Making Small Talk – Basic

‘Small Talk’ means light informal conversation for social occasions.

The ability of ‘making small talk’ helps people to connect with others and mingle comfortably with them.

Learning to ‘make small talk’ can help you to connect easily with strangers in a social gathering, build rapport, and improve your interpersonal and social skills.

You can use small talk to make conversation and connect with others in an interview, a board meeting, or a local conference.

You can also use it to make a good impression on others and hence enhance your career as the ability to connect with others is essential for success.

Knowing how to make small talk can help you to start conversations and keep them going until you find a common area of interest or until the actual business begins.

You can use ‘reflection’ or ‘careful thinking process’ to identify the fears that you have of breaking the silence and approaching and speaking to a complete stranger. These fears are the things that are most crucial to you and you value in your life. These fears are also the ones that most affect the way you deal with strangers and feel about when you have to start a small talk.

When you learn to identify your fear of approaching strangers and talking to them, you will be able to identify your strong reactions that are based on these fears. Hence, if you learn to control your fears, you will in turn ultimately learn to control your strong reactions to situations that arouse feelings of fear. So, in turn you will learn to deal with and manage your fear of approaching strangers and talking to them.

You can break the silence in your small talk through fillers which are apparently meaningless words, phrases, or sound that mark a pause or hesitation in speech. The best way to use fillers most effectively is by omitting a pause and then instead use a filler word instead of the pause. However, you should not use too many filler words as it gives the impression of being nervous, being unprepared, unconfident, vague and not very clear on what one wants to speak.

Introductory conversation provide background information or “set the stage” for the main part of the rest of your small talk. Introductory conversation include information such as introductory greeting, your first and last name, your job or designation, where you are from etc.