> [The Manager] continued:

>> I know that if we get into the details, the reasons will be perfectly reasonable. You'll explain what happened, I'll understand why everyone made the decisions they made, and I'll empathise with you.

>> Then it'll happen again.

>> So I don't want the details. I want to know what we're changing.

Even if the manager's approach was correct, this is just a hurtful way to frame it to your team. It's great that the author could reverse-engineer what the manager was doing, but it shouldn't come to that.

Why couldn't the manager say something like:

> You are all great engineers, so I already know that everyone made the best decision available with the information they had at the time. What are we going to do differently moving forward?

I'm still not sure I agree with the strategy, because I don't see how you can understand what happens next without understanding what went wrong. But I can see how the framing might help steer the discussion.