This is the Business English Podcast, episode 498.
My coworkers said my mistake.
Were they being sarcastic?
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This is real business English, with your favorite American hosts, Lindsay and Aubrey, coming to you from Arizona and Colorado, USA.
Hey, Aubrey, how are you today?
I'm great, Lindsay.
You're going on vacation this month, right?
Nope.
No vacation plans this month.
Oh, my mistake.
I could have sworn that you had mentioned a trip.
Yeah.
Nice.
That's not true.
I didn't think you're going on a trip.
I just wanted to use...
My mistake, which we got a great question about.
Yep, yep.
I'm excited to get into this today because it was a natural conversation, right?
And this came up from a question on YouTube.
Shall I go ahead and read the question, Aubrey?
Yeah, let's do it.
All right, this is from Rama from Saudi Arabia.
Here we go.
Hi, I love your podcast and really appreciate all of your hard work.
Well, thank you, Rama.
We appreciate you.
Oh, there you go.
We appreciate you.
We just talked about that in 496.
So go back to 496 if you want to know why I just laughed.
I have questions about two different things.
The first one is about the phrase, my mistake.
I feel like I've heard it used both sarcastically and literally, and I'd love to hear your thoughts on that.
The second one is fair enough.
It's really interesting to me because every time I hear it, I don't expect it and I wonder why people use it in that way.
Thanks again, Rama from Saudi Arabia.
Nice.
These are great questions.
Today, we're going to talk about my mistake and other ways that we say that.
And then in an upcoming episode, we'll tackle fair enough.
So make sure and hit follow so you don't miss that one.
Yeah, fair enough.
Totally deserves its own episode.
So looking forward to that one in the future.
Make sure you don't miss a single episode of Business English.
Okay, so let's get into my mistake.
Aubrey, what do we need to know?
Yeah.
So first let's talk about when you really mean it, right?
The literal meaning, um, When you do something wrong and you're just saying, oh, my mistake.
And it just means I made a mistake.
I'm sorry.
So, for example, I submitted the wrong report this morning.
My mistake.
Here's the correct one.
Or I see what happened.
I entered the wrong figure in the spreadsheet.
My mistake.
I'll fix it before submitting.
Yes.
And there are a couple of other ways that we say this that we want to share.
I say most often, my bad.
Instead of my mistake, I'd say my bad.
Like if I arrive late to a meeting, oh, my bad.
I thought the meeting was at two, not one.
Yeah, this kind of became trendy, I don't know, like 20 years ago or something, I guess.
And stuck around.
Stuck around.
Yeah, it's good.
I will say it's a little casual.
So if you're going to like a boardroom meeting with investors or something you know, maybe you know choose something a little more formal.
What do you think?
Even my mistake is a little more formal, right?
And even then, I think in a more formal situation like that, you'd probably use a longer phrase, right?
Yeah.
You know, you're like, oh, very sorry for the misunderstanding.
I thought the meeting was at two.
So yeah, both of these are quite informal.
Right.
And here's another example.
My bad for not looping you in earlier.
I'll make sure you're on all future emails.
Yes.
And then we also say that's on me.
So for example, oh, we missed the submission window.
That's on me.
I misread the deadline.
Essentially, you're just saying I take responsibility, which is a big deal.
Some people don't take responsibility.
And so it's, Yeah, it commands respect when you do, I think.
They pass the buck.
Do you use that idiom, Lindsay?
It means to push responsibility onto someone else.
Yes, I appreciate when someone owns a mistake.
Owns it.
It feels mature.
It feels professional, authentic.
It's a good thing to do.
If the team felt rushed, that's on me.
I'll plan the next sprint more realistically.
Project management.
Yes, absolutely.
We use these in sports a lot if we make a mistake.
Oh, my mistake.
My bad.
That's on me.
But we use them at work too for small mistakes.
All three of these. are a bit more informal, like you were saying, Lindsay.
So there are phrases that would be more formal you might use, but it is interesting.
We're now going to talk about using these sarcastically, because these are also used to mean the opposite, right?
You might say, My mistake.
And what you mean is I actually don't think I did anything wrong at all.
Right.
Hey, it's a little confrontative too, right?
Because you're changing your tone of voice.
Let's just break into a role play and see exactly what this looks like.
So perfect.
I'll start us.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Hey, are you coming to happy hour?
No, I've told a thousand people I can't make it.
Okay, my mistake.
I didn't know everyone has been asking you.
So this is perfect.
My tone changes.
You kind of say it in a sing songy way when you want to be sarcastic.
My mistake.
And really what I mean is I don't think I did anything wrong.
So you shouldn't be snapping at me.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Exactly.
Exactly.
Anything else we need to know here, Aubrey?
So we use my bad in the same way.
We also use it sarcastically.
Do be careful, especially at work.
This can come across as rude because you are rude.
Almost every time you're using sarcasm, there's implied criticism of what was said, right?
I'm saying like okay, you know, I feel like you're being a little unreasonable in what you're saying.
So I'm going to passively, passive aggressively use sarcasm.
Yes.
Be careful there, be careful.
So let's show some examples.
All right.
All right, I'll start us out.
So the client didn't receive the updated proposal because someone forgot to attach it to the email.
Oh, my mistake.
I thought we were waiting on your approval before sending it out.
Oh, I guess the delay is on my side this time.
Oh gosh, this sounds like a toxic workplace.
I don't want to work at this place.
I intentionally, I'm like I'm going to make a role play where we can say, like this is what you should not do.
Like this would come across as very rude.
Now it's interesting because the first person, the way they said stop.
Someone forgot to attach it.
That's also passive aggressive.
Instead of saying like you know, I believe you forgot to attach the email, instead using this someone.
No, oh my gosh, don't do it.
It's definitely a what not to do email.
Don't create a toxic environment if you don't have one now, and leave if you have a toxic environment, please.
Exactly.
But this is where you'll most often hear this used sarcastically is if someone feels they're being accused or sub right, like you were saying.
There's that toxicity.
Something has happened, where someone feels like something is unjustified or isn't fair, then they're more likely to use this sarcastically.
Okay, my mistake.
When really what they mean is like, I don't really feel like I did anything wrong.
Right, right.
100%.
Love it.
Oh, yeah.
So we have another role play still.
This is another sarcastic one.
Is this a what not to do or is this a what to do in this case?
OK, we're going to find out after we read it.
Let's find out.
So here's what's happening in this role play.
So Lindsay has just practiced a presentation for me, her coworker and I'm going to give her a little bit of feedback, right?
And we are I would say we're a friend.
We're co-workers with a close working like friendship here.
Right.
Yes.
I'll start us out.
Ready?
Yes.
Nice job.
I would suggest adding an analogy in your intro.
That's not helpful.
I have to present in five minutes.
Oh, my mistake.
I didn't realize you're presenting right now.
Oh, my bad.
I should have mentioned that.
Oh, geez.
We're on edge here, I would say, but you are on edge.
It's funny if, if you don't realize someone's like about to present, then you maybe would give feedback that's telling them like okay, go rework it, add an analogy.
That's the worst thing to hear when you're about to present.
You're like, Oh, no, that's not no one wants to hear that.
I feel like this kind of tone, this sarcasm, this toxicity might be more likely to hear.
You might hear it just like between a married couple or something at home.
Right.
For sure.
It might hurt at work, but like you said, that's kind of a toxic work environment.
What's interesting that I was trying to do in this last role play.
There will be times where someone says my mistake or my bad and you're not positive.
Right.
For this one, it would unless I'm like really obvious with my intonation, it could be sincere.
Oh, my mistake.
I didn't realize you're about to present.
Right.
And you could be like, my bad.
I should have mentioned that.
Or depending on the intonation, you might. wonder if they're being sarcastic.
So with these phrases, sometimes it's hard to know.
Yeah.
I mean, technically we could do this again with that tone you just made.
It would much more down to earth and there's no harm done at all.
Should we actually do it That way I'll be real quick for our listeners.
I'll do it again where it's very clearly sincere.
It's all in your tone.
Yeah, it's all in the tone.
Sincere apology.
Okay, sincere.
I'll start us again.
Nice job.
I would suggest adding an analogy in your intro.
That's not helpful.
I have to present in five minutes.
Oh, my mistake.
I didn't realize you're presenting right now.
Oh, my bad.
I should have mentioned that.
So you can see how drastically different.
Yeah.
We're collaborating.
Yeah, I said something very direct.
That's not helpful, but maybe my tone of voice didn't like.
Make it the person's fault, right?
Right.
Yeah.
So it's interesting.
Usually if someone is sarcastic, they're really going to add intonation kind of a more yes, my mistake.
Right.
Or something really obvious.
Yeah.
But I think a pro tip here is don't assume someone's being sarcastic, even if you kind of hear it a little bit.
Just assume they're sincere, especially at work where, in order to use these sarcastically, it would be usually rude.
Yeah, makes me think of the work environment in the movie Devil Wears Prada.
How toxic was that?
Oh my gosh.
Absolutely.
Or like The Office, a lot of TV shows.
It's a pretty toxic environment in order to create humor.
It really is.
That's a great show, by the way.
That's on TV all the time.
I feel like it's always on.
But I would have wanted to work there.
No, no, thank you.
No, thank you.
This is great.
Aubrey, where should we leave our listeners?
Yeah, intonation is key for something like this, right?
Usually if someone's being sarcastic, that intonation will really be exaggerated.
We definitely recommend being careful with these expressions at work, since they are used sarcastically sometimes.
Really pay attention to the intonation so that you sound sincere, if you mean to say you know just, I'm sorry, my mistake.
Yes.
Intonation is everything.
In other words, I love it.
Good way to end it.
Guys, hit the follow button if you love this show and our philosophy, which is that connection matters more than anything.
And business is about building relationships.
That is what we're going to show you how to do here on this show.
Yeah, definitely.
Maybe avoid sarcasm in order to avoid that toxic environment.
Sarcasm doesn't work as well at work as it does in everyday conversations, right?
No, it's really.
We reserve it for people we're close with maybe a spouse or a close friend when the stakes are kind of low or you are genuinely upset with the person, there is a problem going on and you might be sarcastic, right.
Yes.
Right.
Exactly.
Interesting.
All right.
Good stuff.
Aubrey, we'll talk to you very soon.
Have a good day.
Awesome.
See you next time.
All right.
Bye.
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