What is a readback and why does it help at work?
A readback is a closed-loop check: you repeat the request in your own words, and the person who gave it confirms or corrects you. It helps for three reasons.
A readback is a closed-loop check: you repeat the request in your own words, and the person who gave it confirms or corrects you. It helps for three reasons. It catches the one detail that was wrong before you act on it, it shows that you were listening rather than guessing, and it gives the other person permission to correct you without criticising you. The form is deliberately plain, which is why it works in a noisy meeting and in a written message.
Two refinements. In writing, a readback works best as three labelled facts, one per line, because the other person can correct any line without rewriting the whole message. When the sender says no, ask which part is wrong instead of starting again, for example whether the day or the owner was wrong. A readback that gets corrected is doing its job; the failure mode is the polite yes from someone who was not really listening.