este prompt está estructurado así
El prompt comienza presentando a la IA como mediadora y coach ejecutiva en lugar de un asistente genérico. Ese encuadre importa — empuja al modelo hacia un lenguaje directo y probado en campo, en lugar del tono suavizado y cauteloso que un asistente de propósito general usa por defecto cuando un tema suena sensible.
El bloque de contexto pide cinco entradas específicas: con quién hablas, tu relación con esa persona, la situación, qué la hace sensible, y el resultado que deseas. Cada una de estas cambia el guion de forma material. Una conversación con un par necesita un encuadre diferente que una con un subordinado directo o un jefe de nivel superior, y "qué la hace sensible" permite que el modelo tenga en cuenta el historial — conflicto previo, consideraciones de clases protegidas, o volatilidad emocional — que una plantilla genérica pasaría por alto por completo.
La sección de restricciones hace el verdadero trabajo de control de calidad. Exigir que la frase de apertura declare el propósito en dos oraciones previene el modo de fallo más común en conversaciones difíciles: enterrar el punto bajo cinco minutos de charla trivial, lo que hace que el giro eventual parezca una emboscada. Exigir que cada respuesta preparada reconozca la objeción antes de redirigir evita que el guion produzca respuestas que suenen despectivas o ensayadas cuando la otra persona reacciona emocionalmente — lo cual, en una conversación difícil real, suele ocurrir.
El formato de salida en cinco partes refleja cómo se desarrollan estas conversaciones en tiempo real: una apertura que dices textualmente, puntos clave en el orden que evita que la conversación se descarrile, respuestas preparadas para las dos o tres reacciones que realmente puedes predecir, un cierre que fija los próximos pasos en lugar de desvanecerse, y un recordatorio de una línea para retomar el rumbo si las cosas se desvían — porque los guiones rara vez sobreviven intactos al contacto con una sala emocional.
Dónde este prompt demuestra su valor
Esto no se limita a despidos o terminaciones. Funciona para los casos más comunes e igualmente incómodos: decirle a un colega que su comportamiento en reuniones te está perjudicando, darle a un empleado de larga trayectoria una retroalimentación directa de que sus habilidades no han seguido el ritmo del puesto, abordar un conflicto entre dos miembros del equipo que ambos reportan a ti, o rechazar a un cliente que sigue cambiando el alcance sin ajustar el presupuesto. El patrón — decirlo temprano, esperar objeciones específicas, responder sin ser despectivo, cerrar con pasos concretos — se mantiene en todos ellos.
Ejecútalo la noche anterior, no cinco minutos antes. El valor no es solo el guion en sí; es que escribir las objeciones anticipadas te obliga a pensar en el momento más difícil de la conversación antes de estar parado en él.