You talk too much! The cost of conversation.
When I finished my last class at GVSU, one thing stuck in my head; a conversation is worth a million. What exactly did that mean? It’s the value of the conversation, no only to you, but to the other party. What is the actual worth — is there information to be shared, a story to be told or even in recruiting, a job to be done or offered.
Every conversation has meaning, has value, and impact. It is not meaningless unless we value it as insignificant. The art of conversation is a necessary skill for almost everything in life. Discussions introduce you to people, talented people who could be your mentors, employers, employees, partners, or friends. Without conversations as the foundation for those relationships, you’ll have a hard time building a social circle, starting a business, or advancing your career.
I think there are ten reasons that conversations are so valuable they drive almost everything we believe, understand, and do:
- It’s better to know. Maybe we say and feel that we don’t want to know how bad it is, but when we say that we already imagine the worst. The truth is usually not that bad, and that truth often emerges from the conversation.
- We like reassurance that what we feel and think sense to us. The fastest way to get that reassurance is to converse, to share because from conversation come the nods of understanding, the appreciation, the sympathetic ideas, and the empathy that make what we feel and think more bearable, more sensible.
- It’s how we learn. We learn best by doing, by watching others, and by asking questions, and all three processes are improved through intelligent conversation. Tell me, how/why did you do that? Show me again, and this time talk me through it. Now let me try and tell me how I’m doing at each step.
- It’s how we decide. The best decisions are informed by ‘the wisdom of crowds,’ by consultation, by talking through the options, by consensus.
- It’s how we resolve conflict. The conversation is how we ‘talk out’ our differences. When we discuss our respective viewpoints respectfully and openly, an appreciation of the other person’s feelings, beliefs, and rationale can emerge, and the misunderstanding that usually underlies the conflict can be dissipated.
- It leads to intention, and hence to action. Often an event or learning will lead us to a sense of urgency to act, but not give us the wisdom of what effect to take. Conversation, once it has reassured us that our instinct to act is valid, can help us surface and learn some of the options to work, and hence propel us into action. And when we converse, we often state our commitment, our intention to act, and having a witness to that intention can also push us to work on it.
- It clarifies, in our minds, what we care about and hence who we are. What we care about defines who we are, so when we have a conversation that helps us understand whether and to what degree we care about an issue, and why, we come to understand and know ourselves better. That makes us more useful in many ways, and in the process, it probably makes us happier.
- With practice, it improves our social fluency and other critical capacities and competencies. The chart below shows the blue circle, in concert with our knowledge and thinking competencies enable us to be usefully expressive (artistic and improvisational, and hence socially fluent) is all about the capacity for and practice of conversation.
- With practice, it teaches us the critical appreciative skills of listening and attention. Every conversation is a dance, and you have to be pretty insensitive not to realize that if you always lead and dominate the conversation, soon people won’t want to dance with you anymore. And of course, we learn more when we pay attention, really listen to what others are saying.
- It opens us to new possibilities. Although often in conversation, we are seeking reassurance, attention, and appreciation, and sometimes we will be surprised, bowled over, astonished, to hear something, or to realize something that changes us radically, opens us to new ideas and worldviews, breaks our heart. That is the key to innovation and resilience, and good conversation can expose us and keep us open to these mind-altering, heart-breaking new possibilities.
Even the conversation we have with ourselves when we read something stimulating is substantially illiterate — it’s more about acknowledging what we feel, and tapping into our instincts than it is an intellectual word-conversation.
These ten ‘values’ of conversation make us more competent, more human, more appreciative, more collaborative. It is not the start of the conversation, but building the relationship that would create a life-long conversationalist. Over the last few months, I have read and heard more conversations about building a link or an emotional connection with each other that keeps us talking, conversing, and even coming back to your business. No wonder conversation makes us happy.
