This is the Business English Podcast, episode 108.
You can't connect if you don't respect. Welcome to the Business English podcast from All Ears English.
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For a presentation, a meeting, or your office party, this is Real Business English with your favorite American hosts, Lindsay and Michelle, coming to you from New York City and Colorado, USA.
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Hello, Lindsay. How are you? I'm feeling awesome today.
It's all good. Michelle, what's going on in your life?
How are things? Everything's good. My brother and his family are in town, so it's been a lot of fun.
It's also a little bit crazy because you kind of get out of the routine of things.
Yeah. Everything gets a little bit jumbled up, but it's good.
It's all good. I haven't seen my brother since Thanksgiving.
So it's nice to see my brother and my sister-in-law and their kids.
So it's been great. You're very close to your family.
So I know that that's awesome to be able to see them.
Very cool. But not to get too off track, you know, because we have to get started on the episode. yeah sure okay yes all right let's well yeah i mean lindsay do you think people ever get off track during business meetings oh for sure especially you know the whole principle of if you allow a lot of time for something the thing will take up that much time oh especially if you allow too much time for the meeting they will definitely get off track no question That's right.
I always believe in that work expands to fit the time allotted.
That's what I was looking for. Yes. It's a natural part of being a human, having conversations.
Sometimes a meeting may have an agenda though, which is good to stick to the agenda.
But today we're going to talk about this idea about what to do if you want to make a comment.
It doesn't have to do with the agenda, but you feel it's important. and you want to say it right is it okay to do this lindsay what do you think yeah i would say it's okay uh it's okay but it's also important to acknowledge that you know this comment might be might be out of the topic and that you don't want to pull the entire conversation in another direction Right.
I think it's important. Yeah, this idea of signaling that you don't want to completely now change the direction because maybe then the meeting will take three more hours.
And also you want to respect the time. But you but you do want to just throw something in and then get back to what you're talking about.
Just so maybe like, why do you think somebody would want to do this?
Well, when I think about this, I think about culture 100%, because I know that some cultures are much more relationship oriented.
If you look at studies that have been done in intercultural business, there's a spectrum of cultures that are more relationship oriented and cultures that are more task oriented.
And I think our culture, United States culture, Although there are many cultures within the U.S., we know that, yes.
But in general, we're a more task-oriented culture.
And so we want to get it done. We came here to achieve something.
I will be neurotic if I don't get it done.
And so I want to get it done. But if I'm coming from a culture that's more relationship-oriented...
For in that case, the most important thing is building the relationship first before getting the task done.
So that's why we might be tempted. And even if we come from the US, we still might, we're humans, as you said, Michelle, we want to connect and we know it's important.
So yeah, there's culture here. Yeah, excellent.
Yeah. Thanks for bringing that up. I mean, so we're going to talk about this today.
Lindsay, you came up with this idea for the episode.
Why did you, what made you want to talk about this?
It's because I heard it being said on the Wall Street Journal podcast called The Journal.
It's a great podcast, by the way, guys, if you love podcasts that are about 15 or 20 minutes and you get an insider look on the economy, the world of business.
He was starting off a conversation, but he had a side question and he said not to dig too deep into this, but here's my question.
And then that signaled to me that he didn't want to go off track, but he was going to ask a side question and then bring the conversation back to the main point of why we're there on the episode.
Right. Yes, I love this. Okay, good. So we're getting this from real life, guys.
So but before we get to that, we want to remind you to hit follow wherever you are listening to the Business English podcast.
Lindsay, what do you want to tell our listeners?
Guys, you got to hit follow because that's the way you make sure you get it to drop into your feed so that you don't miss it.
We'll let you know when there's a new episode.
You don't have to keep checking back, right?
It's just more convenient. So hit that follow button.
I love it. Okay, perfect. So guys, before we get into it, we also want to remind you, we have a great episode, Business English 83, Participate or Die, How to Succeed in Class and Meetings in America.
So more about meetings. So dramatic. So dramatic, that title.
Yeah. Yes, it is. It is. So, all right, let's do, let's, we're going to divide this into formal and informal.
Okay. Um, so Lindsay, what's, what's one for, I mean, and some of these might kind of be a mixture, like, you know, we, you might read it and say, oh, this could be also informal and that's fine.
Um, so what's the first thing you could say?
Yeah. And I want to say, it looks like we have a lot of them today.
Right. And actually, no, we don't have as many as I thought.
It's just more. No, those are examples. Okay.
Whoa. We have a lot. No, no, no. Don't worry.
Don't worry. It's not that many. All right.
I'm just going to get a few for each and that's perfect guys.
So here it is. I'd like to bring up one quick point. i'd like to bring up one quick point okay all right yeah because i'd like to bring up one quick point our clients may not know how to get to our social media perfect okay and again what is the signaling that's happening which part is the signaling the quick point yeah oh yeah yeah i guess yeah yeah that's true right because you're emphasizing this is going to be fast i know in awareness that this is not the main goal of our of our chat right yeah And then the next one is just to mention briefly.
Perfect. So just to mention briefly, our sales did go up in the past three weeks.
Okay. And then one more is I feel it's important to quickly mention that.
So for example, I feel it's important to quickly mention that Vicki is going on vacation next week.
Okay. That's so good. These are more, oh, sorry.
These are more formal, right, Michelle? Yeah.
No, because I feel like, I mean, again, I don't think that as well.
So I think mentioned briefly, I feel like briefly is, I don't know, whenever I hear briefly, I feel like it's kind of an important, like a little bit more formal.
I don't know why. Maybe that's just me. But, and then also the, I feel like I'd like to, I'd like to bring up one quick point.
I think takes it to Another level or formal level.
I would agree with that. Yeah. And then I feel it's important to so that kind of the way these are starting out are a little bit more formal, but that's not to say that you can't use them in an informal way as well.
Yeah, you're kind of giving a platform to what you're saying by building it up.
I feel it is important or I'd like to. These are all kind of elevating what you're about to say and signaling that, yeah, you're going to say something important.
At the same time, you know that it's not the goal of the meeting, right?
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Exclusions apply, see details online. Okay, let's dig into the informal ones.
Guys, I hope you've written down the first three.
Sorry. I just choked on my, whoa. Okay. Michelle, let's keep going.
We're good. All right. Let's do it. Okay.
Okay. All right. So you could say, I don't want us to get off track, but, so I don't want us to get off track, but we should discuss the Kemper account later.
Yes. Perfect. Okay. So why is that one a little more casual, would you say?
Because I don't want to get us off track.
Right. The other one is like, I'd like to.
I feel it is. Oh, I don't want to get us off track.
Right. Yeah, I love it. And the next one here, guys, is what I heard on the Wall Street Journal podcast.
Not to dig too deep into blank right now, but dot, dot, dot.
OK, what would be an example of that? Not to dig too deep into our finances right now, but let's discuss how that would factor into the project later.
Yeah. And an example of how this might sound on a podcast is let's say the guest came on and they came on to talk about the environment, but somehow their upbringing came up in the beginning.
Maybe the host would say not to dig too deep into your upbringing, but.
Ah, yes. Okay. So just to make it clear, right?
Why it's used in places. Yeah. Yes, that's good, Lindsay.
Yes, that's a good point. One quick point is the next one.
One quick point, we still need to make the job ad for the assistant role.
Very nice. Good. And then there's one last one.
We're going to sneak in a last one. We're giving you guys a lot of options today, right?
I don't want to change the subject, but... So here we're being very clear.
This one is the most straightforward. Direct, yeah.
Yeah, most direct. So, yeah, I don't want to change the subject, but let's remember that we have the office holiday party on the 22nd.
Why does this matter, Michelle? Why is this important?
Yeah, I think like always signaling, I think, is important.
Having people understand what's coming next.
If you just blurt out what you're trying to say, like if we're having a meeting and we're talking about whatever and I just say we have the office holiday party on the 22nd, it's a little like weird. this is crucial it's like out of nowhere like we're kind of talking about something else or we're not like what are we like what are we doing right so maybe it you this kind of shows okay that this connects i'm acknowledging i'm showing that i have this emotional intelligence and like you know that i know that we're not just oh let me just say my point it's the most important um but you're acknowledging that okay we're getting back to this but i just i had to say this It's emotional intelligence and it's showing respect for people's time.
And at least in American business culture, we can say this for sure.
You have to respect people's time, guys.
You have to. Again, if you're coming from a culture where time is not as... static, right?
Time is more elastic. It can change and it can be flexed and moved around and spent differently.
In American culture, it is a little bit more static.
And so you have to respect time. And this shows them you have the emotional intelligence.
You know, this is not the topic of the day of the meeting.
You're going to grab a second to say this and then you're going to come back to it.
It shows respect. It's respectful. Yeah.
Yeah, I agree. Nice. Nice. All right. Should we do do we have time for a role play?
Do we have time, Michelle? We do. All right.
We have to. All right. Well, I got two short ones.
OK, well, we don't we're not going to use every single one of these.
But all right. In this first one, we are in a meeting.
And yeah, we'll see what happens. Here we go.
So next on our agenda is our upcoming summit.
All right. Yes, this is so exciting. Definitely.
So we are thinking about holding it in June.
Right. Oh, one quick point. I have the results from last summit's feedback survey.
Great. Let's review that later. This is interesting.
It's kind of subtle, right? Because you're still talking about the summit, but you're bringing in results from last year that could be relevant, but you're acknowledging that maybe it doesn't fit right here right now.
Right. So it's just like it's kind of just like putting a placeholder like that we need to talk about this later.
And so I don't want any of us to forget, basically.
Yes. Interesting. OK, let's go into another meeting.
Yeah. All right. Another meeting. Here we go.
So that's why we have to really start focusing on customer retention. yeah i feel it's important to quickly mention that we've received some great feedback about our latest products that's true yeah so here again it does feel formal because you know i feel it's important too is a lot of words yeah it's a lot it's a lot of words yeah it's a lot of words so make sure that like people are i don't are going to be okay to hear that many words i guess or say that many words because it might I feel like I would get a little bit jumbled with this like yeah I feel it's important because it's like I for me it would be a lot of words but I did want to give that option yeah I think that one might work better when there's a lot of silences in the room and no one's saying anything.
And it's kind of like you can penetrate the silence by saying what you think is important.
But if there's a lot of voices, a lot of things going on, maybe there's no space.
Right, right. Because you're trying to quickly mention something, but you're being slow about saying it, right?
Like, no, I think that's a good point, Lindsay.
Good. Touche. Very good. Touche. I love the irony that you pointed out.
The irony. I love it. Good stuff. So, Michelle, what's the takeaway for our listeners today?
Guys, this is an important skill, right?
We always want to be signaling what we're doing that really helps the listeners, you know, and just get your point across.
So we discussed a lot of different ways to do it.
We gave our opinions on this and how to be tactful.
So give this a try. Don't be afraid to bring up other things in the meeting.
I wouldn't say do it all the time. You don't want to get a reputation for always like being like changing the subject and then Um, so, so, you know, be, be aware and mindful of when it would make sense to do this.
But, um, Lindsay, anything else you want to add?
Yeah. I mean, I think just keep in mind, you can't connect if you don't respect.
Love it. We're coming up with the big ones today.
So yeah, that's the point, right? If you don't provide respect to someone, if you don't acknowledge that someone might be kind of upset, if you get off the point, then you can never connect with that person.
That person will never connect with you.
So start with respect and then get to connection.
So good. Love it. All right. Awesome. Let's leave it there.
That was great. And I will talk to you in the next one.
Bye, guys. All right. Good stuff, Michelle.
Talk soon. Bye. Thank you for listening to Business English, a podcast just for you, the high achieving global professional.
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