Latest / Linen Suit & Plastic Tie / Why Connection Beats Perfection? ft. a Stanford MBA Professor (Matt Abrahams)

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Why Connection Beats Perfection? ft. a Stanford MBA Professor (Matt Abrahams) · Linen Suit & Plastic Tie

0:06
Hello, hello, welcome, welcome to the linen suit and Plastic
0:10
Tie podcast. This is the podcast where we
0:13
work to dissect, analyze, investigate, explore the
0:16
amazing, the epic, the are inspiring, the cool, the
0:19
impressive, the inspiring power of storytelling and learn how to
0:23
harness that power in your everyday lives.
0:27
I'm going. And I'm Kevin, and that was
0:30
inspiring twice. So yes, it is doubly inspiring.
0:33
Actually the first time was awe inspiring and the second time
0:36
was just generic inspiring which means different things.
0:39
So one inspires awe and one just generally inspires.
0:43
Anyways, I was watching this master class the other day with
0:47
a professor from Northwestern and she was talking about how
0:51
one way to de stress after a long day is to sit and watch an
0:55
hour long narrative form of story time.
0:58
Because we have been using TikTok and YouTube choice in
1:02
these these formats so much. It's actually causing more
1:06
anxiety for when you kind of sit on a couch and rot.
1:09
And I'm it's just fascinating because I was saying I said this
1:11
to you cab the other day. We've gotten to a point in
1:13
society where we're now being told them one of the ways we can
1:17
de stress and D connect is just sit and watch a full narrative
1:21
hour long television show. Like it's no longer turn off all
1:24
technology, go outside. I'm sure that's better.
1:27
But she's like, I know you feel like relaxing and sitting on
1:29
your couch and scrolling through TikTok.
1:31
It's not watch a full narrative form.
1:36
We're now at a point where people are like, well, you know,
1:38
for your own mental health. Watch an hour of Sopranos.
1:41
Yeah, it's a pretty funny narrative that the best way to
1:45
unwind from being distracted is paying attention.
1:49
A little counterintuitive. The best relaxation thing you
1:52
can do for yourself is to focus on something.
1:55
Focus on thing you enjoy, though.
1:57
Focus is not the enemy of relaxation.
2:00
If you are mindlessly scrolling on your couch and you're not
2:03
feeling more relaxed, odds are it's because you're not actually
2:06
focusing on something. So it's better to put down the
2:09
phone and turn on the television show and watch an hour long
2:12
narrative because you can focus in on that and disconnect while
2:16
focusing on something. That disconnecting while jumping
2:19
from fame to fame, that's where your mind gets more exhausted.
2:23
Yeah, and we actually talk quite a bit about an aspect of paying
2:29
attention this season on the show.
2:32
When we kicked off our season premiere with Professor Allison,
2:35
with Brooks about talking, we talked about how the biggest
2:40
enemy to having a good conversation is distraction is
2:45
not paying attention. And there's something that
2:48
happened to us as well is we're not actively listening and
2:53
paying attention to what the other person is saying.
2:56
You know, you're not going to drive the concept conversation.
2:59
Well, we're not going to be good hosts.
3:02
We're not going to be able to know how to ask the next best
3:05
follow up question to what our guest is just talking about.
3:08
And I think I've seen it with myself sometimes where I'll be
3:11
talking to someone and if they don't get to their point in a
3:13
minute, I'm like kind of like, OK, come on.
3:15
Like, well, I'm like, if this minute didn't serve me or help
3:18
this conversation sometimes. And my brain can sometimes be
3:20
like, OK, what are we doing? Because with TikTok, as we get
3:23
into social media, as you build different Tik Toks, you watch
3:25
all these videos on, OK, this is where you put the hook.
3:28
This is where you engage. And this is where you tell the
3:29
story. Bam, one TikTok, one minute, you
3:33
one TikTok one minute. And you just did this whole
3:35
journey, right? And it's it's a psychological
3:38
trick to get people liking content, moving through, seeing
3:40
a bunch of different stuff. But at the same time, in life,
3:44
things take longer than a minute.
3:46
And if we shorten our attention spans too much, our
3:50
conversations are going to become very difficult.
3:53
And so I think this is the thing with communication and this is
3:56
the thing with we're constantly talking about consumer diversity
3:59
of storytelling. If you want to tell any stories
4:01
to agenda the audience, they are odds are on TikTok.
4:04
And you have to understand that platform to connect with them,
4:07
but also take the time to consume different forms of
4:10
storytelling. I love going to the movies,
4:12
turning off the phone, experiencing a cinema.
4:14
I have to remind myself having my phone off and watching a full
4:18
movie is healthy. Going to kickbox for an hour is
4:22
healthy. The stories you consume matter,
4:25
but also the story, the ways you consume.
4:28
Storytelling matters. Just diversify your palate and
4:31
try different things and you can find ways to live a healthier
4:36
life. Expand your attention span and
4:39
overall connective audiences differently.
4:41
And to explore how to better pay attention and engage in a
4:46
conversation better. This week we are talking with
4:50
yet another expert in how to talk.
4:53
We are talking with Professor Matt Abrams from Stanford
4:57
Graduate School of Business. He teaches a very successful MBA
5:03
class about how to talk better because that is obviously a
5:07
focus of Business School students, but obviously the
5:11
world at large because we as humans need to talk or
5:15
communicate. And Matt hosts a podcast called
5:18
Thinkfast Talk Smart, which further explores this topic.
5:22
Also, a book that stems from his teachings, Think Faster, Talk
5:28
Smarter. So we're going to learn about
5:31
how do you get yourself to pay attention better, to talk
5:34
better? How does doing the wrong thing
5:37
actually helps you communicate better?
5:40
What does martial arts have to do in you becoming a better
5:44
communicator? So without further ado, let's
5:47
get into it. Hello, how do you do?
5:53
Sit down, gather around. We've got stories about stories
5:59
that'll. Make you a dream.
6:01
Of wonder Amnesty The ride can be dry.
6:04
Better dressed for the time with the Lin Minsuk and blasting tie.
6:12
Lin Minsuk and blasting TIE now here's Goriven Gavin.
6:21
Kick us off. Can you tell us a little bit
6:24
about yourself? What is your story?
6:27
Yeah, so I'm somebody who is passionate about communication.
6:30
As long as I can remember, it's been something that's really
6:33
been interesting to me and a significant part of my life.
6:36
My father was a lawyer where clear, concise communication was
6:41
really important. My mother was a an elementary
6:44
school teacher, later in English as a second language teacher,
6:47
where creativity, engagement, really empowering people through
6:51
language and communication. And it's something that I just
6:54
soaked into me. I'm I'm somebody who's really
6:56
passionate about it. Went to to university, I studied
7:00
psychology, discovered communication as a field, got a
7:03
graduate degree in that worked in high tech for about a decade
7:07
and saw the impact of effective communication and not effective
7:10
communication and storytelling. And then had the opportunity to
7:14
come back to my true passion, which is teaching.
7:16
And I've been teaching ever since.
7:17
And today I teach at Stanford's Graduate School of Business.
7:20
I've been there 15 years. I teach strategic communication
7:23
and a large part of what we do is help our students feel more
7:25
comfortable and confident telling their own stories and
7:29
helping craft the of the businesses that they end up
7:31
working for and running. I love that for this season
7:34
we're spending so much time exploring communications, of
7:37
course, and the kind of studying to language itself.
7:41
English is my second language, so English as second language
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learning is a big part of my life.
7:48
Are there anything from observing how your mother went
7:53
about her work in ESL teaching that really influenced you?
7:58
That you can identify, whether explicitly or implicitly.
8:02
Yeah, so I am very interested in non-native speaking.
8:05
Many of the people who listen to my podcast, Think Fast Talk
8:08
Smart, are non-native speakers. I've had several guests on who
8:11
are experts in that. And to synthesize what my
8:14
mother, I observed my mother teach and what I've heard from
8:17
these experts, it really boils down to just a few things.
8:20
One, don't try to be a native speaker.
8:23
The pressure we put on ourselves to speak that other language as
8:26
if we were native actually works against us, and it's a cognitive
8:30
load issue. The goal of all communication,
8:32
this doesn't matter if you're speaking in your native tongue
8:35
or one that's newer to you, is to connect with your audience,
8:39
to get information across. The definition of communication
8:42
in its origins is the word to make common.
8:45
So communication is all about making common and connecting.
8:48
So rather than focusing on saying it exactly right or the
8:52
way a native speaker would say it, focus on just getting the
8:55
point across, which means you might repeat yourself.
8:58
You might say it once and then tell a story or say it once and
9:01
use an analogy. And I saw my mother, who was
9:04
expert at demonstrating this, but also encouraged her students
9:08
to do it. And the thing that it did is it
9:10
takes the pressure off. So the number one rule is, is
9:13
just focus on connecting rather than sounding like a native
9:16
speaker. And then the next thing is
9:18
observation. You know, we learn a lot about
9:21
our communication by observing others.
9:23
If you want to be a good writer, read a lot of people who've
9:25
written well. If you want to become a good
9:27
speaker, observe. And it's not just what people
9:30
say or when they say it, but it's also the context.
9:33
One of the hardest things to learn, as you well know, in any
9:35
language, is, is the contextual meaning of words.
9:38
For example, if you're going to the doctor and the doctor says
9:42
how are you doing? That means one thing.
9:44
If you're at a party or at a bar and somebody says how are you
9:48
doing? That could mean something very
9:49
different. So the contextual learnings are
9:52
hard, and you get that through observation.
9:55
You know, something you talk about a lot in your podcast, in
9:58
your book, in your teachings is this idea of perfection, right?
10:02
This idea that we are kind of chasing perfection in
10:05
communication and in story time, and that's causing all this
10:09
undue pressure. You, you obviously work in a
10:12
very ambitious, strong driving community.
10:16
How do you tackle perfectionism and communication?
10:19
How do you get people to break down that built up story in the
10:23
head about everything has to be perfect?
10:25
Yeah. And that's a great question.
10:27
So I like to say connection over perfection.
10:29
So one of the things that drives us is we want to get our message
10:36
across. When you communicate, you have
10:37
something to get across. And we put a lot of pressure on
10:40
ourselves to say it the right way, as if there is a right way.
10:45
I mean, the reality is I've been studying this and doing this
10:47
work for decades. There is no one right way to
10:50
communicate. There are better ways and worse
10:52
ways. And when we put that pressure on
10:54
ourselves to do it right, whatever that is, we get in our
10:58
own way. It's a cognitive bandwidth
11:00
issue. You know, on your laptop, your
11:02
tablet, your phone, if you have multiple apps or Windows open,
11:06
each one of those individual apps or, or windows is
11:09
performing less well because the others are open.
11:12
It's taking some of that CPU bandwidth.
11:14
Your brain's the same way. If I have a script that I've
11:17
memorized or there's a certain way, I want to say this, this
11:20
part I am judging as I'm saying it.
11:23
So I have less bandwidth available.
11:26
So it's important rather again, to say it's about just getting
11:30
the point across. I just want to get the
11:32
information so the other person learns it.
11:34
And when I do that, that's success.
11:37
Success is not saying it exactly the right way.
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Now, there are circumstances I, I realize this, where you do
11:44
have to say things exactly right.
11:45
If you're doing something in a negotiation, if you're in the
11:48
legal world, yes, there is a way that it must be said, but that's
11:52
not most of our communication. That's a strict subset of our
11:56
communication. If you'll allow me.
11:58
I want to share a story about how much we judge ourselves and
12:02
get in our own way. I do this game.
12:04
I borrowed it from improvisation.
12:06
I Co teach a class at Stanford's continuing studies with a a
12:08
gentleman who's an expert improviser and a screenwriter
12:11
who teaches screen writing at Stanford.
12:12
His name's Adam Tobin and Adam taught me this game.
12:15
It's called Shout the Wrong name.
12:17
And any of your listeners, viewers can can play this game
12:20
for 15 seconds wherever you are. Just point at different objects
12:24
in the room and just call them something different.
12:27
So if I point at the ceiling, I might call it a car, I might
12:31
call it a lemon. It does not matter.
12:33
Just call it something other than what it is.
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And I do this in one of the first activities in my class I
12:39
teach because the students come to realize just how much they
12:43
judge themselves. I had a student once playing
12:46
this game. The only rule is point to
12:48
something and call it something it is not.
12:50
And I had a student who is pointing at a chair and nothing
12:53
was coming out of his mouth. And I went to him.
12:55
I said, what's going on? He said, I'm not being wrong
12:58
enough. And I thought that was weird
13:00
because I never assigned a rubric of wrongness and
13:03
rightness. I just say, call it the wrong
13:05
name. And I said, tell me more.
13:07
And he said, well, I was going to call the chair a cat, but a
13:09
cat has four legs and a chair has four legs.
13:11
I'm not being wrong enough. And then he said sometimes cats
13:15
sit on chairs. I'm not being wrong enough.
13:17
And I tell this story because it gives an example of how much we
13:22
judge and evaluate and strive to do it right.
13:26
He was doing this so much he couldn't do it at all.
13:29
He completely failed at the activity because he was trying
13:32
to do it right. So the whole idea here is to
13:35
dial down the volume on that perfectionism and really just
13:40
try to connect and do what's needed in the moment.
13:43
I'm certainly not saying don't judge what you say.
13:45
We need to think about it. But most of us are running
13:47
around with that setting at 11 when we could bring it down to a
13:50
three or four and survive just fine.
13:52
Sorry, you got me on a on a topic I'm really passionate
13:55
about. So I went on a little more than
13:56
probably I should have. No, no, I mean, we we love a
14:00
tangent here, but no, no, I think Kevin I huge
14:04
perfectionist, right for two people who that was one of our
14:07
biggest struggles of starting the show is because we knew it
14:09
was going to be bad, but we just had to start.
14:12
And so this is something we love talking about because it's a
14:14
story, right? Perfectionism is just a story
14:16
we're telling ourselves that it needs to be a way to be quote,
14:20
UN quote, successful. So we love talking about.
14:22
And I think with that, though, it's pretty natural when you're
14:26
trying to do achieve that doing the wrong thing kind of goal.
14:33
Yeah, there's a certain level of anxiety that comes with that,
14:38
obviously, because, you know, we always at least want to try to
14:42
do things right. How do we navigate that anxiety
14:46
then is unnecessarily a bad thing?
14:49
How do we leverage that? Yeah.
14:51
So anxiety is normal and natural.
14:53
Those of us who study it, and I've done research in this and
14:57
many others, do we believe it's part of being human?
15:00
It is normal and natural to be nervous when you speak in high
15:03
stakes situations. In fact, 85% of people report
15:07
being nervous in those circumstances.
15:09
And quite frankly, I think the other 15% are lying.
15:12
I think we could create a situation that makes them
15:14
nervous, too. We see this anxiety across
15:17
cultures, so it's not just here in the US, and we see it develop
15:21
at a pretty particular time in children's development into
15:25
young adults around the tween years is when anxiety around
15:29
speaking in front of others really amps up in most people.
15:33
So this leads us to think it's just innate.
15:34
It's part of being human, but that doesn't mean we can't learn
15:37
to manage it. You can manage it and you should
15:40
because it helps you and it helps your audience when you see
15:43
a nervous speaker. Let me ask you this, how do you
15:45
both feel when you see somebody nervous speaking?
15:47
How's that make you feel? I think as someone who struggles
15:52
with anxiety in immense ways, I think there's a lot of empathy
15:55
for me. I feel nervous for the person
15:58
and I'm just like sitting there like I really wanted to go well
16:01
for that person. Yeah, absolutely.
16:04
So you feel that second hand anxiety, right?
16:07
And, and in essence, I, I love that you're empathetic, which is
16:10
great and many of us are. But what's happening is you're
16:13
being distracted by that person's nervousness.
16:15
And if the goal is to connect and to actually land the
16:18
message, me making you nervous as my audience is not helping
16:21
me. So we need to learn to manage
16:24
it, not just to help ourselves because if it doesn't feel good
16:26
to be nervous and it can be distracting to ourselves, but
16:28
it's also distracting to the other person.
16:30
So there are things we can do to manage our anxiety and it's a 2
16:33
pronged approach. You have to manage symptoms and
16:35
sources. Symptoms are the things that we
16:37
physiologically feel, rapid heart rate, shaky hands, dry
16:41
mouth, sweaty brow. And then there's sources, things
16:45
that initiate and exacerbate. We've talked about one of the
16:48
sources already, perfectionism. There are other sources as well,
16:51
like the goal you have. Many of the people I coach are
16:55
nervous because of the goal they have when they communicate.
16:58
My students want to get a good grade.
16:59
The salesperson wants to close the deal.
17:01
You might want to get your project supported.
17:04
And what makes you nervous is the potential of not achieving
17:07
it. And there's some things we can
17:09
do to manage against that source of your fear.
17:13
So if the goal is causing you to be nervous, a goal is nothing
17:17
more than a future state. So getting yourself present
17:20
oriented by definition should sort circuit the long term goal.
17:24
So being present helps. So how do you get present?
17:27
Do something physical. Walk around the building, listen
17:29
to a song or a playlist like athletes do before they perform.
17:33
Start at 100 and count backwards by a challenging number like
17:37
seventeens. That gets you present oriented.
17:40
I say tongue twisters before I start speaking.
17:44
That gets me present oriented. You can't say a tongue twister,
17:46
right? Not be in the present moment and
17:48
it warms up your voice. Before we logged on today, I
17:50
said a tongue twister a few times just to warm up.
17:53
So things you can do to manage sources and there are many
17:56
things you can do to manage symptoms.
17:57
The single best one is to do deep breathing and focus on the
18:01
exhalation. All of the magic happens on the
18:03
exhale. So the rule of thumb, or I like
18:05
to joke, the rule of lung, is you want your exhale to be twice
18:08
as long as your inhale. If you do those things, you can
18:11
begin to feel more confident. I love that Kevin knows this and
18:15
I think it's made it into the show a couple times, but I do a
18:18
version of Sharpay's vocal exercises from High School
18:21
Musical before we start every one of these shows.
18:24
Ron though, it's I'm not actually doing the vocal
18:26
exercise, I'm just doing the sounds.
18:29
But it's just a way to like shock your system and get you
18:31
presents. That's one thing I love about
18:33
your work as well as I take mindfulness very seriously and I
18:35
take, yes, how I do with my anxiety very seriously.
18:37
And you talk about it as such. Key tools in communication.
18:43
Mindfulness is really important. Being present is important.
18:47
If communication is about connection, the only way to
18:50
connect is to be present while you're having that
18:52
communication. And many of us live in our
18:55
heads, myself included, right thinking about did I say the
18:59
right thing? What could I say better?
19:01
What am I going to have for lunch?
19:02
What's next? All of this lives in our head
19:05
and gets in the way of us effectively communicating.
19:09
And there's actually some really interesting mindfulness based
19:12
anxiety management techniques. A great one is this, when you
19:15
begin to feel nervous, say to yourself, this is me feeling
19:19
nervous. And what this does is it builds
19:22
distance between you and your experience of nervousness.
19:25
You are separating yourself from that.
19:27
And when you do that, you give yourself space.
19:31
You can say, this is me feeling nervous.
19:32
It makes sense. I'm nervous.
19:33
I'm on a podcast with some really impressive people.
19:36
Others, I don't know are going to hear this.
19:38
Anybody in this circumstance is likely to feel nervous.
19:41
And that space I gave myself by saying this is me feeling
19:44
nervous allows me then to have that rationalization and perhaps
19:49
to do something about it. So mindfulness is a wonderful
19:52
practice for life in general, but especially around helping
19:56
manage anxiety and have deeper connections, yeah.
19:59
I love these very actionable approaches you're talking about,
20:04
and I think it ties so much to what we talked about on this
20:07
show as well about internal storytelling.
20:11
When you're feeling the anxiety, the stress, these are all very
20:16
simple things you can do to reframe the narrative of your
20:20
experience right now to be like. Oh you know this is normal.
20:24
Or I can get myself engaged and think about this experience in a
20:30
different light that is going to de stress myself and keep myself
20:35
more present. So that's why I want to jump on
20:38
that really quickly. The framing that we have of
20:40
these events, especially around anxiety, really, really
20:44
important. A a friend and colleague at what
20:46
I like to say is the Stanford of the East.
20:49
She's at Harvard's Business School.
20:51
Allison Woods Brooks, phenomenal person, great research.
20:55
A while back she did research that said, if you think about
20:58
it, the physiological experience we have of anxiety is very
21:02
similar, if not identical to the physiological experience we have
21:06
of excitement. So if you can reframe your
21:08
anxieties, excitement and say to yourself, Hey, what I'm feeling
21:11
now is the excitement I have to get this information out totally
21:15
changes one, how you feel you, you get more into it versus, you
21:19
know, being negative about what's happening to you.
21:22
And people who redo this reframing end up communicating
21:27
better with more energy. People remember it more people
21:30
find the experience more positive.
21:32
So you're absolutely right. The stories we tell ourselves,
21:35
the approaches we take, fundamentally impact not just
21:39
how we feel, but how those who hear us and learn from us feel
21:42
as well. Yeah, we love Allison on the
21:45
show. We kicked off season 5 of her.
21:47
Great, amazing. He's fantastic, amazing
21:49
professor, amazing person. But I, I love that.
21:52
I love this idea of framing and the stories we're telling
21:55
ourselves and how we approach a situation.
21:57
It really effects our entire mindset.
21:59
Like this is a big part of the show is that storytelling is how
22:03
we view the world. It's not just what we'd say to
22:06
the world, it's how we connect with it.
22:07
And it's the same thing with communication.
22:10
When you start this class and you teach so many students to
22:14
get in touch, so many different lives, what do you think is the
22:16
biggest unlock? Like I'm sure people come in
22:18
thinking, oh, I'm going to be able to give a better Ted talk.
22:21
What do you think? Do they actually get out of
22:23
becoming better communicators? Ironically, when when they come
22:27
to the class to become better communicators, they actually
22:29
learn about themselves more. I I think the two things that
22:33
surprised my students the most is the self learning that they
22:37
they come away with. They think it's all about
22:39
messaging and when I'm going to broadcast to the world.
22:41
But if they actually end up learning a lot about themselves
22:44
and how their internal communication works, and people
22:47
come away with an understanding of how critical listening is in
22:50
communication, you know, you take a communication class,
22:53
especially a strategic communication class, and you
22:56
think it's all going to be about that broadcast and what's coming
22:59
out. But in fact, what makes you an
23:00
effective strategic communicator is your ability to listen and
23:04
target your messages appropriately.
23:07
And that's really where the value can come.
23:11
Can you touch upon a little bit more what's the difference
23:12
between strategic communication and communication?
23:17
What's the difference between strategic communication and
23:19
communication in general? Yeah, so at some level all
23:22
communication is strategic. When I refer to strategic
23:25
communication, I mean it is specific goal based
23:29
communication that's trying to have impact in terms of changing
23:33
attitudes, behaviors, outcomes for people.
23:37
So at the highest level, any communication is strategic
23:40
because there's something motivating it.
23:42
But the class is very focused on purposeful goal driven
23:45
communication in service of your own goals or the goals of some
23:49
organization, be it a company or a group.
23:53
And that's the distinction we make.
23:54
So under the rubric of strategic communication that I teach, it's
23:57
things like branding, crisis management, how do we assimilate
24:03
multiple organizations during a merger, acquisition.
24:05
That's the kind of thing that we're I'm talking about.
24:09
How do we get better at listening?
24:13
You brought up this concept. It's obviously very important.
24:16
We talked about this with Allison as well and you know,
24:20
for us, at least for me, sometimes I get so bogged down
24:25
or just tunnel vision on what I want to say next that I just
24:29
stopped listening. Yeah, there are a whole bunch of
24:32
barriers to listening and and I encourage everybody listening to
24:35
this to listen to what Allison said because she's phenomenal
24:38
and I'm sure had lots of insights.
24:40
I love when she talks about what she calls long term listening.
24:44
So after this conversation we have today, if I see you again,
24:47
bringing up something that we talked about today later is a
24:51
great way to demonstrate I listened.
24:52
I care and I want to connect. But the reality is there are
24:56
lots of barriers to listening and I have to share with you.
24:58
My wife thinks I'm a fraud when I teach listening because she
25:01
thinks I could do a lot better at it.
25:03
And I and I agree, we all can't. So let me talk about the
25:06
barriers first and then I'll share with you some ways to get
25:09
better. There are three primary barriers
25:12
to listening in the way I look at the world.
25:14
They all start with the letter P physical, physiological, and
25:17
psychological. A physical barrier is it's just
25:20
loud. The older I get, the louder
25:22
places become. When I go to a restaurant or
25:24
some kind of public space, it's loud and it's hard for me to
25:28
hear. So that's one barrier. 2 is
25:30
physiological. When we're tired, we're hungry,
25:33
we're nervous, we're hangry. That gets in the way of
25:36
listening. The physiological needs we have
25:38
in that moment can interfere with our ability to really
25:41
listen. And then finally, our
25:43
psychological, and you alluded to those when you were asking
25:45
the question. It's the judging, the
25:47
evaluating, the rehearsing that gets in the way of us truly
25:51
listening. So because of those barriers, we
25:54
listen primarily for just the top line.
25:57
You know, we just get some gist of what somebody is saying and
26:00
then we fixate, or that's all we move forward from.
26:04
A better way to learn to listen is to listen as if you had to
26:08
paraphrase. So when you listen to
26:11
paraphrase, that is to take what the person said and repeat it in
26:14
your own words. And I'm not saying you actually
26:16
have to utter the paraphrase, although that can help.
26:18
And Allison's research shows that when you actually
26:21
paraphrase, you demonstrate connection and listening and
26:25
build trust in a way that you don't if you just nod your head
26:28
and go, uh huh, uh huh. But if you listen to paraphrase,
26:32
listen for that bottom line. It causes you to focus, to be
26:35
more present and to be more deeply connected to the person
26:39
that you're speaking to. So if you really want to
26:41
practice becoming a better listener, practice paraphrasing.
26:45
So I encourage my students after they leave class, after they
26:48
read something, I assign them to read after they listen to your
26:51
podcast, my podcast. I I ask them, take 10 seconds
26:54
and think about what's the bottom line of what I just
26:58
heard? And if you do that kind of drill
27:00
over and over, you train your brain to listen differently than
27:05
what most of us do. And in so doing, we become
27:08
better at communication. With YouTube becoming the norm,
27:13
TikTok, the short form content, it's kind of like we're skipping
27:17
to the bottom line, which is making longer term content
27:20
harder to consume because we're getting trained to like just
27:23
paraphrase it for us, right? Even with tools like AI.
27:27
So I think it's so important that we do these practices so
27:29
that we are still engaged in longer form storytelling.
27:33
I think that's such an important tool.
27:35
Yeah, in some of us who teach narrative storytelling, we worry
27:39
about some of the things that you're talking about.
27:42
I mean, is this all becoming just a quick dopamine hit?
27:45
And people are becoming trained that a story is a quick hit And
27:50
I think there's a place for that, but there's also a place
27:52
for a deeper, more slow building narrative.
27:56
I don't think it's either or. I think it's a blend of both.
27:59
But certainly we are seeing an onslaught of of the shorter form
28:03
storytelling. Through your very long tenure
28:06
teaching communication, Yeah. I mean, I mostly speak to, you
28:14
know, your decorate experience in teaching.
28:17
But something I'm very curious about is throughout our tenure
28:21
of teaching communications to students, have you seen that
28:26
general trend of technology, social media in the world affect
28:30
the student body or audience that you're teaching to over
28:33
time? 100% absolutely.
28:35
Technology has had a tremendous impact on communication, and I
28:39
don't think it's necessarily bad, just the last 15 years at
28:42
Stanford Business School and I talked communication long before
28:44
that in many other places. But the advent of technology
28:48
changed things fundamentally. I mean, I remember when e-mail
28:52
started and how that changed things.
28:53
Certainly texting and SMS change the way that we communicated.
28:57
Emojis change the way we communicated and how people
29:00
respond. The pandemic made virtual
29:03
communication, what we're doing right now, a mainstay, and now
29:07
AI and short form video. So yes, it's a constant
29:10
evolution and that's good. Communication needs to evolve to
29:13
meet the times. What we all have to do is become
29:16
multilingual, though. We have to be able to understand
29:18
the different tools and we have to understand the different
29:20
people have different perspectives.
29:23
I, I do some consulting and I go into organizations where we have
29:26
multi generations within an organization.
29:28
And people who are my age or older are so frustrated at the
29:32
the new hires who are much younger and they just go around,
29:36
pick up the phone and call me. Don't send me 3 texts on it or
29:40
send it on Slack. Call me, right.
29:42
And the younger kids are like, it's a waste of time.
29:44
I got to, you know, connect with this.
29:46
I got to talk. I just want the answer, you
29:47
know, So we have to become multilingual in the technology,
29:51
but also have an appreciation for the people and what they're
29:56
comfortable with. So yes, the answer is
29:59
absolutely. I've seen a change in my
30:01
students. It is not necessarily a bad
30:04
change. It's when we have to adjust and
30:06
adapt to. I will tell you the big thing
30:08
that's changed over them all my years of teaching, attention
30:11
span for sure. I, I am finding that I need to
30:15
change things up in my classes much more frequently than I used
30:19
to, you know, say a decade ago. And again, I'm not saying
30:23
necessarily that's a bad thing. I think I am a better teacher
30:26
because I have to think this way, but it is definitely a
30:30
dramatic difference. You know, it's, it's so
30:33
important. I know there's that common joke
30:35
that our generation hates talking on the phone, right?
30:38
We're all afraid of it. It gives us too much anxiety.
30:41
Yeah, I did an interview with a Korean podcaster.
30:43
My book was translated. My recent book was translated
30:45
into Korean. And she told me in Korea, at the
30:48
college level, they teach a class on how to make phone calls
30:51
because the students didn't know how to do it.
30:53
Isn't that amazing? Yeah, it's, I mean, maybe we
30:56
need that in the States too, to be honest.
30:59
Yeah, it's. It's so it's such a interesting
31:04
lens to look at it this how we are changing how we communicate,
31:07
we are changing the platforms. How do we still have deep
31:10
conversations when so much is test based or even Snapchat
31:14
based? Yeah, it's a purposeful act.
31:17
We have to remind ourselves that as human beings, we are designed
31:21
to connect. There are people who argue that
31:24
we developed the ability to communicate as a way of building
31:29
empathy or showing empathy. That communication is nothing
31:33
more than a tool for expressed empathy.
31:36
And for our species, empathy is really important.
31:39
And when you think about that, that dramatically changes the
31:43
way you approach your communication.
31:44
If you think about the way I really connect, demonstrate
31:47
caring, learn from others is through communication is just to
31:52
remind yourself that the number of friends you have on social
31:55
media or the number of followers you have, that can feel really
31:58
good, but that's not a connection in the way that human
32:02
beings were designed to connect. I'm often asked what are my
32:05
thoughts about AI and communication and and I have
32:08
lots of thoughts. I don't have one thought, but
32:11
one thing I I am fairly confident in is this connection
32:15
that I'm talking about, this empathy that's going to be
32:18
really, really hard to be replicated through AIA.
32:22
Lot of other things AI can do I think are amazing and will be
32:24
very helpful to communication. Some probably detrimental, but
32:28
this fundamental ability to connect in a way that humans can
32:32
and should is something that's unique to communication, and we
32:35
just have to remind ourselves of that.
32:38
Yeah. You.
32:40
Teach and communicate through so many different mediums now, not
32:45
only from your lecturing, but also you've given talks and you
32:48
have a podcast and of course written your book as well.
32:53
Do you think those communicating, engaging through
32:57
those different platforms major better storyteller or
33:02
communicator? Thank you for that question.
33:04
I certainly have multi channels of communication out there and
33:08
I'm fundamentally driven to help people hone and develop their
33:10
communication skills as I am trying to do.
33:13
And so having a multi channel approach be at the podcast, the
33:17
books, the teaching, the coaching, all of that is in
33:21
service of that goal, a fundamental truism of
33:27
communication. And it and it is the number one
33:30
bit of advice that we have heard across all 200 episodes of Think
33:33
Fast, Talk Smart, my podcast is that you have to take your
33:37
audience into account. It's not about what you want to
33:39
say, it's about what your audience needs to hear.
33:41
And I try to live that through the different channels I use to
33:45
communicate. So a short form video could have
33:48
the very same message that one of my long lectures has, but the
33:52
way it's framed, the way it's delivered, the emphasis on
33:55
certain things, visual, verbal, whatever need to be taken into
33:59
account. So it is critical in any
34:02
communication that we think about what the audience needs
34:05
and what's important to them and how the channel through which
34:08
you're communicating it will help achieve that goal.
34:12
So every time I communicate, I think about it.
34:14
So when we got together and I thought, OK, is this a video
34:17
podcast? Is this just an audio podcast?
34:20
All of that is impacting what I choose to say and how I choose
34:24
to say it, as it should for everybody.
34:26
The the the message and the audience are critical.
34:30
Yeah, I I love that. And I think that's what
34:32
storytelling really comes into play, right?
34:33
How do we tailor some of the audience?
34:35
And I know on your show you've talked to a lot of really
34:37
interesting storytellers. You did this series on non
34:39
traditional storytellers and reach out to some Highwood
34:42
people. What are some of the biggest
34:45
like storytelling lessons you try to apply in your work, in
34:48
your teaching, in your part? Thank you for that.
34:52
I see my job as you are doing a great job of as being a
34:56
translator. It's really to to take the ideas
34:59
of people who are very knowledgeable, much more
35:00
knowledgeable than I, and translate them not word for
35:05
word, but into how can you take this knowledge and apply it.
35:09
And if that's my goal, then I have to listen really well.
35:13
I have to really focus on what's being said and think about how
35:17
can that be related in a way that's meaningful.
35:20
So sometimes I'll talk with a a very astute, deep academic whose
35:26
ideas are amazing, but what does it mean?
35:30
How do we apply it? So I try to come up with a
35:32
recipe or some suggestions. In other cases, something
35:36
somebody says, I might have a direct application and I try to
35:39
extend it perhaps to other situations.
35:42
So I was talking to somebody about negotiation, but the
35:44
concept applied to conflict management and persuasion.
35:47
So I see myself first and foremost as a translator and
35:51
then in the storytelling I use, I really try to be engaging.
35:56
I believe attention is the most precious commodity we have in
35:59
the world today, and I feel part of my job is to help people
36:04
engage. And to me, engagement is
36:06
sustained attention. So I can get your attention
36:10
pretty quickly. But can I keep it?
36:11
So as I tell my stories, I try to engage and there's several
36:15
techniques I try to use, and I think everybody can benefit from
36:19
physical techniques. Anything that gets people doing
36:22
something. Where the body goes, the brain
36:24
follows. So when I speak, I might take a
36:25
poll, for example, I might ask people to turn to each other.
36:29
I might ask them to watch something.
36:31
All of that gets people focused and engaged.
36:35
I might ask questions or use analogies.
36:37
That's another way. That's a cognitive engagement
36:39
technique. I might use language.
36:42
I love what I call time travelling language.
36:45
Rather than telling you something, I could say, picture
36:47
this. What if we could imagine what it
36:51
would be like if that language, it gets people seeing it in
36:55
their mind's eyes. So when I tell stories, I see
36:58
myself as a translator and I try to be engaging so people are
37:02
more likely to remember what I say.
37:04
That's my goal. 2nd to last question, how does communication
37:10
translate to martial arts or vice versa?
37:14
I don't that's a huge part of what you do as well.
37:17
It's on your website, on your profile.
37:19
Lots of hear more about it. So I have been doing martial
37:24
arts for longer than neither of you have been around decades
37:27
now, and it's a true passion of mine.
37:30
If you think about it, the martial arts are more than what
37:35
you see in an MMA fight or some Jackie Chan Bruce Lee movie,
37:40
although I find that fascinating.
37:43
It's really about a way of being.
37:45
It's about being present. It's about paying attention to
37:49
the other person, seeing what's needed in the moment.
37:53
It's a lot of the same skills and the life lessons that I
37:57
struggle with outside of the karate mat play out when I'm
38:02
inside the the Dojo, the studio learning.
38:05
So to me, at a higher level, it's all the same thing.
38:09
You can think about a fight, you can think about working these
38:14
skills as a form of communication, right?
38:18
People are signaling certain things by what they do with
38:21
their body or their approach, just like we do in
38:24
communication. So to me, I really see the
38:27
higher order principles. Taking my class at Stanford and
38:31
taking a class for me in the karate studio, we're really
38:35
talking about the same principles, but how they play
38:38
out are very different. Now, I will tell you this, the
38:40
lessons you learn in the karate studio have direct impact.
38:43
When you make a mistake, you feel it.
38:45
You know, I might say something wrong and the repercussions
38:48
might not happen for a few weeks at work, but in the karate
38:51
studio I end up putting ice on the wrong choice.
38:54
So to me, it's one in the same thing.
38:56
And the martial arts have always given me a refuge.
38:59
I think everybody needs to have some kind of physical activity
39:02
that we do to get us out of our head.
39:04
Could be walking in the park, playing a musical instrument,
39:07
whatever, but I think having some physical outlet is just
39:10
healthy and the martial arts have been 1 for me.
39:21
Matt, we have learned so many great stories and profound
39:25
insights from you today For our final closing question, we
39:28
called it the Suspenders. This is where we ask you just a
39:32
random fun question. You can give us any answer you
39:35
feel like The question of the day is what is the best piece of
39:40
advice that you have never received?
39:43
Oh I like it. The best piece of advice I have
39:45
never received. I'm going to think about this
39:48
for a second. So I've never been told to talk
39:54
more, and I think there is value in exploring concepts in
40:04
different ways. And I try to be very precise in
40:08
my communication, although your listeners to this might say he
40:12
rambles all over the place, but nobody's ever said to me say
40:16
more. And I think that's for many
40:18
people, that's useful advice. And in fact, one of the great
40:21
ways to get to connect to somebody is to simply say, tell
40:25
me more. And nobody has ever said that to
40:27
me. Absolutely love it.
40:30
Well, thank you so much for joining us.
40:32
It's an amazing conversation. I really appreciate the
40:34
opportunity. Keep up the good work.
40:36
You're doing a valuable service to people.
40:48
Welcome back to Top Hat. This is the part of the episode
40:50
where we dissect and analyze the amazing storytelling lessons
40:54
that we got from this week's at Split Storyteller.
40:57
And this week we had the amazing, popular, impactful, and
41:01
very impressive Stanford Business School professor Matt
41:04
Abrams. You know, Kevin, one of the
41:07
things Matt talked about that really dinged with me is the
41:10
conversation between how perfectionism and anxiety
41:14
manifests in communication. You know, you and I are both.
41:18
I don't even want to call us recovering perfectionists
41:20
because we're not recovering that well.
41:21
Like, like we just got back from a wedding this weekend.
41:25
And the first thing I thought when we got back was, did we do
41:27
it perfectly? You can't attend the wedding
41:29
perfectly. That doesn't make any sense.
41:31
Until we find the perfect way to attend a wedding.
41:33
Until we find it. Yeah.
41:35
And then we ruminate over how we didn't meet that standard.
41:37
But. Exactly.
41:38
And this happens with communication and Matt talks
41:40
about how anxiety is necessary. It can be powerful even.
41:44
But the most important thing you can do in conversation, in
41:48
storytelling, the stories you tell each other, the stories you
41:50
tell ourselves is address professionism and anxiety and
41:54
understand what they are and take a second be present and
41:57
mindful of them. And this where mindfulness comes
41:59
in and just shake it out and understand, one, everyone feels
42:03
it, it's actually super universal.
42:05
And two, the best thing you can do is just find some ways to
42:09
kind of shake it out and be present in the moment and
42:11
understand everyone feels anxious.
42:13
Everyone struggles with professionism in some way.
42:16
And the best thing you can do is just do it and just try your
42:19
best. Yeah, and Matt and his peers
42:22
actually instruct students to play this game where they
42:26
intentionally say the wrong thing so they can stretch
42:30
themselves in that other directions to combat this
42:33
feeling of chasing perfectionism, doing the perfect
42:38
thing or saying the right thing. Because it does help us to
42:42
realize in the vast majority of circumstances it doesn't matter
42:47
that much. Even if you slip up, say the non
42:52
accurate thing, most of the time is doesn't matter.
42:55
And that should be how we carry with our day-to-day
42:58
conversations. And another thing that was
43:01
really insightful was his observations of different
43:05
generations of students. What is unique about their
43:10
characteristics as listeners to his lectures?
43:14
He talks about obviously with the rise of social media, short
43:19
form content consumption, these later generations of students
43:24
have more of a shorter attention span, which obviously becomes a
43:29
challenge for educators. But from that, instead of just
43:33
pointing out the problem, he's actively trying to meet the
43:37
students where they're at to adjust his teaching strategies.
43:41
Which is something we also talked quite a bit about in
43:44
storytelling, is that you need to take into account who your
43:48
audience is. What are their preferences?
43:52
How do you adjust the message and stories you want to tell in
43:55
a way that they can best consume?
43:58
As a storyteller, you can't always put all the blame on your
44:01
audience because you have a responsibility to get your
44:04
message across. I will go one step further.
44:07
You can't put any blame on your audience, right?
44:09
Your audience owes you nothing. They are giving you their time
44:14
and you're the one on stage and your job is to connect with
44:17
them. Your job is to make it feel like
44:19
when they leave that hour that it was wasn't a waste of their
44:21
time or their money, that they got something.
44:23
It wasn't just them accomplishing the act of going
44:26
to your class, right? So to do that, you have to
44:28
understand them. You have to connect them.
44:30
You have to go on TikTok and understand how they're
44:32
consuming. Even if you think it's wrong,
44:34
even if you think it's bad for them by understand them,
44:37
understanding why they're doing certain things, understand how
44:40
to connect to them. Then you can educate them.
44:42
Then you can impart their wisdom.
44:44
Then you can make a joke that lands right because you took the
44:47
time to understand your audience.
44:50
And one of the biggest ways you can do that understand your
44:53
audience is another thing we talked to Matt about.
44:55
You can listen and paraphrase and practice how to listen and
44:58
paraphrase. And by doing that you will
45:00
withstand your attention. By doing that, you will
45:02
understand your audience better. Even if it's the same story over
45:05
2 hours. By taking the time to engage, by
45:08
listening to the whole story, you can have a rich and
45:12
different experience. It's the thing about story time.
45:15
You have to take the time to listen to your audience and you
45:19
have to practice doing that. And one of the best ways to do
45:22
that is for listening and paraphrasing back so they feel
45:25
hood and you're making sure you're really getting the
45:28
message. Paraphrasing is a great
45:30
storytelling practice because you're listening to a story and
45:34
then you're distilling what is the most crucial piece of
45:38
information from what the other person just said.
45:41
Not only does it help you practice active listening, which
45:45
is great for obviously many different things, but it helps
45:48
you understand how to better consume and understand a story
45:52
yourself. So definitely encourage everyone
45:55
to listen more and paraphrase more to everyone you talk to.
46:00
But this has been another great episode of the Lenin Suit and
46:04
Plastic Thai Podcast. We're super thankful for
46:08
Professor Matt Abrams for coming to the show and sharing his
46:11
stories and insights. If you like this episode, well,
46:15
make sure you like this episode and follow us.
46:17
Subscribe where we listen or watch our podcast, leave us
46:23
comments and review Spotify Apple podcast.
46:27
You'll see what our five star show takes one click.
46:31
It helps us grow the show immensely.
46:33
So super grateful when you do that and follow us on Instagram,
46:38
TikTok at LSBT pod, LinkedIn, Lenin student classic time.
46:43
Yeah, I just want to hype on that again, if you're listening
46:46
on Spotify, listening on Apple Podcasts, or watching on
46:49
YouTube, we're still fairly new on all those platforms.
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So we're at a point where literally every single review
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counts. Every single review helps more
46:57
people find the show, helps us grow the show, helps us get more
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guests. So if you're thinking, oh, you
47:02
know, they don't need my review, we do.
47:05
So if you're on Spotify, take a second, leave a review.
47:08
If you're on Apple podcast, take 5 seconds to leave the review.
47:12
The hard part about leaving reviews is listening to the
47:13
episode, and you've always done that.
47:15
So leave a review or comment on YouTube, share the episode, and
47:19
it'll just help us make better content for you.
47:21
But thank you for listening. We really appreciate your time,
47:24
and we're going to keep being here on this mission to unlock
47:28
the power of story time.