executive dysfunction hack: if you have trouble staying hydrated, get a silly straw. makes drinking water like 100x more fun and exciting. change the silly straw around so it doesn’t get old. stay hydrated and stay entertained
I suck at small talk. But I’m good at coming with weirdly analytical explanations of the things that bewilder me! Here’s what I’ve figured out so far about how small talk is made.
PART I: THE BASIC STRUCTURE
(Or: what to do next when the pause gets long and awkward.)
With all this stuff, it’s best to rely on instinct when your instincts are actually talking to you. But there’s an approximate system that I try to follow when in doubt:
Step 1) Greet someone and/or make an observation. The observation might be comment on the weather, a witty quip about the surroundings or situation, or a polite compliment.
Like: “Hi! I like your shoes.”
Take the other person’s response as a cue about whether they want you to continue with small talk.
If they act discouraging, let the conversation lapse and go back to doing your own thing.
If they act receptive, you can move on to step 2.
If they act neutral, move onto step 2 but let the conversation lapse if they start to act discouraging.
(I can’t tell you exactly how to interpret the cues, because it depends hugely on context and how shy the other person is and stuff.)
Step 2) Ask the other person a question about their life or interests. Ideally pick a question you’re interested in, like, “Did you decorate those shoes yourself?”
But a boring question like “How are you?” will do just fine in a pinch.
If they respond with details, ask them a follow-up question to keep them going, repeating step 2.
If they respond with with a simple answer, go to step 3.
Step 3) Talk about your life or something that interests you for a little while. Then pause briefly to see if they respond.
If they respond with interest, continue, repeating step 3.
If they don’t respond or don’t seem interested, repeat step 2, ideally with a question tangentially related to what you’ve been talking about.
If they ask a question you don’t want to answer, give a brief, oversimplified answer and repeat step 2.
Step 4) If you want to stop, you can close by saying something about what you’re about to do after the conversation, followed be an affirmation or good wish to other person.
Like, “I’m gonna sit here and answer emails for a bit, but it’s been fun talking to you. Good luck with your class!”
(It seems to be generally acceptable to lie about the the urgency or exact nature of your task in order to indicate that you’re ready to stop talking. That’s how you set time & energy boundaries without implying that the other person is boring or annoying you.)
I don’t think this system is perfect, but I haven’t been able to find another explanation of the process that works nearly as well for me.
PART II: WHAT IS THE PURPOSE OF THIS HELLISH CULTURAL PRACTICE???
In a short interaction, the idea seems to be to exchange a few pieces of surface information and then part ways. It’s a way of acknowledging that you and the other person are both humans who have feelings and experiences.
Other times, the goal is to transition through the small talk phase and into a deeper conversation both people find interesting.
“Deeper conversation” can look like one person telling a story, expounding on a topic, or articulating personal feelings, all with intermittent encouragement from the other person.
Or it can be an even exchange of related opinions & experiences, or two people brainstorming the answers to life’s difficult questions.
PART III: OKAY, BUT WHAT AM I ACTUALLY SUPPOSED TO SAY?
Once you’ve got the general concept down, the next problem becomes: What questions and topics will make the small talk phase fun and effective?
It’s easier if you already know someone, because you can follow up on & try to expand your existing knowledge about their life.
“How is (family member) doing?”
“How is (job or project) going?”
“Have you done any (hobby) lately?”
“Does the weather ever get like this in (place of origin)?”
For first getting to know someone, one option is to focus on creating a template so you have follow-up questions later.
“Do you have any siblings?”
“Are you from this area?”
“What do your parents do?”
(Note: Asking “What do you do?” is considered polite among baby boomers, but with the younger crowd it’s more often a sore spot.)
It’s good to intersperse the “template forming”-type questions with questions that are more likely to have engaging answers. Like,
“Do you have any exciting plans for the winter?”
“Are you rooting for anyone in (popular sport that’s in season)?”
There’s also the old Hank Green standby: “What’s your favorite bridge and what do you like about it?”
Other people with executive dysfunction: you’re allowed to have an actual written list of funny stories you know and questions that you find go over well. (I keep meaning to write a list for myself, but haven’t gotten around to it yet. In the meantime, I have a loose mental list.)
Curate your list to maximize the ease with which people can make the conversation more personal, and more related to things they like talking about. If you’re worried that a question is too personal or invasive, it’s okay to explicitly ask. Like, “Would you be comfortable telling me more about (experience)?” or “Is it okay if I ask you more questions about that?”
Keep in mind that there’s a bit of emotional labor in making a conversation more specific.
Like going from “How is your day going?” to “Here is a particular incident that happened to me today...”
Or going from, “I’m good. You?” to “I’m excited about my camping trip next weekend. Do you have any exciting plans for the summer? Any trips or projects?”
So try to supply that labor whenever possible, and don’t expect shy people to be good at providing it on their end.
Related to that: Talking about the weather isn’t actually boring. It’s cliche because people do it a lot. People do it a lot because it’s an AWESOME segue into more specific conversations. Weather is universal, but impacts everyone’s life differently.
Like:
“It’s really coming down out there.”
“Oh man, here’s my horror story about how the rain inconvenienced me this morning...”
Or:
“It’s beautiful outside today!”
“Yeah, I hope it holds so I can go hiking this weekend.”
“Oh really. Do you hike often?”
In addition to having a standard set of topics and questions to fall back on, it’s good to be ready to answer vague questions about yourself with specific answers. If you know you’re going to be making small talk in the near future, briefly think over your own life. Things like:
Events from the past few days.
Major events/developments from the past year.
Events you’re looking forward to in the the next few months.
Events in the lives of your friends and family.
Topics you’ve been thinking about lately. (Ones that other people won’t need a PhD or a hardcore fandom obsession to follow.)
From that, pick out a few items you’d be comfortable going into detail about if the other person expresses interests. Keep those items in the back of your mind as something to throw out in response to a question or a lull in the conversation.
PART IV: EXTRA POINTERS ON BEING CHARISMATIC
Keep track of jokes or witty remarks that go over well, and don’t be afraid to re-use or re-purpose them.
I’m personally fond of the ludicrously transparent self-serving lie. Like, “How many words can your other applicant type per minute? Whatever it is, I type ten words faster than that.”
With any type of joke, there are some hazards. I like this one because if you undershoot and sound dishonest or arrogant, you can recover by piling on a bigger claim. I.e., “I can also leap tall buildings in a single bound.”
But this formula of joke can also land as quite sarcastic, so watch out for implying you’re bad at something you want to seem good at, or appearing to disparage the other person’s question/claim.
(I’ll write up a more detailed list of formulas for coming up with funny dialogue once I have my fiction writing how-to blog up and running.)
Ask for types of help that are easy to give.
Most people love feeling like they can be helpful in some way. So asking for advice, or really simple favors like “Can you pass me that tissue box?” is a surprisingly effective way to get people to like you.
Express enthusiasm when you feel it.
...especially when you can give the other person implicit permission to expound on something.
Say things like
“I really like hearing people’s perspectives on (topic that just came up).”
“I’m always interested to hear how people deal with (challenge the person just mentioned they’ve encountered).”
As a rule, people tend to be unsure if you approve of them or if you want to know what they have to say. Set them at ease on that point whenever you can do so in a genuine way.
