Speakers sometimes have to deliver bad news. It’s not a pleasant prospect for most of us; we prefer to keep our audiences happy so that they will love us. After all, risking dignity and exposure to stand up in front of an audience and speak costs us something in nerves, so we want good vibes back. If we deliver bad news, we risk turning that love fest into a grump-a-thon.

But there are occasions when it must be done, and the question arises, how do you do it best? Most people believe that the most effective way is to give a little good news first, then the bad news, and then more good news. A bad news sandwich, in fact.

I vividly remember a long argument with a CEO a number of years ago over how to inform the audience that layoffs were in the offing. The audience’s layoffs, in fact – at least some percentage of it. The CEO wanted to start with the good news that sales were improving, follow that with the bad news that sales weren’t improving fast enough to avoid layoffs, and then wrap up with the good news that he was confident of the future of the company.

It was early in my coaching career, so I was a little tentative at first in my argument with him. I coached him that I thought it would be better to be upfront with the bad news. It seemed like he was going to be sandbagging the audience, I argued, if he waited to hit them with the bad news.

In the end he agreed, and delivered the bad news first. It worked. The audience didn’t love him, but it worked. These days, of course, we’re much more sophisticated about layoffs, and have the counselors lined up and ready to go. Those who are to be terminated get the news separately; they’re not forced to sit through company meetings that will soon be irrelevant to them.

Since then I’ve always more forcefully maintained that it’s important to get bad news out of the way immediately, whether it’s about layoffs or anything else.

A recent study in the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin confirmed my early hunch. Most people indeed want to deliver the bad news disguised in a sandwich, but that’s for selfish reasons: it makes them feel better.

What the recipient wants is the bad news first.

So, if you’re a speaker, man up or woman up and get the bad news out of the way.

Be prepared not to be loved. And be prepared to deal with the fallout from the bad news. But don’t hide it in a comforting wrap of good news: it’s only yourself you’re comforting. In the end, you’ll break trust with your audience if you do it that way, and once that’s gone, your ability to be effective is nil.

I hope you don’t have to deliver bad news too often in your speaking career, but if you do, face it, speak it, and own it. Right up front.