-
What could interest me in the person I am talking to?
-
What do I already know about the person I’m talking to?
-
Which topics could be suitable?
-
How does he find…?
The best thing to do is to find common ground. The quickest commonality you can find is the place, environment and occasion that brought you together. Meet your client in the theater, talk about the nice atmosphere of the theater or how well attended the performance is.
Ask questions about the location where you are meeting your business partner. Does he know his way around? Can he make recommendations for restaurants or things to do. If not, where does he come from? And you’re already in conversation.
Another way to open a conversation is to give a serious compliment to my potential conversation partner. This has the nice side effect that you immediately said something sympathetic.
Active listening
This doesn’t just mean nodding and saying “yes” or “hmm” every now and then, but also the ability to remember what was said in passing. A question might have an answer with more than just one piece of information. Remember this additional information and incorporate it again later. Along the lines of: “You mentioned earlier that you…”
The topics of conversation
The range of what we can talk about is long. And with some topics of conversation you have to ask questions to find out whether they are suitable for the person I’m talking to or not. Much more important, however, are the taboo topics.
Avoid any topics that are polarizing. You can easily fall into the trap of the person you are talking to having a different opinion than you on a topic. Typically this includes the following topics: politics and religion. Some sports can also be disastrous, just think of supporters of various football clubs.
