Newsrooms are emotional spaces. Don’t let a heated moment get out of hand.

I can fully admit, with a lot of training, mentorship, therapy and even more training, I wasn’t always the best manager. I shouted across the newsroom when emotions flared. I didn’t step in for journalists in verbal altercations with others. I sat silent while someone spoke badly about a coworker.

I was reminded of that this morning when it was reported on Breaker that two New York Times employees had “an epic blow-up” about a story in the works that “resulted in an HR complaint about a ‘death threat’.”

You might shrug this off as an overreaction by the editor or as an overreaction by the reporter. Don’t.