People trust leaders who say the same thing in the room and out of it.

Everybody eventually compares notes. If your account of a decision shifts depending on who is listening, the versions meet and all of them lose their value, including the honest ones. Saying one thing consistently costs something in the moment, because you have to disappoint somebody to their face. What you get for it is that your word travels without needing you there to defend it.

Before you soften something for whoever is in front of you, ask whether you would say it that way with everyone present. If not, pick the version you can repeat. Then go back and correct anything you shaded earlier.