Welcome back to the Look and Sound of Leadership, an ongoing series of

executive coaching tips designed to help you be perceived in the workplace the

way you want to be perceived. I'm Tom Henschel, your executive coach,

and today we're talking about

three words you should never say.

Vince is a passionate guy

who believes good relationships are the key to getting things done.

In private, Vince expressed exasperation to me about the way many people handle themselves.

He should have known his email would backfire, he complained about a

subordinate, or about the CEO. Brad should have had the decency to let me know about that

announcement. Or on a positive note, my team should be able to pull that off. It wasn't

long before I observed to him that he used the word should a lot, and I asked who's should

he was referring to. He asked me what I meant.

Well for example who says Brad should have had the decency to let you know where's that written?

Well it's just common courtesy, don't you think?

Whether I do or don't, I said, I don't see where should comes into it.

I explained that to me, the word should sounds as if there's some universal truth everyone

agreed to. We should wear sunscreen. We should eat fewer processed foods. We should

get eight hours of sleep each night. We should do these things if we want to live a long healthy life.

That's good advice.

But of course, many of us don't do these things and we live long healthy lives anyways. So other than producing guilt,

what good do these shoulds do us? I asked Vince, when you say Brad should have let you know whose should is that?

...