Business Communication, Communication, Speaking |
Where are you shining your spotlight? It showed up again the other night. A friend was telling me a story as we sat at the restaurant, and her eyes never met mine. From the moment she began to describe what happened, she gazed up and to the right, disconnecting from me. It’s a common habit. It might be yours. Here’s why it’s a problem. Imagine your face as a spotlight. Every time you start a conversation you shine that spotlight somewhere. You’ll have more impact if you shine it on the people you’re talking with.
Business Communication, Mindset |
Let us finish. Isn’t it frustrating when you’re trying to make a point in a meeting and somebody cuts you off? Chances are you know that feeling well. Especially if you’re a woman. Maybe you’ve seen the essay floating around social media about women being interrupted more often than men. It cites research in conference rooms and classrooms, and even the Supreme Court chambers.
The female justices are interrupted nearly four times as often as their judicial brethren.
Business Communication, Communication, Men and Women |
Let us finish. Isn’t it frustrating when you’re trying to make a point in a meeting and somebody cuts you off? Chances are you know that feeling well. Especially if you’re a woman. Maybe you’ve seen the essay floating around social media about women being interrupted more often than men. It cites research in conference rooms and classrooms, and even the Supreme Court chambers.
The female justices are interrupted nearly four times as often as their judicial brethren.
Mindset |
Are You Breathing? Chances are pretty good you’ll hold your breath sometime while you read this note. Not because it’s alarming or frightening, but just because you and I are communicating through a screen. It’s called “screen apnea” and it’s a stress response. There’s nothing stressful about our exchange here. But screen apnea happens when we do, well, almost anything in front of a screen.
Communication |
You Delulu? “De-what-huh?” I thought. ChatGPT to the rescue. “‘Delulu’ is internet slang short for ‘delusional.’ It’s usually used jokingly to describe someone who has a delusional belief, often about romance, success, or a favorite celebrity.” They say “delulu” emerged a decade ago a s a K-pop term for obsessed fans having parasocial relationships with their Korean musical idols. Buying their music, going to their concerts … and imagining that they’ll wind up with some kind of personal, intimate connection. That might have seemed derogatory, but since then, it’s flipped into a lighthearted, playful, and sometimes even empowering term.
Communication, Mindset |
Our mothers were wrong. “Don’t talk to strangers,” they warned us. And, okay, it was undoubtedly a smart lesson for a young child to learn. Now that we’re adults, that conditioning to keep our head down and our mouth shut when we’re with someone we don’t know isn’t doing us any favors. It turns out that talking to strangers makes us happier than we expect Nicholas Epley, a behavioral scientist at the University of Chicago, stumbled across that proposition sitting next to a woman in a red hat on his commute into Hyde Park. Instead of staring at a screen and scrolling, he told her how cool her hat was. They wound up chatting all the way into the city. And he started his workday in a surprisingly good mood.
Business Communication |
The language of leadership. Can you imagine calling a colleague “piggy?” Labeling your accountant “low IQ?” How about erupting at your administrative assistant, telling her she’s a “very stupid person?” Of course you can’t. Full-grown adults in business don’t talk to each other that way. And yet … You’ve seen the quotes. President Trump insulting reporters, especially female reporters. Cutting them off—and shutting them down—as they ask entirely reasonable questions about his decisions. And the results those decisions create for the rest of us.
Are you as offended as I am?
Communication, Mindset |
Sometimes you amaze me. You had a lot to say about the notion of getting older and … weirder. All of it was positive, and much of it was zealous. I wondered with you about the notion that we become more authentic over time. More comfortable and confident about who we are and what we believe. And much less inclined to hide our true selves, to hold back, to wear a mask. And you confirmed the hypothesis. Enthusiastically. A bit of backstory here.
Communication, Mindset |
Older, wiser, weirder. The young guy was bagging my groceries at Whole Foods when he complimented me on my teal glasses. He was doubly impressed to observe that they matched my teal cane. “I hope I’m that fly when I’m your age,” he said. That “fly???” Yes, “fly.” Often used informally to describe someone as stylish, sharp, or well-dressed, as the dictionary explains. “Thanks,” I told him, “I’m not going quietly.”
Mindset, Speaking |
Are You Asking them or Telling them? I had a chance to tour a beautiful new apartment building. My guide was a young woman whose job depends on people like me saying, “Yes! I love it. When can I move in?” It wasn’t the only reason I won’t be moving there, of course. But the way she talked sure did make an impression. Not a positive one. Everything she said sounded like she was asking me instead of telling me. You know, with that questioning tone at the end of each sentence. Linguists call it the high-rising terminal. I call it annoying.
