“We judge others on their impact on us, but we judge ourselves on our intentions.”

– Harvard Law School lecturer, conflict expert, communication keynote speaker SHEILA HEEN

We’ve all experienced that sudden, hot flash of frustration in a meeting.

You’re presenting an idea, and a colleague cuts you off mid-sentence. Or perhaps you notice you’ve been completely left off a crucial email chain regarding a project you own.

In that exact millisecond, your brain does something highly efficient and deeply dangerous: it fills in the blanks. They left me out, therefore they are trying to undermine me. They cut me off because they don’t respect my expertise.

According to Harvard Law School lecturer and conflict expert Sheila Heen, this is the exact moment where ordinary workplace friction morphs into a toxic, ongoing feud.

According to Sheila: the vast majority of difficult conversations fall apart because we make a fundamental error: we confuse intent with impact.

The “Mind-Reading” Trap

The mechanics of this psychological trap are simple. When someone’s actions hurt or frustrate us, we experience the impact firsthand. Because that emotional impact feels so real and so sharp, we automatically assume that the other person intended to cause it.

But human intentions are entirely invisible. When we approach a colleague armed with assumptions about their motives, we inevitably attack their character rather than the problem. The result? They instantly pull back into a defensive crouch, the “blame frame” locks into place, and any chance of genuine problem-solving evaporates.

To break this cycle, Sheila argues that leaders must transition away from a culture of blame and shift toward a framework of joint contribution.

This requires pausing to ask yourself three critical questions before confronting someone:

1. The Action: What did the person actually say or do? (Stick strictly to the unembellished facts).
2. The Impact: What was the actual result or emotional impact on me or the project?
3. The Assumption: Based on that impact, what am I guessing or assuming about their motivations?

The Script That Changes Everything

Once you have separated your internal assumptions from objective reality, you can approach the conversation using a neutral script that keeps the other person open to listening.

Instead of saying, “You intentionally left me out of that meeting to bypass my input,” try framing it through the lens of impact:

“I don’t know what your intention was—and my guess is you didn’t mean anything by it—but I want to share the impact it had on me when I was left off the invitation line.”

By explicitly separating their invisible motives from the visible consequences, you allow the other person to clarify their true intent without forcing them to defend their integrity. It transforms a hostile confrontation into a collaborative learning conversation.

The Bottom Line

Your first and most important negotiation in any conflict is always with yourself. It is the difficult internal work of moving from absolute certainty that you are “right” to a state of radical curiosity about why someone else sees things differently. Stop trying to read minds, ditch the blame game, and focus on what you both can contribute to the solution.

Sheila Heen is the Thaddeus R. Beal Professor of Practice, and serves as a Deputy Director of the Harvard Negotiation Project, where she has been developing negotiation theory and practice since 1995.  Heen also teaches in the executive education programs, including the Harvard Negotiation Institute’s Advanced Negotiation course, and the PON Master Class.

To book Dr. Heen for your corporate event, contact us at [email protected]