Do You Want to be Less Long-Winded?
I’m a career and personal coach. Few people hire me to help them be less long-winded. But when I experience a client as long-winded, I offer to help fix that because long-winded people tend to do poorly in trying to land a job and on the job, and in their personal life.
Behavioral tactics
I usually start by teaching my clients one or more of these tactics:
The traffic-light rule: During the first 30 seconds of an utterance, your light is green. In the next 30 seconds, it’s yellow — The chances are increasing they’d appreciate your stopping because they don’t want to forget what they want to say or simply because they want a conversation, not a lecture. At 60, your light is red: Yes, rarely you’ll want to run a red light but usually not. At 60, stop or ask a question. If they want to know more, they can ask.
Nearly every client likes the traffic-light rule…in theory. In practice, even when I ask them to remind themselves of it before every conversation, in the heat of battle, they too often forget.
Occasionally the reason the traffic-light rule fails is that the client doesn’t have a good sense of how long 30 seconds is. In those cases, we practice with a timer. I tell them to start talking and stop at 30. They’re usually shocked when the timer chimes. If that bit of in-session practice isn’t enough, I ask them to practice for homework.
The 40–60 rule. As a rule of thumb, in a two-person conversation, you want to talk a little less than half the time. You’re aiming to talk roughly 40 percent of the time and the other person 60.
Forced distillation. Sometimes, a client is long-winded because s/he doesn’t try hard enough to distill. I say, “Let’s say you had to get the essence of your point across in 30 seconds, how would you do it?”
That tactic is the least likely to succeed because it’s usually not just a matter of trying. Some people don’t think clearly enough, especially in the moment, to be able to separate wheat from chaff.
Digging deeper
When those behavioral tactics don’t work well enough, I go deeper. I ask questions to unearth why they talk a lot:
Nervousness about silence. They fail to realize that the silence is usually better than filling it. Often the other person wants time to think about what you said or what s/he wants to say. If you’re always filling the silence, you’re denying that opportunity.
Feeling they’re interesting when they’re not. No one tries to be boring but we all know that some people, especially when they get on a roll, are boring. I ask my clients, “Do you think that might apply to you?” I’ll say something like, “Get out of your head and think about the other person. How confident are you that your missive will interest them?” Like all my tactics, that one succeeds enduringly only with some clients. All my clients like the concept, agree to keep it top-of-mind, but too often get on the aforementioned roll and prattle on.
Trying to impress. Some people erroneously think that talking a lot is impressive. It rarely is. More often, it’s seen as egotistical or at minimum, boring. Again, nearly every client says that makes sense but they end up not sustainably motivated to quell their diarrhea of the mouth.
Talking long to gain clarity. Many people gain clarity about something by talking it out. They fail to realize that they often pay a high price for that clarity: being perceived as boring and egotistical and, in turn, being less liked, professionally and personally.
If you’re long-winded, you might pick one or two of the aforementioned tactics, write it on your palm, and right before every conversation, read it aloud and promise yourself that you don’t want to be long-winded.
I read this aloud on YouTube.
Marty Nemko is a career and personal coach. His new book is, How to Do Life. You can reach Marty at mnemko@comcast.net.
