The Art of Human Conversation
In the rush to join the latest online conversational offering, it seems we have lost the art of face to face conversation (if we ever had it in the first instance). Earlier this week, I attended an MBA open evening for INSEAD. This esteemed institution boasts an average of 30 nationalities per year “each is eager to share best practices with people from other cultures and other industries”. The MBA’s are finance sector heavy, followed by the enterprise then a varierty of other indsutries. And at €90,000, it justifiable needs to be something pretty special as they develop business leaders of tomorrow..
As I enter the doors of Le Meridien Piccadilly, I am excited about the prospect of meeting some interesing individuals who I have nothing in common with but the fact that we’re all considering an MBA at INSEAD. When I enter the refreshments room, it’s buzzing with chatter so I head over to get my peppermint tea (I suppose they were worried we’d all be pissed by the time the presentation itself started). I grab a free space on a table, put down my tea and look to my fellow table huggers to make eye contact – not a bloody sausage. Everyone conveniently had their heads down in the brochure given out upon entry. Now, I can appreciate that been in the company of unknown individuals can be uncomfortable but we were all adults with a common factor here. So, I open my brochure and follow suit. After downing my tea and looking round the room rather awkwardly, I saw an opportunity to pounce. The guy diagonally opposite me, looked up. Feeling like a hunter capturing it’s prey, I said “Ok, I’ve got to say something. It just feels rude to be standing by a table full of people and not introduce yourself”. And I did, everyone breathed a sigh of relief. Six business executives round a table yet nobody was comfortable or confident enough to simply say “Hello, I am …”
How is it possible for individuals to connect with other individuals on social media sites that they have an either tenous or no link with yet given the opportunity to do so face to face and we’re struck dumb?
Later that week, I was at the 140 Characters Conference. Again the one thing we had in common was our interest in the event subject. At one of the mornng sessions, the panel chair asked everyone stand up, turn around and introduce themselves to the person behind them. Now this a bit awkard as it meant we’s all talking to someone’s back but everyone followed introducing to the person front and back – ice broken. From then on in, it was a series of “What do you think so far” while queueing in Starbucks or simply contributing to another groups conversation. The real high came when after the event when I introduced myself to one of speakers. That one moment turned an interesting day to one of the most enjoyable I’d had in a long time. I was invited to a dinner and networking evening. While, we didn’t make it to the networking party I had dinner with nine people I’d never met, five of whom were speakers.
Whether it was the context or the culture of the industry of the attendees that made the difference, I’m still left to ponder. But in an age where we are led to believe that we’re all making connections, the bravado of talking to strangers online has still not seeped into most day to day settings. We are still paralysed by fear.
The irony of the INSEAD evening was that there was a Japanese advertising exec from Dentsu currently an intern at Naked Communications and I know a fair few people from Naked. The Italian guy standing next him worked at the Mitsubishi Bank, the Japanese guy’s best friend worked in his department. A woman from the legal department of The Mitsubishi Bank joined us but the Italian guy has never met or dealt with her until then (he’d dealt with her colleagues). Here we were, four supposed strangers around a table who had more in common than simply wanting to do an MBA.
