Almost everyone has had an experience of blurting out the wrong statement at the wrong moment, and management consultant Barbara Bruno offers some tips on how you can recover the situation.

Addressed primarily to recruiters, but which could apply to a number of management situations, Bruno advises, “If you did something that you know you should not have done, hit the issue head on. The time you spend worrying about what you did actually prevents you from peak performance. Often your anticipation of the consequences of your actions is much worse than the actual reality.”

If an inappropriate comment or statement has been made, she suggests the following to recover: “That just didn’t come out correctly. Let me reword what I just said.” Or, “After that statement I think I need to begin this conversation over again.”