Don’t get me wrong. You’re entitled to your feelings. But feelings are not facts. Not even when you say, “The fact is that I feel outraged.”
As a workplace investigator, I regularly discuss the differences between facts, interpretations and opinions (including feelings) in the investigative process. But this distinction is just as important in our personal relationships, business relationships and everyday decision-making.
Facts inform our interpretations. Our interpretations influence our opinions and feelings. And when new facts emerge, our interpretations and feelings can change.
For example, my ex-father-in-law used to play the exact same lottery numbers every week without fail. One happy day, his numbers were called straight across the board. ELATION!
Then he realized it was the one week he hadn’t bought a ticket. DEVASTATION.
New facts, new feelings. (True story, by the way.)
The difference between facts, interpretations and opinions is critical if you want to be persuasive. It is equally important if you are committed to resolving conflict.
Here's why.
A fact is something objective that can be established through evidence. When I look at a signed contract, I can point to the date it was signed. The fact is that this contract was signed on January 15, 2025. The fact is that the contract required work to start on January 8, 2025. It says so right here. See it?
The most effective way to challenge an assertion of fact is with other evidence. If we disagree about what happened, we need to examine the evidence, not simply argue more passionately about our respective positions.
An interpretation is what happens when we put facts together to draw conclusions. My interpretation of this contract is that it was likely signed after work was supposed to begin because the signing date is later than the required start date.
Some people love to assert interpretations as though they are facts. The problem is that interpretations can be selective. We tend to focus on the facts that support our conclusions and overlook those that don't.
The more facts you exclude, the weaker your interpretation. Conversely, an interpretation that accounts for all the available evidence, including facts that might not support your initial position, is much more persuasive.
An opinion is your assessment or reaction to those facts and interpretations. Maybe you have strong feelings about a contract being signed late. Maybe you don't.
Your opinion may also involve speculation. Sometimes we don't have all the facts and must make assumptions to bridge the gaps. That's human nature. But we must never confuse our assumptions with established facts.
This distinction is particularly important in workplace investigations.
The investigator's job is to establish what happened, assess the evidence and determine whether the established facts demonstrate a breach of some kind. A strong investigation report distinguishes between what the evidence establishes, what the investigator concludes from that evidence and what remains uncertain.
And yet, I've recently seen several investigation reports that completely convolute the differences between facts and feelings, sometimes leading to catastrophic results.
Here's an example. I've changed some of the details to protect confidentiality.
An employee alleges that the boss is abusive. The employee presents a few examples including an incident where he says the boss yelled at him, slammed a door and the employee was very upset as a result.
The investigator finds that the boss provided performance feedback but did not yell, and closed the door but did not slam it.
The investigator then goes on to state that he believes the employee was genuinely upset and finds as a fact that he was upset. The investigator then concludes that the boss engaged in wrongdoing on the basis that the employee was upset.
To be frank, I found the investigator's conclusion wholly unsupported by the factual record.
Let's be clear. I have no reason to doubt that the employee was upset. His feelings may be entirely genuine and he may have conveyed them with credibility to the investigator. But his emotional response does not establish that the boss engaged in misconduct. The investigator cannot invent a fact by saying “I find as a fact that…” The employee’s reaction is their opinion about what happened, not a fact.
The findings of fact are that the boss provided performance feedback without yelling and closed the door without slamming it. In this example, how anyone felt about it is not actually relevant to the analysis. Someone feeling upset does not, in itself, establish wrongdoing by another.
I'm sorry that the employee was upset. But an investigator cannot substitute someone's feelings for actual evidence.
This isn't about dismissing people's feelings or suggesting they don't matter. They do. It's about understanding what feelings can and cannot establish.
If you're participating in a workplace investigation, don't be put off if the investigator spends more time exploring what happened than how you felt about it. A good investigator will listen to your experience, but their job is to establish the facts, assess the evidence and determine whether the conduct actually warrants a finding of wrongdoing.
Let’s stick to the facts, folks.
