The Magic of “I Don’t Know”
- Why is This so Hard?
- External Pressure
- Internal Experience
- Consequences
- Creating a Culture Where This is Acceptable
- How to Say “I Don’t Know” At Work
Sometimes, just saying “I don’t know” and moving on doesn’t work at the moment. Sometimes action is required immediately, and we must make our best guess and implement it. Other times, there is no way to know the answer, so we pick an answer and move on.
Most work situations aren’t like this. Taking a bit of time to research an answer, asking someone with the required knowledge, and acknowledging that lack of information are all options available. They result in better outcomes, but we still don’t always use them.
Why is This so Hard?
Why is it so hard to admit we don’t know something? After all, no one knows everything, so this should be simple, right?
External Pressure
- School: For many people, this starts early. When a teacher calls on you in class, you are generally expected to know the answer. Tests, which often make up a large portion of grades, are rarely open book, meaning you must memorize all the required info to do well.
- Views on Leadership: While this varies across cultures, many see decisiveness as a desired leadership quality. This requires having answers without having time to step back and do research.
- Fake It ‘til You Make It: While pretending to know more than you do is a common practice in the work world, it has its limits. Applying to jobs you don’t have every qualification is usually fine. Making important decisions without knowing the best answer can end in disaster.
Media: Movies and TV often show experts as people who always have the answer right away. Looking up information makes for a boring movie, but it’s not realistic.
- Being Seen as Incompetent: Sometimes, we don’t know something that is supposed to be fundamental in our field. While it’s a good idea to learn the info, at the moment, there’s not much you can do about it.
Internal Experience
While the source often comes from external issues, this can create an internal experience that is difficult to overcome.
- Shame or guilt for not knowing the answer
- Fear of looking incompetent or of failing
- Humiliation for not learning something “simple”
- Pressured to answer regardless of whether you know the information
Concequences
What happens when we pretend to know things? Sometimes nothing, which is why it’s such a common strategy. Either the consequences of getting it wrong are minor, or we guess right. The pressure to answer is relieved, and we go on with our lives. The most significant issues occur when we get it wrong or pick a bad solution that might still kind of work. The direct result is one issue that has to be resolved, but it isn’t the only one.
When we consistently pretend to have all the answers and keep making mistakes, it will eventually erode our colleagues’ trust. How are they supposed to take your advice when there’s such a high chance of it being either useless or outright destructive? Even when you do know what to do, they won’t be able to trust that your information is accurate.
We also rob ourselves of opportunities to learn the answer when we fake knowledge or experience. We’ll discuss this later, but one of the best ways to handle these situations is to defer answering until you get more information. Then the next time the question comes up, you will know the answer, and things will move more smoothly than if you kept getting it wrong.
Creating a Culture Where This is Acceptable
Before we get to the practical “how-to” part, I want to stop for a minute and talk about some ways to create a culture within the workspace that allows “I don’t know” as an answer to questions.
- One of the best places to start is to lead by example. Someone has to try it first, and if you want to improve this aspect of the culture, you just volunteered. :)
- Encourage and reward learning. Admitting to not knowing something is much easier if you know you will get the resources to figure it out.
- Ask open-ended questions. It’s easy to answer a yes or no question when you aren’t sure. Explaining that answer is much more challenging if you have nothing to back it up. It also allows people to pool their knowledge- maybe they know part of the answer but not the whole thing. You can piece the answer together when each person contributes what they know.
Saying “I Don’t Know” in Corporate
How we talk at work often differs from how we speak in other aspects of life. A direct “I don’t know” might work okay, but it creates a new problem for the person to solve. Instead, providing a possible way to gather the info needed alongside your response establishes a path forward.
A basic outline of responding has three parts that you can tailor to your situation:
- Be upfront with your current level of knowledge. You might have no idea, but it’s common to know part of the answer but not the whole thing. Part of gaining confidence in your skills involves understanding your limitations, which shows when you answer this way.
- Provide potential next steps. If you need to do something, try to give a due date. Knowing what to expect will make the other person more comfortable not having an immediate solution.
- Follow through on anything you agreed to. If you said you would email them by tomorrow afternoon, send an email. It may just be that you need another day, but it builds trust that they will get an answer and makes them less likely to pressure you for an immediate response in the future.
Examples
Here are some examples of what those first two parts might look like:
- That depends on a few different factors. Can you give me more information on what you need?
- I can’t give you a good answer right now, but I can look into it and email you tomorrow with one.
- I think the answer is (answer), but I’ll need to research to ensure it is correct.
- I don’t know, but (coworker) knows more about that. They should be able to either answer your question or point you toward the right person to answer.
- I haven’t worked with this before. Can we bring in someone who knows more about it or allocate additional time so I can learn about it?
Wrapping Up
Admitting to not knowing things is a skill that takes practice, and it’s not easy. However, it’s incredibly freeing to feel like you don’t have to hide any information gaps from your coworkers. That short-term discomfort pays off massively in the long term as the quality of our work improves and our colleagues learn to trust our answers.