How to Small Talk

I used to think that I was someone that just didn’t like small talk but recently I realized that it’s just that I don’t like bad small talk.? Unfortunately, there is a lot of that going around these days!

In our technology obsessed world, small talk increasingly feels like a lost art.? Though COVID dealt the final blow, it was probably the smartphone that killed it.

Anyway, I suspect you all know the feeling.? You’ll be at some party, work function, or gathering hoping/expecting to have some fun.? Then, something happens that makes your soul leave your body.

You get stuck with a bad talker!? In the worst case, you are stuck in a literal corner, but with a bad conversationalist even the middle of the room can feel claustrophobic.

Time moves impossibly slow and you start wishing you were at home binging a TV show or that you were in the middle of a grueling workout or maybe even that you were lost at sea.? Your eyes start to wander looking to make contact with someone else…anyone else.? You start drinking your drink compulsively and shifting back and forth on your feet.? Eventually, you are saved by another person or come to your senses and realize that you are not trapped after all, and excuse yourself to get another drink or go to the restroom.????

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We’ve all been there, right?? We’re probably also all guilty of being the other person as well.

Bad small talkers come in all kinds of flavors.

There’s the narcissist, who is present and engaged but only really interested in talking about him/herself.

Then there’s the bore, who is completely uninteresting and simultaneously uninterested and makes you feel even worse.

There’s the joker, who cannot help but tell off-color / cheesy jokes.

There’s the social climber, who’s constantly scanning eyes betray their profound indifference to you—everyone’s least favorite!

One type that makes me crack-up is the beast mode guy.? Almost always a male, this is someone who is so amped up they literally cannot see a conversation to a natural conclusion.? Conversation is erratic and disjointed.? They will ask you questions on a new subject while you are in the middle of your answer on another topic altogether.

Look, some of these talker-types can even be fun for a while and often present like naturals. But when it comes to small talk, there are those who appear like they are good and then there are those that actually are.? The difference is awareness.

You see, what makes all these types “bad” is that they are, more or less, clueless.? They either don’t care or just cannot see how they are coming across—I’m not sure which one is worse—and, at a party, their blindness becomes the problem of others pretty fast.

Small talk is not something you can just expect to wake up and be good at.? It’s an art and as such requires study, practice, and reflection.

To be clear, I’m not really sure I’m some great small talker myself.? I’ve been guilty, in fact, of engaging in many of the bad talker typologies (maybe all of them).? But as someone who talks to pretty much everyone everywhere, I think have some decent ideas.? You all will have to be the judge!

First of all, you have to have a genuinely open and curious mind.? This is about being open to new experiences and interested in what other people have to say.? It’s also about knowing how to listen without trying to confirm something you already believe or think you know.? This mindset is rarer than you’d think and quite difficult to hold.???

People like to make excuses for their closed-mindedness or hide behind fake personality tests—“I am an introvert so it’s really hard for me.”—but you simply cannot be a good small talker if you aren’t at least a little curious about other people.? To be sure, introversion and extroversion exist on a spectrum and socializing might be harder for some than others but if you cannot get yourself to walk into a party with at least a little interest in learning about others, you’ve got bigger problems!

So, stop making excuses, learn how to be interested in others, and make sure it’s genuine, otherwise people will know.?

Secondly, only talk to one person at a time—that’s all you can do anyway!? Even if you get caught in a bad conversation, don’t let your eyes wander in hopes of an escape or someone better.? Just stay in the moment and try to make the best of it.? Remember, one of the worst feelings in the world is to be in conversation with someone who is obviously trying to get away.? Don’t be that person!

Third, don’t assume anything.? Most of the time, the reason you are bored in a conversation is that you think you know everything about a person.? Don’t let your preconceived notions get in the way of discovering something really new and interesting.? People are very complex and there’s a deepness and richness even to people who seem hollow and shallow.

Fourth, listen, listen, listen.? If there’s one thing I’ve learned in life it’s that good conversation is about good listening.? The best conversationalists I know aren’t talking much at all and when they are, they definitely aren’t talking about themselves.? Instead, they are fully engaged in what the other person is talking about and are always asking questions, looking for connections, or coming up with ways to intelligently and compassionately relate.

Fifth, don’t be boring!? This is all about choosing the right questions.? Almost all bad conversation comes down to someone starting with a lame question.

Whatever you do, don’t ask the dreaded transactional American opener “What do you do?”? And please don’t be the “Did you see the game, bro?” person.

The idea is to choose questions that make other people feel heard, important, or special.

I’ve found that questions like “Where did you grow up?” or “What do you think of this?” or “What are you reading now?” produce way better outcomes than standard openers like “How was your weekend?” or “Who else do you know here?”

If that doesn’t work, reveal something unexpectedly vulnerable about yourself.? Don’t share your deepest, darkest secrets or anything like that—no one likes the awkward over-sharer—but there’s nothing quite like an artfully delivered moment of vulnerability or self-deprecation to open up a conversation.??

If the conversation is going nowhere, bring up a current event, offer a contrarian take on it, and then see how they react or talk about a cool movie or cultural experience you recently had and solicit their input on it.? The idea here is to avoid the basic and the cliché at all costs.

You see, small talk doesn’t have to be bad, dull, or meaningless.? It can be interesting, important, and even significant—whatever you make of it really!? The goal in these little moments is to quickly open up a vein of fertile territory.? You want to get to the heart of the person you are talking to, beyond all the social caution and armor that gets in the way of genuine connection.? The secret to small talk is to find out whatever lights that person up and then just talk about that.

Profit+ Inspiration

Special thanks to my great friend and partner John Young, who you can read all about here, for recommending this one!

Poem: “See Paris First”

By: M Truman Cooper

Suppose what you fear could be trapped and held in Paris.

Then you would have the courage to go everywhere in the world. All the directions of the compass open to you, except?the degrees east or west of true north that lead to Paris.

Still, you wouldn’t dare to put your toes smack dab on the city limit line.

And you’re not really willing to stand on a mountainside miles away and watch the Paris lights come up at night. And just to be on the safe side, you decide to stay completely out of France.

But then danger seems too close even to those boundaries, and you feel the timid part of you covering the whole globe again.

You need the kind of friend who learns your secret and says, “See Paris first.”

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