A Hatsch situation
What to Say When You Don’t Know the Answer at Work
You’re in a meeting. Your manager turns to you and asks a question you absolutely do not know the answer to. Everyone looks at you. Your brain offers two options: bluff confidently, or make a noise like a dial-up modem.
There is a third option. It’s much better, and it takes about five seconds to say.
Being put on the spot is a normal part of having a job. What separates people who look capable from people who look shaky usually isn’t knowledge — it’s how they handle the gap.
What usually goes wrong
Panic makes people pick one of two bad moves. Bluffing: you guess, sound confident, and now someone is making a decision based on your invention. Or over-apologising: “Oh god, sorry, I’m so sorry, I should know this, sorry.” Now a normal gap in knowledge looks like a crisis.
Both come from the same belief: that not knowing something once means you’re bad at your job. It doesn’t. It means you’re a person, in a job, being asked a question you haven’t needed the answer to until right now.
What Pa would say
“Nobody knows everything. The people who look competent aren’t the ones who always know — they’re the ones who handle not-knowing well.”
Try: “I don’t want to guess on that one. Let me check and I’ll get back to you by this afternoon.” Calm, honest, and with a time attached. That’s it — that’s the whole move.
Why this works
“I’ll find out and come back to you” is not a confession of failure. It’s what senior people say all the time. It shows you care about being accurate more than you care about looking smart — which is exactly what makes people trust you.
The deadline matters. “I’ll check” is a shrug. “I’ll check and get back to you by 3 PM” is a commitment, and commitments are what reliability is made of.
One thing to avoid
Don’t pad the moment with a backstory. “Well, see, I was going to look into that, but then the file from last week…” — nobody needs it. The longer you talk, the more it sounds like you’re hiding something.
Short, honest, timed. Then move the meeting on: “While I’ve got you — the other thing I can confirm is…” Show what you do know, without performing it.
Your move
Memorise one line so it’s there when you need it: “Good question — I don’t want to guess. I’ll confirm and get back to you by [time].”
Then actually follow up, on time. Do that twice and people stop noticing that you ever didn’t know.
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