Transcript of 712: Matt Abrahams - How to Become a Better Communicator: Speaking With Confidence, Structuring Your Message, and Thinking Fast on Your Feet New

Applications are now open for our next Learning Leaders Circle. You can go to learningleaderscircle.com to apply. I thought it would be helpful for you to hear from some current members of my Learning Leaders Circle. Here they are. I chose Learning Leaders Circle because I wanted to be around really winning professionals, people killing it at work, but even better people. Brian does such an amazing job of vetting the group. It's all A-players. It is all amazing rockstar people who want everybody to become their best and just add value to the group. We have people with agriculture backgrounds. We have people with white-collar backgrounds, blue-collar backgrounds, people in education. The totality of the room is very impressive with the amount of knowledge we have to be gained, but when you sit down and you break out with 5, 6, 7 people, you can have that intimate, that in-depth conversation that allows you to go a little bit deeper.

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Know that you're gonna leave with new relationships, new takeaways to make you better at your job, better as a parent and as a person. So it was just a very intimate, very inclusive environment. To apply for our next Learning Leader Circle, go to learningleadercircle.com. Welcome to the Learning Leader Show presented by Insight Global. I am your host, Ryan Hawk. Thank you so much for being here. Go to learningleader.com for show notes of this and all podcast episodes. Go to learningleader.com. Now on to today's Tonight's featured leader, Matt Abrahams, is one of the world's leading experts on communication. He's a lecturer in strategic communication at Stanford's Graduate School of Business and the bestselling author of Think Faster, Talk Smarter. His whole body of work is about the hardest kind of communication, not the polished, rehearsed speech, but knowing what to say in the moment on a stage, in a job interview, or just making small talk. During our conversation, we discuss the best interview question he was ever asked and what his answer taught him about hiring people. Then he shares a breathing trick that will kill your filler words. Then the 3 words his mother-in-law used to get great at small talk.

And he shares the 1-minute daily habit he's kept for 16 years to keep getting better as a communicator. Ladies and gentlemen, please enjoy my conversation with Matt Abrahams. I enjoyed learning a little bit about your dad. You said he was the most intelligent person you knew.

Yes.

Quiet but not shy. This makes me think of my dad, who is still my number one mentor in my life. Quiet but not shy. The guy who's going to wait to speak, but then when he does, the entire room stops and goes, oh yeah, that's the thing. I'd love to learn more about your dad and what you learned from him.

Yeah, your dad sounds almost exactly like my father. My father was a man of few words, but really important, detailed words. He was really, really intelligent. And back in the day, he was skipped a couple grades, so he was much younger than his colleagues. And I think that, that had a big impact on him. But very thoughtful, very logical, was a lawyer, so very much into argumentation and detail. And the thing I respect many things about my father and my mother as well, but my father was not only a good person, but he believed in being truthful. and trustworthy, and those are things that I've really tried to live up to.

What a great man.

Yeah.

How does his legacy live on within you?

Oh, thank you. That's a very touching question, and I reflect on that often. I hope I do justice to his legacy. My father was all about helping people, all about really getting to the bottom of things, solving tough problems, and I try to do that. And in the work I do through the podcast I host, Think Fast, Talk Smart, the writing, the teaching, all of that is trying to help others hone and develop their communication skills. So there's a little bit of that. I think, is honoring my father and his desire. And interestingly, my mother was an elementary school teacher, and so communication was always something we were talking about in our family. My mother was like, how do you make it engaging? How do you get people to focus? My father's like, how do you organize it? How do you make it structured, understandable? So we would debate communication all the time in my family. So it's not strange that that's something I spend a lot of my own time with.

I learned a question from reading your work that I have never asked before, and I kind of want to ask it to you just to see what you say. Are you cool with that?

I am. Let's do it.

If you were—

sorry.

Okay. If you were an onion and I peeled back your first 3 layers, what would I find?

Yes. Can I give a little context before I give the answer? Please.

Please. Please.

So, uh, I was interviewing for a job and I had made it far along in the process. So I, I'm, I'm going to meet with the CEO of the company. This was a small startup at the time. The CEO was still interviewing everybody. I walk into the room and he's already there, which freaked me out because my I'm used to the executives coming in late, rushing in, not having a lot of time for you. He's there with my resume, looking at the door when I walk in. And so whoever escorted me got me there just in time. He welcomed me, we shook hands, and that was the first question he asked me. If you were an onion and I peeled back the first several layers, what would I find? In that moment, I'm like, oh my gosh, what the heck is going on here? And I made a decision. I made a decision to be truthful, honest, and direct. And so what I said, my answer was, Onions make me cry. I am somebody who, it brings my full emotion and being to work. And when you asked that question, the first thing I thought about was just being present and being somebody who brings my emotions, my passions, and my concerns.

We ended up talking about Bambi, I think, as well afterwards, and I ended up getting the job. And weeks or months later, I asked him, I said, hey, Keith, what's up with that question? And he said he uses it to just put people a little off-center to see how they respond. And he remembered my response, and he had interviewed a lot of people, lots of people since then. And he said what he liked about the response is I committed to something and I connected it to a broader picture, what it meant for me at work and what it meant for the company. And so it was an interesting question, but I think a better example for what do you do when you're put on the spot? And I think the answer is you commit and you try to connect what you say to the broader, bigger picture.

One of them that I heard is like, how many windows are in New York City? Or other versions of stuff like that. I'm just curious what you think overall of those questions. Do you like them? Do you use them? This one seemed to be an incredible story. So I really like the end result, but it also helped that you answered it so well. So I'm just curious what you think about those overall.

I was a hiring manager for a number of years. I grew an organization from 2 people to 85 people in a very short amount of time. So I'm very familiar with hiring people and having to make quick judgments. I do think there is value in figuring out how people manage under pressure, how they handle pressure, but I don't like putting people on a spot that really makes them feel uncomfortable. And so I think there is a way to do that that isn't just out of the blue, first question, what happens when I peel back an onion? And this is what I do when I teach. When I teach at Stanford's Business School, I don't believe in cold calling. I believe in warm calling. And so in interviews, I would say, one of the things I want to figure out is how you fit in and how you handle difficult, challenging situations. So I'm going to ask you some questions that are difficult and challenging. The goal is not the right answer. The goal is to best understand how you process things, how I can collaborate with you, how you can fit in. And then I might say, how many windows are in New York City, or whatever the, the question is.

I think it's important to prepare people because at work, you know, things are going to be challenging and you know things are going to be difficult. So you're warm-called for the work as well. Out of the blue, hitting somebody with that is unfair. Some people can respond well to it and others find it more challenging.

I'm fascinated by the hiring process, especially hiring leaders. We all have had moments where we failed at this. If you've hired enough people, you've definitely hired some duds. Not that they're bad people, but just to—

Just not a right fit.

You make a poor choice, right?

Right.

And we get fooled. Everyone's on their best behavior. We get it. I'm curious, what have you learned over the years in the hiring process to increase your batting average as you went, to make the right choice more frequently? now than you did maybe earlier in your career?

I think it's really an insightful question and a really important part of the process. Like most communication, for me, it's about expectation setting and homework in advance. So I spend time when I interview somebody doing some deep dive into them. I'm not walking in and looking at their LinkedIn profile or resume for the first time before I interview them. I've thought about it. I've looked at their background. I've looked at companies. If I don't know what they are, see what those companies do, what role they had. So I do my homework. I also reach out to them before I interview and set expectations. Say, this is going to be a conversation, or this is going to be an opportunity where we'll do some talking. I'm going to give you a couple of problems, see how you'll solve them, give you an opportunity to ask me some questions, and then we'll have a discussion. So I think setting expectations up front for what I'm looking for from them, not the specific skill set, but how it's going to go, is really helpful. And I'll tell you something I started doing when I was growing that one group.

I actually, when the person would show up, 2 things. One, I would talk to the people that met them and say, how was the interaction when, when they met you? I have found many people treat the folks who are greeting and moving them around very rudely, and then they're perfect when they meet with me as the hiring manager. So I like to—

That's crazy though. Think of it. Isn't that crazy? Like, that's such, that's like interviewing 101 that people— isn't that wild though?

Yeah. The, the best example of that, I had a second story. I was able to look out on the parking lot. The guy I was interviewing was clearly running late, cut somebody off, pulled into a parking space, you know, at an angle that made it— would've made it difficult for the other person to come out, runs in, treats the receptionist poorly, shows up, does an amazing interview. We didn't hire him. We got insight into who the person really was by the behaviors. The other thing I do is I actually teach people early in an interview how I want them to answer questions. So I will often say, and this is a structure I like, I'm a big fan of structure. I say, when you answer a question for me, I want you to answer the question I want you to give me an example so I can really understand what that means. And then I want you to help me connect your answer to what that means if you were to work here. So you answer the question, you give an example, and then you explain what that means in terms of the value it provides me and the company I work for.

And you've probably seen this too when you interview people. People ramble, they're all over the place, and then you're left saying, did they answer the question? Why did they tell me that? So I would actually say it helps me When you answer the question, give me an example and help me connect how what you've just said will help you be a good employee here. Dramatically changed the way my interviews went, gave me much more insight.

That's good advice for anybody at any time. Like that exact thing right there. Try to figure it out because ultimately when someone's hiring you for something, they need you to help them solve some sort of a problem.

That's right.

They need you to make their life better. If not, they would just do it right. But they need somebody else to do it. There's not enough time for them to do it or whatever. So that's why they need you. You have to Help them see how you are going to solve that problem. It's about them, it's not about you. And I think that's where people miss. I did not expect to get on interviewing at all with you, Matt, but that's why I love this. But I am curious, before we started recording, I don't know if this just is normal for you, but you made it a point to tell me that you listened to a number of my episodes.

Yeah.

And, and complimented me on that. Was that intentionally done by you to bring us closer together before I clicked record? Because if so, it worked.

Well, no, I mean, I was not doing that to be manipulative. I was doing that because in the flow of our conversation, it was an appropriate thing for me to say. Like I said, when I do interviewing, I do— when I'm fortunate enough to be interviewed on great shows like yours, I have listened to your show before in the past, but I wanted to listen to several different types of episodes to remind myself of the way you ask questions, the way you follow up, because I want to be the best guest I can be, and I really want to make sure that I can hone that in. And I was being very genuine when I said, hey, I think you do a good job of this. I mean, I host a show too. I know how hard it is. And so I wasn't ingratiating. I was, I was really just reporting out.

No, it, it felt as genuine as anybody I've ever talked to. And I, I love this idea of being able to get close to somebody quickly.

Yes, rapport building is important. Making that connection is important.

Yes, and just going straight into it. And I felt like that happened, and we pressed record pretty quickly, but, but still, that those few minutes of getting to know one another, it's like, ah, this is the way it should begin. It didn't feel manipulative at all. It just felt like, hey, this is—

I'm glad it wasn't intended to be.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I give a lot of speeches. I work with others who give speeches. Leaders that are part of this are doing town halls. They're giving speeches all the time. I'm particularly curious to learn from you about the beginnings of speeches. I mean, like the very first words you say, whether it's me on stage in front of 1,000 people giving a keynote, or it's the manager 12 people or the CEO at a town hall. I realize there are differences between those things. However, you, as someone who is an expert, one of the best in the world at helping people become better communicators, what are the ideal ways to start a speech?

Well, you are too kind. I don't know that I, I live up to what you've just said, but certainly I've spent a lot of time on this. I really focus on what I call commencing, how you start, and I'm I've been fascinated for decades with going from silence to brilliance. How do you do that? A few things are in mind. One is intent, your intention, how you show up. And then it's attention, getting attention from the other people. So those are the 2 things I really focus on. How are you showing up? Is your energy focused? Is there an emotion you want to convey? I believe you should start in a way that gets attention. To my mind, attention is the most precious commodity we have in the world today. Our attention is constantly being scattered. So I don't like the slow roll. Hi, how are you? Oh, nice to see you.

Thank you so much for having me, guys. Yeah.

Every class I teach, I don't start with good morning, take your seats. I just make a statement. I come out and say something. I'm starting my classes shortly after we record this. The very first thing my students will hear me say, they'll be clamoring. It's because it's coming off of summer. They'll all be catching up with each other. The very first thing I'm going to say is I will say communication is critical to your success in business, and in your personal life. That's the very first thing they hear me say. It's to the point, it has conviction, and it gets attention. It doesn't have to be that directive. It could be a question, it could be a story, but we need to start by engaging the audience first. And then very quickly after, we have to tell them what value they are going to get from the time we're spending together. Attention is a gift people give you. If they don't see a return on that, they're going to check out. So very quickly, there has to be value. Now, you could say it explicitly. I can say, by attending this class, you're going to gain these skills.

That's very explicit. Or I could ask a question. I could say, think of a time where you didn't live up to your expectations for your communication. That's what this class is all about. It's another way of setting expectations and showing relevance. So for me, it's about intention, attention, and then very quickly making it relevant.

Man, I could spend the rest of the time just on this, but I'll just— maybe I'll do one more. How about closing a talk? We all— even I've seen some of the best still kind of struggle with this, and I wrestle with closing. What's the best way to close?

So do you know the most frequent way work communication closes? It's something like this: uh, I guess we're out of time, or somebody needs the room. Yeah, yeah, you know, how you end matters almost even more than how you start. We remember what we hear last, a lot, and it colors our perception of everything that happened before. Think of this. If you go on an amazing holiday, an amazing vacation, and you come back and the flight back is delayed, your luggage is lost, it's late, that wonderful vacation is remembered slightly less wonderfully because of that. How you end really matters. But at the same time, as soon as you signal you're ending, people check out. When you're on a Zoom team or Meet call and you say, in conclusion, like Pavlov's dogs, your audience goes and clicks exit meeting. bring up their calendar. It's just reflexive. So you don't have a lot of time. The way I like to end is 3 things. I believe all communication should be goal-driven. You should have a goal for what you're doing. To me, it has 3 parts: know, feel, do. What do you want people to know?

How do you want them to feel? What do you want them to do? If you structure your communication, whatever it is, the stories you tell, the financial data you report, whatever it is, know, feel, do, you should be able to end by summarizing the know, feel, do. You might not use these exact words, but I might say, thank you for your time. I hope you're leaving this knowing this, feeling this, and ready to do this, or willing to do this. Change the words to be comfortable. But if everything you've said is built on that goal, stating it at the end not only summarizes it, but it gives it a sense of closure and completion.

Know, feel, do. What would be an example of, like, knowing something, feeling something? Is it in one of your classes or in a speech?

Let me give you an example of my goal, because I thought about this for our interview today. I always do this before I go in. I would like like people to leave here knowing best practices for effective communication based on the work I've done and the research and the writings. I want them to feel confident that they could take some of the tools that you and I discussed today and employ them right away and see a difference in their communication. And I want them to do that. I want them to take a few things away. So I want them to know the tools. I want them to feel confident that they could try it. And I want them to put a few of the things you and I talk about today into practice. That's my goal, and that's guiding everything I'm saying. So if at the end of our conversation you say, Matt, do you have anything else you'd like to say? I could say, thanks so much, Ryan, for the time. I really hope you and your audience feel they are leaving here today with some tools they can use. They're excited to use them, and ultimately their communication improves as a result of our conversation.

And that's how I wrap up.

Do you feel this— this is maybe a stupid question— like a weird pressure to be perfect when it comes to every word you say on this podcast or in your class because you are an expert communicator. I mean, so I don't like that word, by the way, to James Clear about habits. Like, do you feel this pressure to have perfect habits because you're the habits guy, or now you're the communication guy? Do you feel like a weird pressure to saying the right word every time?

Well, what I feel most weird about is when people keep saying expert, because I have a wife who will tell you that I am not an expert. In fact, there's a lot of work I need to do. Early in my career, yes. When I first started teaching, I would start and I would gesture and I would watch the whole class watch my hand go this way. And it's like, oh my goodness, everybody thinks that's the right way to do it. There is no right way to communicate. There are better ways and worse ways. And once I acknowledge that for myself and I share that with others, it takes pressure off them and it takes pressure off me. I cannot tell you the number of times I'm introduced to do a keynote and the person says, I am so nervous introducing Matt because— I mean, almost everybody does it. They get the laugh. But I don't want to make people nervous. I want to make people comfortable. So please don't look at what I do and say that's the right way. It is not. It is a way and it works for me.

And it's actually a piece of advice to others, maybe, because I get the same thing when I go on somebody else's podcast. They'll like open with that.

Yeah.

And I'm like, this is not a good open. Don't do that. Don't say I'm so nervous because you host a podcast, blah, blah, blah. Don't do that. Just do it. Just go into it. You don't have to say you're nervous or, or tell me because I've done more podcasts or something. It's weird. I don't think it helps the host or the guest or the listener to do things like that.

No. And in fact, one of my biggest bits of advice for people who are anxious, nervous speakers is do not pre-apologize. Because we think what we're doing is buying empathy. When I say, oh, I'm a really nervous speaker, we think we're buying empathy from you. All we are doing is priming you to pay attention to everything I do that confirms I'm nervous. So I am, in effect, making you more sensitive to my nervousness and distracting you from what I'm saying. Just start. Just like you said, just start.

And it's funny, I've heard somebody who does the communication thing actually say the opposite of what you just said. And I completely disagreed with them at the time because I don't think it helps you to admit you're nervous. I don't think that helps. The audience, by the way, they are rooting for you to do well.

Yeah.

They want you to do well. When you open with something like that, it almost like makes them not root as much for you. It's bizarre.

You know? It disconnects. It disconnects, you know? Yeah. And, and we don't go around sharing our emotions in that way. Yeah. You know? Yeah.

What about, uh, memorizing a speech? I don't do this, but I know some people who do it, like TED Talks and some people I work with in corporate America, they'll have new talks every I don't know, a few months, and they'll, we'll sit together and they'll write the whole thing. I'm like, dude, are you gonna memorize this?

Yeah.

Yeah. I'm like, wow, that seems so hard. Why is it a bad idea to memorize speeches?

So I am, I am anti-memorizing. I am not anti-writing something out completely. Let me explain. I'll answer your question, which is why is memorizing so bad? When you memorize, you have created the right way to say it, at least in your mind, that's the right way to say it. And essentially your brain is like a computer. It's not a perfect analogy, but let's use it. You know, on your laptop, tablet, or phone, when you have lots of windows or apps open, each one of those is performing less well because the others are open. They're each sucking some of the precious CPU bandwidth. Your brain's the same way. So if I have my memorized way of doing it, part of my brain while I am communicating is constantly assessing and comparing what I'm saying to what I intended to say, which means I have less cognitive bandwidth. With, to focus on the real goal of communication, which is connection. So I tell my students all the time, it's about connection, not perfection. Now, writing out a script is not a bad idea, especially if you're a non-native speaker or you're novice or nervous to your topic, write it out.

But once you have it written out, then distill it down into a structure. A structure is a roadmap, problem, solution, benefit. That's a structure. Most people know that because television advertisements are in that structure, problem, solution, benefit. Many others. I have lots of favorite structures. Take the structure and become very familiar with it. Don't memorize it, but know your structure. Practice from the structure. That way I can have a conversation and connect with you rather than worrying about word for word. Now, I am always asked at this point, but in my profession, I have to make sure I say it exactly right, or that number has to be exact. Great. Read it. Say, hey, this is important. I want to make sure I read this quote right, or I get this number right. Do that rather than try to memorize it, because all you do is make yourself more nervous. You build distance. And actually, there's research that says the more you memorize, the more you forget.

What about a PowerPoint?

So slides can be very useful. I have a very simple rule. Slides should do 3 things. They should simplify, amplify, or clarify for your audience. Simplify, amplify, or clarify. So not every point needs a slide. TED has shown us that you can give long, motivational, powerful talks with no slides. If you have something that's important and you think a slide will help simplify, amplify, or clarify, then create a slide. But that slide should not be all words. Words actually end up making it harder for your audience to understand. We have one area of our brain primarily associated with verbal information, spoken or written. So if I'm speaking and I've got a lot of words on a slide, I'm asking you to multitask, and we're not good at that. Rather, have an image, a chart, or pictures that reinforce what you're saying. So you're actually using different parts of the brain, the visual brain, visual processing, not the verbal processing. And those together make the information more memorable. So slides can help, but they're for your audience. They're not a teleprompter for you.

Yeah, I love using pictures to help reinforce and make the story even stronger, because if I'm talking about, for example, me climbing a mountain, yeah, it can be kind of cool to actually see me on the mountain. Uh, you know, it doesn't— it's not necessary. I don't have to have it, but it can add to it. It can amplify, I guess, to use your language of, oh, okay, now I can see them. Now, none of their bandwidth is used. They're just like, oh, okay, cool picture. But they're not reading words or trying to write anything. They're still looking at me, but they just can glance and notice. And I think that can help those types of things where it makes your stories a little stronger because it adds another sense, like their, their sight to it. I think that that's a good use of slides.

Absolutely. And can I add one other thing? Yeah. To go back to a previous question where, you know, how do you start? I am on a personal mission to get presentations that have slides to stop starting like Hi, my name is, and today I'm going to talk about. Not only is that disengaging, and I see through your laughing, you would agree, but that's what's on the first slide somebody has. So literally you're just reading your first slide. I would much rather, I tell everybody, start your communication like an action movie. How does an action movie start? With action. I'm not saying jump out of a plane or crash a car, but tell a story, ask a question, take a poll, give a startling statistic. And then introduce yourself. And when you do that, your audience will pay more attention.

It's so true, man. It's wild though, how that gets violated almost every time. I changed a few years ago with this. I have different ones, compelling questions that really move you to the edge of your seat. They don't care who I am. They literally don't care. By the way, I was just given probably a very poor intro up onto the stage. That doesn't matter. They don't care at all. But if I engage them immediately with a question and maybe a picture that brings that home, I can introduce myself later or never. It's really about them and trying to speak to them and help them and move them and create some sort of behavior change. Ultimately, like, hi, I am so-and-so and I've done all this incredible stuff. They're like, good for you, dude. I don't care. Like, I care about me. How are you going to help me?

Right.

So let's start helping them literally immediately by moving them just to the edge of their seat because of the way we open.

Absolutely. Do you mind if I ask, can you give me an example of a question you have found is really intriguing or useful?

So I borrowed this from an essay about high agency that says, you wake up in a third-world jail cell. Who is the first person you call to get you out? And you're like, what? Yeah, why would you ask that? And so Without spoiling it, because I'm actually going to give this talk in 2 days. It's a talk about being a high-agency leader, and the person you would call is probably the most high-agency person you know. So it gets them thinking about—

I love it.

Yeah. Yeah. So it gets them thinking about them being the person that other people would call. And so the rest of the talk is a series of stories and ideas and practical application they could— to be a high-agency leader. So it starts though, there's no intro. Again, they don't care who I am. All that stuff. I never do an intro. After it's over, I'll put up a slide that has like ways to get in touch and stuff.

Sure.

But that's when the speech is over. It's mostly first question. And it's funny, we started filming the crowds when I bring my video guys to literally see people lean forward or look at their neighbor or kind of like, huh? And it's just because it's so different from what they used to, especially if they're at like a, a meeting and there's a lot of speakers and the speakers have other things that they do. They just happen to be giving a talk because they work at the company. So it's so jarring for people because it's so different from what they're used to the rest of the day.

I really like that as a start.

What about you? Do you have a good one to open with?

Yeah, yeah, I'll share in a second, but, but I want to just comment on yours if you don't mind. What I like about it so much is it's so visceral. You're in a third world country in a jail, right? So it gets to emotion.

I have a picture of a third world jail cell, like, with it, so you can—

you can actually make it more powerful.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, 100%. And it really helps bring people forward because it's so different than something else. And when you ask a question, your brain lights up when people ask questions. So when I teach my classes, I never say, today I'm going to cover 3 points. I always say, I'm going to answer 3 questions and frame everything as questions. It's much more engaging. So I really like that. I will often— I like taking people into the future or the past. I love what I call time-traveling language. I'll say, picture this, or what would it be like if? So I put people in that circumstance and make them either curious or desirous of it. Or I remind them, I'll say, think back to when, a time where you were really confident, or think back to when a communication didn't go the way you wanted. So what I'm doing is not only getting them to see it, I'm getting them to feel it. And now I'm also sharing some of the relevance about what I, I'm gonna take you to that point or help you avoid that other point. That's how I like to start. But there is no right way to start except to make it compelling, engaging, and not, hi, my name is.

Did I read right that you were a tour guide at one point?

You, you did. So when I was in college, I was desperate for money and it was the highest paying job I could get. So I was a tour guide. To this day, I can, if, if I were standing, I can walk backwards and talk still as a result of that training.

In order to be an effective tour guide, I assume there's some skills you gotta develop. What did you learn doing that that has helped you since then?

So, so you're setting me up for one of my most common jokes. I would say good jokes, but you can be the judge. But I will often ask my audiences, I'll say, I was a tour guide. What do you think is the most important thing they trained us? And people say, oh, tell good stories, vary your voice, be funny. No, the single most important thing they taught us, and this is very true, they said, never lose your tour group. You are a bad tour guide if you get people lost. And where I went to school, they were afraid if people got lost, they would get hurt and sue the university. So they would literally tell us, Do not lose anybody on your tour. But I took that as an analogy, as a metaphor, as a communicator. Never lose your audience.

Hmm.

We do so many things to confuse and befuddle our audience. You have to be a tour guide. What does a good tour guide do? They set expectations up front. If you don't know where you're going, you're nervous the whole time. Where am I going? Should I go to the bathroom first? Do I have to put on different shoes? No, I tell you, we're gonna go here, we're not gonna go there. So you can say, okay, I'm cool, I'm ready. And a good tour guide connects where you've been to where you're going. I cannot tell you how many people in their communication don't transition well. They just go from one point to the next. That's jarring. A good tour guide knows that you're going to wander off if they don't motivate you to move from where you are to where you want to be. So being a tour guide taught me a lot about how to communicate better, set expectations, bring people along, keep them motivated. And I'll ask you this, Ryan, Where does every tour of a college campus end? The bookstore. You need to have things people can take away, right? That's why they bring you to the bookstore.

You have to have things people can take away from your talks and from your writing. So I learned a lot as a tour guide.

So this is fresh for me. My daughter's in college, so we went on a lot of visits, and I vividly remember the one at University of Tennessee. But I'll tell you why he was so good. None of them chose Tennessee, But it did make it closer. He was funny. He told us that he was a master of dad jokes, and then he proceeded to actually follow through on that promise at the very beginning. He had a partner, so it helped, so they could play off each other. And where does humor come into play? Because this is something that is— man, it's a skill, but it's hard. And sometimes when you try and you're not funny, it's not good. How does humor play a role in this?

So what we're really talking about is engagement. Engagement is sustained attention. Attention is hard. Keeping it is even harder. And humor is what I call black belt level engagement.

Mm-hmm.

It is risky. I have 2 colleagues, Jennifer Aaker and Naomi Bagdonas. They teach with me at Stanford's Business School, and they teach a whole class on humor, levity. How do you use it as a leader? How do you use it in business? And they'll be the first to tell you that you really need to be thoughtful and test out your humor. So the first time you try a joke should not be in a high-stakes situation. You should test it out and definitely listen to what people say. Humor is a great way to connect. It's a shared experience. There are a whole bunch of neurochemicals that are released when you laugh, including those associated with affiliation. So you want to be with the people you're with, but it is risky. There are much safer ways to engage— asking questions, telling stories, getting people to do something physically, like raise their hand— that are are safer. But humor can be really useful, but you have to be careful with it. And I always advise my students and the people I coach, humor about yourself, not about others.

Let's talk about something that a lot of people claim to hate and not want to do, yet we all do it every day, and it's worth it to get good at it. And that is small talk. And I want to talk about your mother-in-law because you said that she Really, really good at this. And she has 3 words that she uses to help her be good at this. Again, I've said it in the past, hey, that's dumb. Let's just go deep real fast. I don't need small talk. But then I realized I'm having small talk all the time. I should get good at this. I should try to get better at small talk. So it's worth it. So how do we get better at small talk and what makes your mother-in-law so good at it?

Excellent. So small talk is critical. Small talk leads to big things. It has a bad rap and I think we need to rebrand small talk. I challenge everybody to think about their friendship network, their true friendship, not their social media friends. I bet everybody in their friendship network has at least one person that's a friend as a result of some kind of small talk that they had. It is just a way that we do it. It is a way that leads to deeper conversations. The challenge is most of us, one, feel very awkward in it because we don't know how to start it and we don't know how to end it. I had a woman on my show, Think Fast Talks Rachel Greenwald. She's fascinating. She's an academic and she helps people form relationships. The goal is to be interested, not interesting. And that means asking questions. The secret to small talk is asking questions and then giving space for answers. And that's where my mother-in-law was amazing. 3 simple words: tell me more. Tell me more. So you ask a question, And the person answers, and then you say, tell me more about that, from a genuine place.

It has to be authentic. So my wife is from the Midwest. I live out here in California. I am not kidding. When my mother-in-law would come visit, she would come off the plane with 2 or 3 new friends, people she did not know. And when I say new friends, I don't mean like she got their names. They would go out. They would go for coffee after she arrived to visit us. And it was because of this connection and genuine interest. So we start by observation, asking questions, and then the best way to get out— I love this, Rachel taught me this— she calls it the white flag. Not for surrender, but in auto racing, you wave the white flag right before you end the race. It's the last lap, the white flag goes out. Do the same in your small talk. Most of us end small talk by relying on biology. We say, I have to go to the bathroom, I need more food, I need something to drink. I did that once with somebody. I said, oh, thanks, this has been great. I gotta go to the bathroom. He's like, yeah, me too. And then we had a much more awkward conversation in a bad location.

But what you do is you say, I might say, hey, hey, Ryan, this has been a great conversation. In a minute, I'm gonna go over there and talk. But before we go, I wanna hear a little bit more about your trip to Tennessee. Do you see what I just did there? I signaled that this is gonna end in just a few minutes. So you're prepared, I'm prepared. But I come back with one more question that I'm genuinely interested in. After you gimme some information, I say, oh, that's great. I hope to visit Tennessee someday too. And we separate. So knowing how to start, knowing how to end takes a lot of the pressure off, and then you can just enjoy.

I love it. Daily reflection journal. This whole thing went out a few months ago that the great leaders of our history didn't reflect, they just always pushed forward. And it's so annoying when you see that because it's just nonsense. I'm not black and white on many things, but this is one of them that I am. I think the idea that that great leaders don't reflect. It just couldn't be further from the truth. The best ones I've talked to over the past 11 and a half years, 700 of these things, they reflect all the time. You have to, to try to figure out what's going well, what's not, what you could do better. You want to remember what happened during the day, so you got to document those things. So can you walk me through your daily reflection process?

Yeah. So I've journaled for as long as I can remember. And what I do every night before I go to bed is part of my journaling. I do a lot of stuff. I will write down One thing that went really well in my communication, and one thing that I didn't think went well or went poorly. And every Sunday, I spend about 5 minutes going back over the list for the week, and I make a plan. And the plan's job is to reinforce the things that went well and to work on something. So this week, I am working on paraphrasing. I have noticed last week, given circumstances I was in, I was interrupting people a lot. I was asserting my position more. than I felt was comfortable. And so what I'm doing now is I'm paraphrasing before I assert my position. So I'm saying, I heard you, and then adding my value. I'm not doing it in every conversation and everything, but that's my task for the week. And this coming Sunday, I'll assess how I did on that. So I'm not saying I'm a great communicator, but I am absolutely a better communicator for having done this reflective process.

So one thing that you've done well at the end of each day, how does knowing that those prompts are coming, how does that work as a forcing function for you?

That's really interesting that you asked that, because when I first started doing this many, many years ago, it really was— I was like, oh, this is it. That's gonna be it. This is gonna be my good thing for the day. And then I could relax. Now I don't really even think about it. I really don't. And for me, it is genuine reflection where I have to actually sit back and say, yeah, let me think about that. Where was something, you know? So it used to be front of my brain. Now it's something I just do at the end of the day. And I think that's better for me. I would hate for somebody to be so locked into, is this the good thing? Is this the bad thing? thing. So I just, at the end of the day, I just, I go back and reflect, which I enjoy actually. I am somebody who's very future-oriented and I'm really trying to savor more. And this reflection process helps me savor those really good moments in conversation and highlights how I should do other things so I can have more of those good moments.

Do you look back years and years at old journals and say, oh wow, I forgot, like that was a really good thing. Or, oh hey, you know, I messed that up 5 years ago.

Yeah, so I have, as part of my practice, there are certain key milestones every year that I, I will dedicate time to go back to, to journals and different things I've done. So, um, anniversaries, both positive and negative, New Year's. So it's not every day, but I, I definitely go back and review my, my journals. And, and I'm old school. I write in pen in a book. You know, I have a, a whole closet full of these over the years. But yeah, no, I enjoy it actually. It's, it's like being Indiana Jones into my own life.

Yeah, exactly. Okay. There's structures and frameworks Frameworks, tools. One of them, uh, I want you to go deeper on. What? So what? Now what?

What?

So what? Now what? Why is this the Swiss Army knife of structures?

I love your deep voice saying, what? So what? Now what? Uh, and I, at some point I'll be curious why you picked that one over others, but this is my favorite structure. So let me take a step back. Many of us, when we communicate, we take our audiences on a journey of our own discovery of what we wanna say while we're saying it. In other words, we just, we say too much. We live list, we itemize, we just ramble. Our brains aren't wired to remember information that's listy or rambly. It's really hard for us. So we tend to tune out or we tend to make assumptions, and that's not good. The ultimate goal of messaging is the F word, not the naughty one, but fidelity, accuracy, and clarity. I want you to understand what I'm trying to say accurately. And if I just ramble and list things off, I'm working against myself. I'm introducing noise. So structure, cognitive neuroscientists have shown, actually help us increase fidelity and remember things better, up to 40% better. Structured information is remembered 40% better, at least. So a structure is nothing more than a logical connection of ideas. I already mentioned problem, solution, benefit.

That's a logical structure. There's an issue challenge in the world. We solve it in this way and you benefit. What, so what, now what is another structure. It is a structure that works really well. For updating, informing, teaching, educating. The what is the idea you're getting across. It's the information. It could be your position, your product, whatever it is. The so what is why it's important and relevant to the person that you're speaking to. And then the now what is what comes next. Let's have another meeting, sign the contract on the bottom line, ask me what questions you have. What, so what, now what. So I'll give you a quick example. You're in a meeting and you have to give an update. The update is your what. That's what I've done. The so what is, here's why it's important to our KPIs and goals. And then now what is the next steps I'm gonna take and the contingencies in the way. Very simple. When you write an email, the subject line becomes the now what. That's what you want somebody to do. The body of the email is the what and the so what. So it becomes an easy way to compartmentalize information.

So you package it up concisely and the audience receives it well, and they can then cascade it with high fidelity. 'Cause if you think about it, it. The job of most leaders is not just to communicate, it's to communicate a message that others can repeat in a high-fidelity way. And when you structure it well, it helps.

We all— not all of us, because it doesn't sound like you do, but I use filler words. It bothers me. I tell my editor to take them out of this podcast at times when I use the word like too much. I listen to raw cuts of my conversations in order to try to improve as a communicator. I think my background's in sports. I've watched game film and of every single rep ever. I try to take the same approach to this. With that said, you've gotten better at this. You're good at this. Breathing to kill filler words sounds a lot easier than it actually is to do it. What does that mean?

Absolutely. And awareness is the first step. And I love that you listen. One of the only tools to really help you accelerate your presence and your nonverbal communication is to watch and listen to yourself. It is awful to do. It is so hard. But I tell my students, who I make watch and listen to their stuff in my class, I tell my class, it's like going to the dentist. Most people don't enjoy going to the dentist, but everybody's glad they went.

Mm-hmm.

Watch and record yourself. So the fact that you do that, Ryan, awesome. Filler words, first and foremost, having some is normal and natural. And I actually believe in a world of AI where everything can be perfect and polished, having a few disfluencies and repetitive words actually makes you more human. Because we have this authenticity crisis where I don't know if what you're saying is yours originally, or you've got an earbud in and somebody's reciting it in your ear. No, right? So when you sound human by having a few of these verbal foibles, you're okay. But the problem is, for many of us, we do too many and it gets annoying. So to get to the breathing technique, let me have you do this with me. On the count of 3, let's both say um together while exhaling. Ready? 1, 2, 3.

Um.

Um. Very good. Now I want you to try to say um while inhaling and see how hard it is. Ready? 1, 2, 3. You can't do it. You can't speak while inhaling. Speaking is an exit-only event. You have to be pushing air out. And here's the trick: the ums and filler words and likes and all of that that bother us the most are the ones that come in silence. So when I'm done speaking, um, and then I start speaking again, that sits out there because there's nothing else going on. So if we train ourselves to end every sentence and every phrase out of breath, What must I do before I start speaking again? I have to inhale. And you just demonstrated, you can't say, um, you can't say like, in fact, you can't say anything. You build in a pause and pauses are good in communication. So this is hard because all of us have been breathing the way we breathe when we speak since we've been born, or since we've started speaking around the age of 1. So we need to retrain ourselves. How do you do it? You read out loud lists.

Hmm.

Because a list, at the end of every point of a list, just practice being out of breath. So I might bring up my calendar for the day. I mean, I bring up my calendar 100 times a day. I will read 1 or 2 times a day what I have out loud, and then I just speak and land my phrase at the end of each one. So if you practice that for a week and begin to develop that, you will reduce the filler words you have that come between sentences, cuz you're training yourself to end on a complete exhalation. And then you start speaking again, and no filler word will fit in that spot.

Do you record your own audiobooks?

I do. So my latest book, Think Faster, Talk Smarter, one of the hardest things I've ever done, because I am not good as a scripted person. I am much better spontaneously, which is what the book is about, spontaneous communication. And there's somebody in your ear who's reading along with And because of the ADA rules, American with Disabilities Act, I have to read it exactly as it's written. And I'll skip over a word or I'll mispronounce something. It's hard.

With that said, I think it can help you because there are no filler words. You are getting a lot of repetition. I agree with you. I've done it 4 times and they are usually 3 or 4 days each book. They're brutal days, but I feel like that practice has helped me as a communicator.

Yeah, I agree. And in fact, I encourage people to read out loud for many reasons. One is for filler words and awareness, but also because the words are on the page, you begin to be able to play with things because you don't have to think of the words to say. You're also building what I call vocal stamina. Now, you speak a lot. But most leaders aren't used to speaking for long periods of time. Very few people listening and watching this would wake up one morning and say, I want to run a marathon, and just go run. No, they'd train first. If you want to run a marathon, you got to train. Reading out loud is like running on a treadmill. It's a proxy to train yourself, to build that vocal stamina, to understand your breathwork, to understand pauses and filler words. So it's really helpful, and I encourage everybody to read out loud. It doesn't matter to me what you read. read, just read out loud. Reading your book is great.

A couple things before we go. Costco credibility. Okay, there's, there's different types of credibility. I love Costco, so I love their whole story, everything they're all about. So the difference between LinkedIn and resume versus Costco credibility, what is this?

So credibility is really important in today's world. It's critically important. I distinguish between career and college credibility and Costco credibility. Career and college is your background, What you've done—it's what goes on LinkedIn. It's what goes on a resume. It's important. It's important. That background is important. It definitely gives you some credibility. But when you go to Costco, you and many of those listening, and when I go, they give free samples away. Why do they give free samples away? Why? You try it. You go, "That's really good. I want to buy it." You have an experience of it. They're showing you their value. Many of us get locked into demonstrating our competence. By listing all the credentials that we have. Show people, tell them stories, give them examples, leverage testimonials. That demonstrates your credibility versus telling people. Now, ultimately, you want to blend them both. But many people over-index on what I call college and career credibility. So think about ways you can show your credibility. What stories can you tell? What accolades can you highlight? What testimonials can you leverage? leverage. That's what I mean by Costco credibility.

What was the word you used to describe me before we started recording again?

So you have a lovely voice. I'm, I'm very voice sensitive. Oh, mellifluous. It just means a deep resonant voice. I can listen to, to your voice and people with deep resonant voice, men and women. I just, I really like voices. My father had an amazing deep voice. My father, I can only remember him ever yelling at my brother and me once. He just had such a deep voice that he didn't have to yell. He would just say stop and the world would stop. You know, a James Earl Jones-like voice, really.

Awesome. One more question before we run, Matt. This is called the champagne question. You probably heard me ask it if you listen to the show. That is, fast forward exactly one year from today, you're surrounded by the people you love and you're popping bottles, spraying all over each other, celebrating like crazy. What are you celebrating?

I am celebrating with the people who mean the most to me, the impact that the work I have had and the hard work others have done to really bring forward the importance of communication and having people be more confident, clear, and compelling in what they do. It is a great joy to me to see people communicate well. I happen to believe that our world needs to hear everybody's voice and you need to be able to communicate clearly to do that. So I am celebrating whenever anybody feels good and confident in their communication.

How do you know when you've achieved that? Do you just get daily emails from people? You hear from students, all of the above? Like, how do you know?

So I have the good fortune of people share with me the value they've taken from my work or derivatives thereof. So yeah, I, I, you put a podcast out in the world, you know, I do the same thing and I'll get an email from a place where I have to go to Google and say, where is that place? And Somebody will say, I listened to an episode and I feel like it helped me get my job, or it helped me resolve this conflict I had with this. That to me warms my heart. You know more than probably anybody how hard it is to do podcasts and write books, but when you hear the value that it provides to somebody, that, that's— it means the world to me.

It's the juice, man. I tell you, every time. It never, ever, ever gets old, no matter how many times, in person, email, text, whatever, to feel like you're making a positive impact.

Absolutely.

In somebody's life. I don't know, man. It's everything. It really is the gas that fuels me up. I'm sure it fuels you up to keep going, especially, especially on those days when you're tired, it gets hard, you got a million things going on, you got life plus work. That is fuel. So yeah, I think we share that. Think faster, talk smarter. Matt, you're seriously a guy that I would love to regularly have conversations with, Both with microphones and maybe without, because I love your aura, the— what you bring to conversations, not just this one, which has been awesome, but other ones I've watched. I've been a fan of your work, and it's been cool to get a chance to have this conversation with you. So thank you so much for being here.

Well, thank you for the kind compliments and for the insightful questions, and I would absolutely be up for conversations with mics, without mics, with beers, out in the wild, Whatever.

Love it, man. Do you ever come back to the Midwest or, well, I mean, I can get out there too.

Oh yeah, absolutely. We, we still have family. I'm in the, I'm in the Midwest at least a couple times a year. Love it. Love it.

All right. Well, where would you send listeners to learn more about you online?

Thank you. I'd love everybody to go to fastersmarter.io. That's where you'll learn a lot about the podcast, Think Fast, Talk Smart. You can always check out mattabrahams.com for lots of resources and other things too.

Thank you. Love it. Thanks so much, man. As I said, we're going to continue this dialogue as we both progress. I really Appreciate it.

Thank you. Enjoy.

It is the end of the Podcast Club. Thank you for being a member of the End of the Podcast Club. If you are, send me a note, ryan@learningleader.com. Let me know what you learned from this great conversation with Matt Abrahams. A few takeaways from my notes. Start your next talk or meeting like an action movie. Cut the credentials and the agenda opening. Lead with a provocative question, a surprising stat, or a story that shows the audience what's in it for them within the first 30 seconds. Earn their attention by delivering value, not by doing some random introduction of yourself. Next, to be interesting, be interested. This is something we've talked about a lot over the years on this podcast. Tell me more in your next conversation. This is the simplest small talk upgrade there is. Ask a question, then genuinely follow up. Matt's mother-in-law uses these 3 words to connect deeply with people. And then know, feel, do. Before your next presentation, write down one sentence for each. What you want people to know, how you want them to feel, And what you want them to do, and then build the talk from there. Once again, I want to say thank you so much for continuing to spread the message and telling a friend or two, hey, you should listen to this episode of The Learning Leader Show with Matt Abrahams.

I think it'll help you become a more effective leader because you continue to do that. And you also go to Spotify and Apple Podcasts and you subscribe to the show. You rate it hopefully 5 stars. You write a thoughtful review. By doing all of that, you are giving me the opportunity to do what I love on a daily basis, and for that I will forever be grateful. Thank you so, so much. Talk to you soon. Can't wait.