By Steve Adubato, PhD

The expression “I misspoke” is in the news a lot these days. Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton said she “misspoke” when she told a story about arriving in Bosnia as First Lady in 1996 under “heavy sniper fire.” When Clinton was responding to a question recently about video footage of the event that contradicted her assertion that her group “ran with our heads down” to avoid this sniper fire, she said; “I say a lot of things -- millions of words a day -- so if I misspoke, that was just a misstatement.”

Just this week, Republican Presidential Candidate U.S. Senator John McCain once again apparently “misspoke” when he confused the Shiites and Sunnis in a much-publicized Congressional hearing on the war in Iraq. McCain asked U.S. General David Petraeus; “Certainly not an obscure sect of the Shiites overall?...Or Sunnis or anybody else then? Al Qaeda continues to try to assert themselves in Mosul, is that correct?”

Everyone in the room knew that McCain had once again made the mistake of confusing the two highly polarized sects in war torn Iraq. Ironically, he had done the same thing two weeks ago in a very public speech and had to be corrected on the spot by Senator Joseph Lieberman. It was embarrassing and awkward and for many demonstrated that McCain may not know the difference between the Shiites and the Sunnis in Iraq. This is not a small point. It’s not something you should be confused about. The McCain campaign responded that the Senator simply “stumbled on his words and corrected them immediately.” They said the same thing when he did it the last time. Okay, but was it really a stumble? Or are you misspeaking if you keep repeating the same very public mistake? To do it again raises a whole range of new issues. It’s not misspeaking if you don’t know or aren’t aware of the facts. That’s being ill-informed or unaware. These are two very different things.

So what exactly does it mean to “misspeak?” According to Webster’s dictionary, misspeak could mean to “speak, utter, or pronounce incorrectly; to stammer or garble.” Interesting.

When corporate executives exaggerate the performance of their company, or communicate an unrealistically rosy picture about the next quarter’s earnings, are they misspeaking? Or, are they just being less than honest?

It seems that when people say they “misspoke” they may be trying to dismiss or minimize public communication that gets a negative reaction. However, there is a big difference between a leader or any professional mispronouncing a word, getting a date wrong, not being clear enough and/or intentionally communicating a message that they know to be untrue or to be hurtful toward an innocent party. Further, you can’t keep making the same mistake with an explanation that you misspoke once again.

Saying you misspoke or somehow that you were misunderstood can be a legitimate explanation in certain situations. However, embellishing a story, making up events or rewriting history that you know to be false, is a very different issue. Being uninformed is also serious stuff for a leader.

If you’ve done any of these things, then say so. Say you embellished. Say you exaggerated. Say you were trying to make yourself look better or get yourself out of a situation by saying something you shouldn’t have. Say you need to become better informed and do your homework. By offering weak explanations and playing word games, we ultimately avoid taking responsibility for our communication. Doing this raises serious questions about your character and your ability to lead. It’s as true in business as it is in government.
Write to me at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. with a legitimate example of when you actually misspoke or miscommunicated and tell me how you dealt with it.