You're not alone, Nicolette. Making small talk with another person tends to be a challenge for many and yet, it is absolutely essential to do in order to move up the hierarchy and develop rapport. What might you do to improve your ability to make small talk?
Keeping my opinions to myself. I will try to be more open minded and less biased be careful of what I say to avoid putting my foot in my mouth or to seem like I am a know it all.
The most challenging part for myself is small talk. Trying to initially find a common interest or similarity to discuss before getting further in to the hierarchy.
This is good awareness to have, Gary. And it's something many people have trouble with. What are some questions that you can ask to small talk with your students?
For me it is the small talk. I don't do enough of it. I could discover a lot more about the student and develop a greater bond of trust if I would allow them to talk more. I tend to move too quickly into telling them about the school etc. I need to ask more open ended questions that will cause them to open up.
Ah yes, offering onions can be a challenge at times. This is great awareness to have, Monica. I'm curious, how do you know when it's okay to offer an opinion?
Opinions. you can never be too sure when is the right time to express you opinions. If you do express opinions, it could be doen at certain levels.
It's great that you can sense a connection right away, Portia. It's wonderful when you can move all the way through the hierarchy to bonding, however it may not happen with everyone. The important thing to remember when building rapport with someone new is to make sure you have mutual interest before moving forward. At this stage you have relationship equity and will find it easier to move forward. Good luck in your future communications!
I tend to feel a connection with people right away. I need to be sure I go through the entire hierarchy so I can really establish a bond. Not everyone will feel an immediate bond, so to communicate effectively I will try to go through all the steps consistently.
These tend to be two of the most challenging steps in the hierarchy, Ashleigh. So you're definitely not alone. Given that these two steps are key to helping you achieve relationship equity, which means you can safely offer your opinion, what might you do to help yourself feel more comfortable with small talk and working to achieve mutual interest?
I get the sense that students come first with you, Jason. That's awesome! Isn't it crazy how having small talk can be so challenging at times? I love thoe fact that you introduce the student to others that you believe might have an easier time developing rapport or connecting. How has this worked for you?
We find a lot of individuals working with students tend to experience the same thing, Kelly. What might you do to remind yourself to not jump to opinions too quickly in your conversations at work?
I have a horrible time with small talk and mutual interest. I can never seem to get passed those points. I either jump directly to facts or fumble through small talk and mutual interest making a fool of myself. I don't care about small talk most of the time and I rarely have anything in common with people being that I am and have been a completely sheltered introvert for most of my life.
Sometimes i really struggle with the small talk especially if they aren't really working with me. Sometimes when this happens i will try and pull in another rep who i think might have a better rapport with that student. At the end of the day i just want that student to be comfortable.
I have a very straight forward personality so I would say my weakest link in the hierchy is opinions. I have a tendency to give my opinion before it is asked for. However if a family member or a friend is having a personal crisis I do not give my opinion until I am asked. At is kind of reversed for me.
This is something that happens a lot, Emma. It can be hard not to jump right to opinions when you're eager to help your students and sometimes pausing for a few moments can seem like an eternity. It's awesome that you apologize to your students and allow them to continue when you realize that you've jumped ahead before the student is ready. That's a critical piece in maintaining and continuing to build rapport with your students.
Opinions seems to be my most challenging. Once the individual stops talking about a topic I tend to jump in with an opinion. I count to 2 and if the individual does not continue I assume they are finish. I try not to cut them off and if I do I apologize and allow them to continue. But I tend to respond within 2 seconds.
I havr thought about waiting 3 or 4 seconds but then you get those strange looks and focus seems to be lost and that creates a brakedown of the communcatiion hierarchy.
With the communication hierarchy I really believe that I effectly to all those skills with no problem, so I believe that with more interaction with all different types of people that I will be able to relate on some level with them.
Opinion. You never know how they will be received, even if it seems the conversation is going well. I’m always nervous about putting them out there, even if enough “mutual interest†has been invested. I can see now that it’s the pivotal point in the hierarchy so my existing apprehensions make sense.
To improve at this stage, I will work harder on the stage preceding it. Building rapport and establishing trust are not always easy, but if I put more effort into that part of the process, I think I can get to a point where I won’t be afraid to offer an opinion as well as have a better idea of what not to say.
Awesome, Samantha! Keep it up.
