Second Cup: Make shallow questions deeper

Invite connection by tweaking the usual small talk

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good Morning,
This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's
tip is to make shallow questions deeper. By tweaking your
usual small talk ever so slightly, you can wind up

(00:27):
with much richer conversations. Today's tip, like another one this week,
comes from Charles Dohigg's new book, Super Communicators. In this book,
he shares strategies for how anyone can connect with others
more effectively. Doig notes that many of us ask pretty

(00:48):
straightforward questions when we are getting to know someone. Where
do you work or what do you do? Where are
you from? Where did you go to school? Do you
have kids? And there's nothing wrong with any of these
questions per se, But the problem is that the point
of conversation is connecting. A person can answer all of

(01:12):
those questions quite quickly, and then you might need to
keep reaching to forge some sort of connection, and doing
so can feel tedious, like, Oh, you're originally from Dallas,
and now you're racking your brain to think of who
you know from Dallas, and the other person probably doesn't
care about this person that you know from Dallas. So

(01:37):
Doeg suggests making shallow questions deeper. Instead of where do
you live, you could ask something like what do you
like about your neighborhood? Instead of where do you work?
You might ask what was your favorite job? Or even
what's your favorite part of your job? Or another question

(02:02):
or two later, you might ask is there anything else
you ever dreamed of doing? Do you have kids? Or
are you married? Can become the more open ended. Tell
me about your family? How long have you lived here?
Becomes what's the best place you've ever lived? Where did

(02:23):
you go to high school? Or where did you go
to college? Might become what advice would you give someone
in college right now? As Doig says in super Communicators,
none of these deeper questions are incredibly pushy. You are
not asking someone you have just met to tell you
about their deepest regret or something like that. You could

(02:45):
ask any of these slightly deeper questions in a professional
or personal setting, but you will definitely get to know
people a little better. You will know something important about
them which will allow you to connect. If the person
tells you that the best part of growing up in
Dallas was the tight knit neighborhood they lived in, and wow,

(03:07):
that neighborhood has changed a lot over the past thirty years.
This just gives you a little bit more to work with.
You can talk about that change in general, rather than
the person you know in Dallas to your conversation partner
doesn't know from Adam. So as you talk to people,

(03:27):
think about ways you could switch up your usual questions,
invite a little storytelling and reflection. You will probably wind
up feeling closer and you will enjoy your conversations a
lot more. In the meantime, this is Laura. Thanks for listening,

(03:52):
and here's to making the most of our time. Thanks
for listening to Before Breakfast. If you've got questions, ideas,
or feedback, you can reach me at Laura at Laura
vandercam dot com. Before Breakfast is a production of iHeartMedia.

(04:19):
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