A flight simulator for hard conversations
You have rehearsed it in the shower all week. Steady lets you actually have it — out loud, with someone who pushes back — before the stakes are real.
For first-time managers · iPhone · Voice or text
Receptive
Listening, and calm.
The week before
You know the conversation is coming. You have written the opening line four times. You have imagined every way she could take it. And on the day, thirty seconds in, you hear yourself soften it into nothing.
Rehearsing in your head does not work, because the part that is hard is not knowing what to say. It is saying it to a face that is reacting. There has never been anywhere to practise that — so the first time you do it, it is real, and it is with someone whose job you affect.
How it works
The Brief
Who they are, what has actually happened, and what nobody has said yet. Then one question that is yours to answer: what does a good outcome look like? Whether it landed is measured against that, not against a template.
The Room
A real voice, listening and replying in the moment. She has a position, and she will hold it. Above her, her state moves while you talk — receptive, guarded, defensive — so you watch the cost of a sentence land the second it lands. You can type instead, at any point.
The Flight Log
Not a grade. What worked, the turning point, and the sentence it turned on — scrub back to it and hear yourself say it. Over runs it tracks the habits: how long you take to get to the point, how often you hedge, what happens after you say “but.”
The rooms
Each one is a person with a history, a position and a reason to resist. None of them is a prompt to fill in.
Feedback
Their work has slipped since you got promoted. You had drinks with them on Friday.
Jess is on the other side of this.
Feedback
Her work is technically fine and she has stopped bringing anything else.
Rachel is on the other side of this.
Feedback
Six weeks of it. Everyone has noticed. Your silence is now part of the problem.
Callum is on the other side of this.
Feedback
Your strongest performer is making two quieter people invisible.
Anya is on the other side of this.
Feedback
He thinks it went well. It did not.
Dominic is on the other side of this.
Feedback
He undermines you gently, in front of the team, in a way that is impossible to point at.
Brian is on the other side of this.
Boundaries
He messages at all hours and expects an instant reply, because you always used to give one.
Tom is on the other side of this.
Boundaries
Oversharing, drinks invitations, and reading your management as coldness.
Sophie is on the other side of this.
Boundaries
He takes things straight to your boss, and copies you in afterwards.
Nathan is on the other side of this.
Boundaries
Your own boss drops work on you at the end of every week. Managing up is a boundary too.
Meera is on the other side of this.
Boundaries
For “just two weeks.”
Jonah is on the other side of this.
Saying no
Declining a project you cannot take, with reasons, without damaging the relationship.
Douglas is on the other side of this.
Saying no
She thinks she has earned it. The budget does not exist and it is not close.
Leila is on the other side of this.
Saying no
You want to say yes. You cannot.
Hannah is on the other side of this.
Saying no
You didn't decide it. You have to deliver it, and not throw your own leadership under the bus.
Ade is on the other side of this.
Bring your own
Describe that one — who they are, what has happened, how you expect them to take it — and Steady builds the room, with a counterpart who reacts the way you said they would.
Steady never hands you a sentence to read out. The words are yours; what it gives back is what yours did.
She can close up, harden, or stop engaging entirely. A room you can't lose teaches nothing.
Same room, same person, different you. Two runs go side by side on one scrub so you can hear the difference.
Privacy
Your runs, transcripts and trends live on the device. Audio is transcribed so the counterpart has something to answer, and is not kept as a recording. One button in the You tab deletes all of it — and it means it.
Read the privacy policyPricing
There is no crippled free tier. Seven days, everything open, and then you decide.
Steady Pro
£59.99
a year · £5.00 a month · save 44%
Start 7 days freeFree for 7 days, then £59.99 a year. Cancel any time in Settings.
What's included
Unlimited runs
Say it once. Say it eleven times.
All 15 situations
Feedback, boundaries, saying no.
Rewind any moment
Go back to the sentence it turned on and take it again.
Bring your own situation
Describe the one you are actually having this week. Steady builds the room.
Compare your runs
Two attempts at the same room, on one scrub.
Drills
One sentence, sixty seconds, as many times as you want.
Questions
No. There is no correct sentence and Steady never gives you one. It gives you a person who reacts to what you actually said, and afterwards it tells you what your own behaviour did — where you hedged, how long you took to get to the point, what happened right after you said “but.” The words stay yours.
It works best out loud, because saying it out loud is the part that is hard. But every room can be typed instead, at any point — including halfway through, if the moment arrives and you would rather write it.
First-time and newly promoted managers, most often people now managing colleagues who used to be their peers. If you have rehearsed a conversation in the shower more than twice, it is for you.
Your runs live on your phone. Audio is transcribed to give the counterpart something to answer and is not kept as a recording afterwards. You can delete everything — every run, every transcript, every trend — from one button in the You tab, and it is gone.
There is a 7-day free trial, and after that Steady Pro is £59.99 a year or £8.99 a month. Cancel any time in Settings.
Steady is practice for work conversations, not therapy and not crisis support. If a run turns towards something the app should not be handling, it stops and points you at people who can help.
Have it tonight, where it costs nothing.
7 days free · Cancel any time in Settings