SMALL TALK; the FORD method - Business Communication class

0:01Chris Welcome back to the Breakout Business English podcast. My name is Chris. I'm a business English and communication coach, and I've personally worked with over 1,000 international professionals, likely just like you, to improve the way that they communicate at work in English. Thank you so much for listening and for your time.

0:29Chris I know how valuable it is. And today we're discussing Smalltalk. Again, specifically something called the Ford Framework. That's F-O-R-D, the Ford Framework. Now, a couple of weeks ago, I recorded an episode all about Smalltalk. In that podcast, we explored the ARE method or the ARE framework, which was a three-part structure that we could use to guide how we speak when we're in small talk situations.

1:14Chris Today, we'll look more at what you're going to say. We're going to discuss four themes that you can reliably talk about and discuss in small talk situations that will make sure that your colleagues, customers, and clients find you interesting, engaging, and enjoy talking to you. And then at the end of today's podcast, we'll have the answer for last week's quiz question along with a new grammar quiz for you to think about.

1:53Chris So let's get started. Now there is a misconception, I would say, that small talk is always about boring things. People often think that small talk begins and ends with questions like, How are you doing? Or maybe talking about the weather. I've definitely heard this said in coaching sessions before. People are always surprised when the small talk topics that we cover extend beyond the weather and what you did that weekend.

2:32Chris So the FORD Ford framework solves a really common problem that people face in small talk situations. And that is, what do you say? What do you talk about? And rather than tell you what to avoid, the Ford framework gives us four reliable topics that we can bring up and ask about when we're building those professional relationships.

3:04Chris So what does Ford stand for? Well, the F is for family. The F stands for family. Talking about family is a reliable topic for small talk. We want to ask about things that are important to people and things that they consider to be most valuable. Well, for most people, we can reliably say that this is their family.

3:34Chris The O stands for occupation. This is their work and what they do for a living. This topic is a little more challenging because it can get very boring very quickly. So we'll explore that in a little more depth to make sure that you're keeping it interesting. Let's listen now to a couple of examples of those first two topics: the F for family and the O for occupation when we're in a small talk situation.

4:16Chris So tell me about your family. Is your family quite small or bigger? So tell me about your family. Is your family quite small or bigger? You mentioned that you work in accounting. Why did you go into that profession? You mentioned that you work in accounting. Why did you go into that profession? Now, the first thing that I think you might have noticed is, wow, some of those questions sound really direct.

4:58Chris I can't just ask someone about their family. Well, maybe that's because you're used to small talk being things like, how are you doing? and how was your weekend? But remember, we don't want to keep small talk small. By which I mean we don't want it to be boring. This will sometimes mean that you have to be a little bit brave and more direct with more interesting questions.

5:33Chris One thing that you can do is apply the ARE method that we talked about a couple of weeks ago. If you don't know what I'm talking about, then you can go and listen to that podcast right after this one. I think it was two episodes ago. Using an anchor and a reveal to elements of the ARE structure before asking these questions can make them feel more natural and help you to ease into your question slowly instead of diving straight in.

6:14Chris There are two key ideas that I want you to notice from the examples that I gave you. The first is the idea of making questions very open and easy to answer. When we're discussing communication skills, we often talk about the difference between closed and open questions. A closed question is something that can be answered very quickly with very few words, often with just a yes or no answer.

6:52Chris For instance, what was your department's budget last year? That's a very closed question. And it can be answered with a simple number. However, tell me about how your department spent your budget last year is a far more open question that allows the other person to build a more interesting and complex answer.

7:19Chris So, how can we make our small talk questions more open? This is a really simple one. We can use the phrase tell me about. Tell me about. Tell me about is the most open question that anyone can ask. It gives a topic and nothing else. It asks the speaker to say whatever they want to around that theme. And it gives them just enough structure and direction to guide them to an answer without really telling them anything about what they should put in that answer.

8:04Chris So, whenever possible in small talk, it can be great to use tell me about questions. The second idea here is the use of why. So often when we're making small talk with people, we ask them what questions, or maybe when or where questions. For instance, what do you do for work? Or what did you do this weekend?

8:34Chris Or maybe where do you live or where are you from? However, these are very closed questions. They can easily be answered with a sentence or two, maybe even a single word. For instance, where do you live? London. Cool. Next question. However, why questions often don't have easy answers. They often require us to think more deeply and ask us to approach our answers from a far deeper and more personal perspective.

9:15Chris This means that we're building a far stronger connection with the person we're speaking to and ultimately moving past the small nature of small talk. So think about talking about a vacation. That's a common small talk topic. Where did you go on vacation? Oh, I went to Paris. Cool. When did you go to Paris?

9:40Chris I went in August. Cool. Anything else? Just lots of closed questions in a row. How about why did you go to Paris? Ah, now that's not a quick and easy question to answer. Why did I go to Paris? Well, I had a discussion with my wife, and we decided that Paris had a lot of things we wanted to see, a lot of history, and we're interested in history.

10:12Chris Maybe they had great food and we were interested in that. These why questions are really the foundation of great conversations. And if you want to have better conversations when you are speaking English at work, then maybe we can work together. My full-time job is helping international professionals who use English at work to improve their communication skills.

10:43Chris So, if you need English to do your job, but you don't speak it natively, then I would love to meet you. If you'd like to book some time to meet with me through one-to-one video calls, just you and me, then you can go to breakoutbusinglish.com. That's the title of the podcast, breakoutbusinglish.com and find out more.

11:11Chris Starting on our very first call, we can focus on the specific opportunities that you personally have to improve your English and communication skills and the mistakes that you make most often or cause the biggest problems with your communication. And right now you can use the code podcast30, that's podcast30, at checkout to get a 30% discount off your first booking.

11:44Chris Sometimes my calendar gets a little busy, so if you have trouble finding a time that works for you, then you can always send me a message through the contact page on the website and ask if I have any time to fit you in. I've worked with well over 1,000 non-native English speaking professionals, from new graduates up to CEOs and government leaders to help them achieve their goals.

12:12Chris And I look forward to meeting you. I've been saying 1,000 professionals for a long time now. I really should check my statistics. I think we're getting much closer to 2,000 at this point. I'm pretty sure I put 1000 in the first ever podcast episode, and that was about 96, 97 episodes ago. So I must be closer to 2000 now.

12:37Chris Maybe I'll update that soon. Maybe you maybe you'll notice when I finally cross that 2000 clients threshold. Okay, so let's get back to the Ford framework now. And our next letter is R. The R in Ford, in this case, stands for recreation. Recreation, which is a formal word that means fun. How do you relax?

13:09Chris What do you do in your free time? And then finally, the D stands for dreams. These are conversations about the future and what people want in life. These might be professional aspirations, goals they're working toward in their personal life, or maybe just complete fantasy that is almost never going to happen, but is fun to talk about.

13:41Chris Personally, I think that recreation and dreams are far more powerful small talk topics than family and occupation. So I would absolutely encourage you to aim to discuss these topics first. I guess that would make it the RDFO framework, but Rudfo is not as memorable as Ford, I don't think. So we'll still call it the Ford framework, but we'll prioritize those R D topics, recreation and dreams.

14:20Chris So feel free to disagree with me in the YouTube comments on this video. But I think that most people are more interested in discussing what they do for fun, their recreation, and what they want in the future than they are discussing their work and family. Just my opinion. So let's listen now to some examples of questions that we might ask on these topics.

15:35Chris Do you have any professional goals that you're working on right now? Do you have any professional goals that you're working on right now? If money were no object, what would your dream vacation be? If money were no object, what would your dream vacation be? How do you spend your time when you're not at work?

16:08Chris How do you spend your time when you're not at work? I quite like that last question. How do you spend your time when you're not at work? This leans toward the questions, what do you do for fun? And do you have any hobbies? Which are questions that a lot of people like to ask, but it's more open and easier to answer.

16:37Chris It invites a broader answer. If you're anything like me, then your family takes up a lot of your time. I work a lot, and when I'm not working, I'm usually spending time with my two-year-old daughter. However, is that the answer that I would give you if you asked me what I do for fun? Or do I have any hobbies?

17:04Chris Again, you probably wouldn't get that answer. Now, I also like to run. I run three or four times a week, and just yesterday I completed a half marathon in Manchester in the UK, which was a wonderful day and a fantastic experience. Now, if you ask me what I do with my free time, or what do you do when you're not at work?

17:31Chris I could tell you about my running, or I could tell you about my family. The choice in that situation is mine. Making that question wider and more open allows the person you're talking to to take the conversation in whichever direction they want. And given that I did this half marathon yesterday and I'm very proud of it, and I'm telling everyone about it, I would probably take it in that con in that direction.

18:05Chris Okay, let's take a quick look at that phrase, if money were no object. In the second example, we heard, if money were no object, what would your dream vacation be? One more time, if money were no object, what would your dream vacation be? If something is no object, it means that it doesn't matter. It's not a limit or an obstacle, and you don't want it to be a part of the decision-making process.

18:44Chris The most common things to include in this are money and time. For instance, if you ask someone to recommend you a restaurant, you might add, and my boss will be paying, so money is no object. My boss will be paying, so money is no object. Which means that you should not decide against recommending a restaurant just because it's very expensive.

19:14Chris That doesn't matter to my boss. We can also use this to talk about distance, for instance. Maybe I'm looking for a new house, and if distance were no object, then I would love to live by the coast, by the sea. But that's two hours away, and I need to be close to the office. If distance were no object, then I would love to live by the coast.

19:42Chris But that's two hours away, and I need to live close to the office. I need to be close to the office. So the next time you want to make it clear that a potential limiting factor should not be part of a conversation, then consider saying that it is no object. Okay, so that is the Ford method. When you're in a small talk situation and you're trying to come up with a topic that you can discuss or a question that you can ask, you can think about these four topics family, occupation, recreation, and dreams.

20:26Chris All four are great themes that can generate interesting and deep conversations with almost anyone. Equally, if you're watching on YouTube, I would love to find something to add to that list. So, do you have a category or theme that you would prefer, that you would recommend in addition to those four?

20:52Chris Let me know down in the YouTube comments on this video. Now, let's get into our quiz. Last week's question focused on the word tell. And I asked you about the words that could follow tell. Usually, when we're talking about giving information, the word tell needs to be followed by the person or thing receiving the information.

21:24Chris As in please tell me what you need. Please tell me what you need. Tell me. However, there are a couple of words that break this rule. So the first one, which I gave you last week, is telling stories. A sentence like, he told a story is perfectly correct, but it doesn't have anyone receiving the information in the sentence.

21:55Chris Okay, so what else is on that list? What else can I tell? Okay, so here's the list. I can tell a story, I can tell a joke, I can tell a lie, and I can tell the truth. I can tell a story, I can tell a joke, I can tell a lie, and I can tell the truth. None of these things require a person in the sentence to receive the information, but as I mentioned, it's a very short list of things.

22:38Chris Now let's move on to your question. Question for this week. Today we're going to have a look at a common grammar mistake that can cause a lot of confusion. This is a mistake that I hear mostly made by native Turkish speakers and speakers of Slavic languages, but it's definitely one that everyone should know about.

23:02Chris So here's the sentence I want you to think about. We went with my boss to the meeting. We went with my boss to the meeting. Now, this is actually a correct sentence. And for a long time in the work that I do, I would ignore this sentence. I would think, yep, that's a good sentence. I'm not going to offer you any correction or advice on that.

23:29Chris However, what I've learned is that this isn't necessarily what people mean. This sentence is often used when people mean something else. It sounds like a good sentence, it communicates something very specific, but that specific thing is often not what people intend. So my question for you is how many people are in this sentence?

23:59Chris How many people is this sentence talking about and describing? One more time. We went with my boss to the meeting. We went with my boss to the meeting. So that's all I'm going to give you for today. A simple question. How many people are in this sentence? And we'll find out the answer and a grammar analysis on next week's podcast.

24:30Chris So don't forget that if you would like to discuss any of the ideas or vocabulary or maybe the grammar, etc., in today's episode, or work on your communication skills or your small talk skills for work more generally, then you can book a session with me by going to www.breakoutbusinglish.com. That's breakoutbusinesenglish.com, or click the link in the show notes and use the code podcast30 at checkout to get a 30% discount off your first booking.

25:07Chris I've worked with well over 1,000 international non-native English speaking professionals, from new graduates up to CEOs and government leaders to help them achieve their goals, and I look forward to meeting you. Between episodes of the podcast, you can get videos every couple of days on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube.

25:31Chris Just search for Breakout Business English. Also, if there's a topic that you'd like to hear me talk about on the podcast, then I'd be excited to hear your ideas. Leave me a message or a comment on one of my YouTube videos, and I look forward to hearing from you. If you're listening on Apple Podcasts, then I invite you to leave a review.

25:55Chris Every review really helps me out and helps to push the podcast to new listeners and to grow the show. So if you found this podcast useful and you think that there are some valuable things in here, then feel free to write a couple of kind words and I thank you in advance. Also, that's another great place to request a topic for a future podcast.

26:19Chris That's it for today. Thank you so much for listening and for your time. I know how valuable it is, and I really appreciate and respect your choice to spend some of your time with this podcast. I hope you have a great week, and I'll talk to you again next time on the Breakout Business English podcast.

26:40Chris Thanks a lot, everyone. Talk to you soon.