Just as the first glimpse should please their eyes, your first words should delight their ears. Your tongue is a welcome mat embossed with either “Welcome” or “Go Away!” To make your conversation partner feel welcome, you must master small talk.
Small talk! Can you hear the shudder? Those two little words drive a stake into the hearts of some otherwise fearless and undaunted souls. Invite them to a party where they don’t know anyone, and it mainlines queasiness into their veins.
If this sounds familiar, take consolation from the fact that the brighter the individual, the more he or she detests small talk. When consulting for Fortune 500 companies, I was astounded. Top executives, completely comfortable making big talk with their boards of directors or addressing their stockholders, confessed they felt like little lost children at parties where the pratter was less than prodigious.
Small-talk haters take further consolation from the fact that you are in star-studded company. Fear of small talk and stage fright are the same thing. The butterflies you feel in your stomach when you’re in a roomful of strangers flutter ’round the tummies of top performers. Pablo Casals complained of lifelong stage fright. Carly Simon curtailed live performances because of it. A friend of mine who worked with Neil Diamond said he insisted the words to “Song Sung Blue,” a tune he’d been crooning for forty years, be displayed on his teleprompter, lest fear freeze him into forgetfulness.
Small talk! Can you hear the shudder? Those two little words drive a stake into the hearts of some otherwise fearless and undaunted souls. Invite them to a party where they don’t know anyone, and it mainlines queasiness into their veins.
If this sounds familiar, take consolation from the fact that the brighter the individual, the more he or she detests small talk. When consulting for Fortune 500 companies, I was astounded. Top executives, completely comfortable making big talk with their boards of directors or addressing their stockholders, confessed they felt like little lost children at parties where the pratter was less than prodigious.
Small-talk haters take further consolation from the fact that you are in star-studded company. Fear of small talk and stage fright are the same thing. The butterflies you feel in your stomach when you’re in a roomful of strangers flutter ’round the tummies of top performers. Pablo Casals complained of lifelong stage fright. Carly Simon curtailed live performances because of it. A friend of mine who worked with Neil Diamond said he insisted the words to “Song Sung Blue,” a tune he’d been crooning for forty years, be displayed on his teleprompter, lest fear freeze him into forgetfulness.
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