THE forgotten technique for effective conf calls

Hi guys, this is Christina and you’re watching Speak Better, Feel Great TV.

The place to boost your English and boost your career.

Conf calls.

We all have’em.

We all hate’em.

In a world where relationships are key,

working across distances with people we never see

seems

counterproductive.

In fact, it IS counterproductive, if team members don’t relate to each other.

Today, I’ll show you how to make time for small talk in your conf calls

and why it’s important.

If your conf call ends at 3pm,

plan to actually stop discussing business at 2:50pm.

This is not because everyone wants to leave the conf call quickly.

Rather, it’s because you should dedicate those last 10 minutes to socializing.

You know, small talk,

chit chat. Talking about your weekend or the weather or whatever.

Plan to dedicate

10 minutes

to socializing at the end of your conf calls

You may be asking

“Isn’t small talk a waste of time?”.

Actually

no.

A recent study by Harvard Business School found teams who dedicated

6-10 minutes

to socializing at the end of their conf calls had

better team cohesion

better performance,

and better efficiency.

I like to call the 6 to 10 minutes at the end of a conf call

"Planned Socializing."

So what do you talk about?

Common small talk topics include

the weather, your social life,

your weekend activities,

things like that.

You can start planned socializing with questions like:

If you’ve seen something in the news related to your colleague’s country or their city,

you can talk about that.

Specifically for Americans, hot topics might include the Super Bowl in February,

4th of July, in the summer.

Halloween, or Thanksgiving.

You can ask questions like:

Are you gonna watch the Super Bowl?

What are you gonna do for the 4th of July?

What are your plans for Halloween/Thanksgiving?

And you can also tell them about important events in your country,

to keep the dialogue going.

For planned socializing to work,

it’s important to make it a habit at the end of each conf call.

Planned socializing may start slowly,

but it will quickly become a very pleasant part of an otherwise

unpleasant experience.

And your team will work better in English because of it.

If, however, you’re worried that you won’t understand what the other person says,

check out the 2 videos

titled

“How to Stop Feeling Embarrassed When You Don’t Understand”

and

“Reformulating to Be Sure You Understand”

on Speak Better, Feel Great TV.

Now,

here’s your Speak Better, Feel Great challenge for this week:

If you manage conf calls,

introduce the idea of planned socializing to your team.

If you don’t manage conf calls,

suggest planned socializing

to the organizer.

Try it out for the next conf call

and then come back and tell us about it in the comments below.

Remember

the best way to boost your English and boost your career is to work

regularly on your English communication skills.

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So sign up at christinarebuffet.com.

I’m Christina, from Speak Better, Feel Great TV.

See ya next time!