Communicating When Stuff Is Going Wrong
by Sara Heitkamp | at MinneBar 12
Your team successfully rolled out a new product feature. Great! A project was completed on time, within budget. Awesome! You've built something really cool and it works! Your boss is impressed.
But what happens when things go wrong? How and when do you inform your stakeholders? Who should you include in that communication? How should you word it? How technical in nature should it be? What do you do when a successful professional relationship begins to deteriorate? What happens when things go really, really wrong? Like an application becomes unavailable or worse, there is a full on outage?
In the midst of these stressful moments we have stress hormones running through our bodies, making communicating all the more challenging.
Drawing from my experience in Emergency Management and working in Web Operations, I will share best practices (and failures) I have learned along the way. Topics including: 1. A brief overview of the science behind what's going on in our brains during stressful moments 2. Steps to take before communicating 3. Communicating when you're in the middle of things going wrong 4. Following up with a communication after the thing that has gone wrong is resolved.
Come to share what you've learned from success and failures while communicating under stress!
Sara Heitkamp
I’m a people-first, high-energy engineering leader specializing in Site Reliability Engineering, Incident leadership, and operational resilience at scale with 10+ years of experience managing Incidents and living the #oncalllife spanning Fortune 50 and Fortune 500 companies across e-commerce retail, telecommunications, SaaS, and highly regulated healthcare, leading reliability, performance, and engineering functions at scale. I've recently wondered is everything falling apart?! as I've navigated career losses, my son's autism diagnosis and worked through health issues (including surviving septic shock).
Known for strengthening system reliability and cultivating high-performing teams, I collaborate across engineering, product, infrastructure, and business functions to execute complex cross-organizational initiatives while fostering environments grounded in clarity, accountability, and psychological safety. I bring energy, momentum, and even joy to the work so that people and platforms thrive together.
At the core of my leadership philosophy is the belief that reliability is both a technical and cultural discipline. I lead with energy and positivity, intentionally creating a team environment where people feel safe, supported, and even have fun—because I’ve seen firsthand that when people enjoy working together, they perform better, solve problems faster, and show up strong even on the hard days.
I’m a mom to a 22-year-old daughter and a 9-year-old son, and raising them has been both my greatest joy and my greatest teacher. I love creating moments of adventure, curiosity, and connection with them. Outside of work, I’m drawn to movement and growth—whether that’s volleyball, strength training, yoga, learning a new skill or getting lost in a good book. I’m always exploring ways to live with more intention, energy, and authenticity.