Effortless Networking

When it comes to business networking, I find that people are often encouraged to make “small talk”.

And I’ve always wondered, “Why?”

Perhaps people are encouraged to make small talk so they do something other than hang around by themselves at networking events.

Perhaps the purpose of small talk is to find out more about another person, so you can find points of common interest — and ideally, common business interests.

Or perhaps it is used by people who feel awkward to talk about their own business, ease into the conversation in another way.

Or perhaps it’s something else.

In any case, it seems to me that making small talk is a method or technique that people use to get to some goal.

And when a technique — any technique — doesn’t work for you, don’t use it!

Find a method that does.

So why do you want to (or feel that you have to) make small talk?

What do you think it’ll help you accomplish?

What is another way you can accomplish the same thing?

For example:

If you’re making small talk (or trying to do so without much success) in order to find out something in common between you and another person, just be curious and ask questions.

And ask questions on topics that you care about.

This includes topics you don’t know about, but about which you are genuinely interested or curious. Such as, what does someone’s job as XYZ entail; what exactly do they do? Or how did someone’s interest in a particular hobby start?

You don’t need to talk about the weather, if that’s not something that you’re interested in!

If you start a conversation on a topic that interests you, it rarely feels like a challenge.

And what’s more, you’re more likely to find points of common interest more easily — which, in this example, was the original goal.

So what do you want to accomplish through small talk? What is another way you can accomplish the same thing?

Go ahead. Try it.

And let me know how it went.
– Sri

This entry was posted on Sunday, September 24th, 2006 at 12:04 am and is filed under Networking Conversations, Improving Effectiveness. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.