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Communications expert shares 'powerful' 3-word trick to skip small talk for real rapport

"Here's a powerful game I love to play when I want to instantly deepen my relationship with someone."

via Canva/Photos

A man and a woman talking in a store.

Is there someone in your life that you see often, but your interactions are merely surface-level small talk? You either talk about the weather, what you watched on television last night, or the people you know in common? It could be a coworker you run across in the kitchen, your brother’s new girlfriend that you’ve never really connected with, or that neighbor you always see at other people’s parties that you never have much to say to.

To build a deeper bond and cut through the veneer of small talk, communications expert Vinh Giang suggests you invite them for a round of an old theater game: High, Low, Buffalo. Giang, a keynote speaker who teaches communication and presentation skills, also performs magic.

“Here's a powerful game I love to play when I want to instantly deepen my relationship with someone,” he writes on Instagram. “It's called High, Low, Buffalo, a game commonly played in the world of theatre, and it allows you to discover three topics of conversation. High is something going great, low is something challenging you're going through, and buffalo is something interesting about you."


High, Low, Buffalo questions:

1. What is something that’s going great for you right now?

2. What is a challenge you’re facing these days?

3. What’s something unique about you?

Giang says you should invite the person to the game, which may take a little courage. But anyone you work with, live near, or has just joined your family would probably never say no. He starts the game with a little script: “This might seem a little bit strange, but I really want to get to know you. I love this game called High Low Buffalo. Could I quickly play this game with you? Is that okay?”

At first, it may seem like a big ask in order to build a deeper connection. However, the game is predicated on one of the basic rules that all communications experts know: just about everyone loves to talk about themselves. Studies show that one of the easiest ways to become more likable is to ask people multiple questions and let them talk for most of the time.

The three-word trick to build rapport fast

- YouTube www.youtube.com

The High, Low, Buffalo game is also handy because it creates multiple potential conversation threads and topics for you and your conversation partner to expand on.

“The moment you do this, you build instant rapport, and then when you're in rapport, they will then ask you about your threads," Giang says in a YouTube video explaining the game. "This is the power and and if they don't ask you about your threads, then you bring your threads in."

conversation, woman having coffee, two women chatting, communication, small talk, Two women enjoying a coffee.via Canva/Photos

For those who are a little reluctant to ask their new friend or coworker to play the game, the basic questions are still great for elevating your small talk. The questions are open-ended, which allows your conversation partner to go beyond a simple yes-or-no answer and to open up and talk about themselves.

Ultimately, building your conversational skills is a great way to improve your career, social life, or romantic relationships. For those who feel they’re just not a natural at conversation, Giang's methods show that just about anyone can become a great conversationalist by learning a few simple tools and a bit about human nature.

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Working and breastfeeding is hard. Studies say support from coworkers is key to success.

Breastfeeding can be a challenge all on its own. What happens when you add working to the mix?

Compared with the rest of the industrialized world (and much of the rest of the world, actually), the U.S. makes working parenthood difficult. As the only developed nation with no guaranteed paid family leave, many new parents find themselves having to return to work within a handful of weeks after having a baby.

Image by The DataFace, LLC.

And when you're a breastfeeding parent, that also means having to figure out how to pump breastmilk while balancing job duties. Sounds simple enough — if you've never pumped before. At best, it's a lot of work and not the most fun way to spend a break. At worst, an employer who is exempt from the federal requirements to provide time and space to breastfeed can make it darn near impossible to pump at the office. Even with time and space, some are never are able to pump efficiently.

For many, breastfeeding and working is doable, but difficult. But there's one thing that is proven to make it easier.

When coworkers are supportive, people have greater success with breastfeeding while working.

According to researchers at Michigan State and Texas Christian University, support from colleagues is a major factor in parents feeling confident that they can continue breastfeeding. In fact, surprisingly, coworker support has an even stronger effect than the support of family and friends.

One of the researchers' studies found that around 25% of participants decided to breastfeed while working because their employers created a breastfeeding-friendly environment. And about 15% said that direct support and motivation from supervisors and coworkers inspired them to keep breastfeeding after going back to work.

The study data showed that simply going back to work was enough to make many folks decide to stop breastfeeding, but those who chose to continue cited colleague support as a primary factor.

"In order to empower women to reach their goals and to continue breastfeeding, it's critical to motivate all co-workers by offering verbal encouragement and practical help," said Joanne Goldbort, an assistant professor in the College of Nursing at MSU, who collaborated in the study. That means accepting that breastfeeders will need extra "breaks," encouraging and supporting them in taking those breaks, and providing a clean, quiet, private space for them to pump.

We've seen progress in the past decade, from laws supporting breastfeeders to better breast pumps.

Thanks to provisions of the Affordable Care Act, federal law mandates that employers provide time and a clean place to pump — a place that is not a bathroom. Not all employers are bound by that law, but it's a good start. And recently, the final two states passed laws protecting the right to breastfeed in public anywhere in the U.S.

In addition, technology keeps getting better and better. Those of us who breastfed a decade or two ago had no choice but to use pumps that were basically the human equivalent of a commercial milking machine. While they got the job done, they were cumbersome, uncomfortable, loud, and not particularly dignified.

Now there are pumps that you can wear inside a bra, with no tubes, no electrical hookups, and no bottles connected. I recently found out about this Willow breast pump and was blown away by how much better it is than what I had available when my kids were babies. While on the pricey side, it's whisper-quiet and can be totally hidden inside your clothing, so you could pump while working and no one would ever know. Mind. Blown.

With more and more working parents in the picture, we have to be creative and flexible when it comes to balancing breastfeeding with work.

There is a lot more America could do to help make breastfeeding easier for working parents. But until we catch up with the rest of the world in providing guaranteed paid leave, we'll have to approach breastfeeding and working as individual employees, employers, and coworkers.

The more we can voice our support for breastfeeding and make it easier for folks who work to get the time, space, and support they need to pump, the happier and healthier our communities will be.

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Why telling the world (or just your coworkers) your salary can be a really good thing.

In the Sony hack in 2014, leaked emails publicly put a spotlight on the wage gap between male and female movie stars.

Actress Jennifer Lawrence had no idea that she was making less than her male co-stars in "American Hustle" until that information was leaked. She was, understandably, pretty ticked off.

Co-star Bradley Cooper was also upset. As a result, he said he would start revealing his salary information to female co-stars to help with their contract negotiations.

Cooper speaks to the crew of the U.S.S. Ronald Reagan during a USO tour in 2009. Image via Chad J. McNeeley/U.S. Navy/Wikimedia Commons.

Bradley Cooper pledging to reveal his salary to colleagues wasn’t just unusual because he’s a big-time celeb — it was unusual because Americans, quite frankly, hate talking about their salaries.

In the absence of leaked emails, we often have no idea how much our peers are making.

Think about it: Do you know how much money your friends make? What about your coworkers? Your parents? Your dog? (OK, your dog probably isn't making anything.)

Why are we so hesitant to discuss how much money we make?

Sharing salary information can be nerve-wracking — and for good reason.

Unspoken societal rules make it uncomfortable to talk openly about the subject, and some companies even have explicit policies against employees discussing wage information. It’s illegal for federal contractors to prohibit employee disclosure of compensation, but many companies (especially those in the private sector) do their best to discourage the dialogue anyway.

According to a Marist Poll, over 70% of adults in the U.S. don’t think private companies should be required to publish employee salary information internally or externally. The same poll showed that 66% of people want to keep their own salary info private.

Clearly, the whole topic is incredibly taboo.

Even this piggy bank won’t tell you how much money it has. Image via iStock.

Plus, there’s the concern that salary discussions will lead to nothing but resentment among employees who find out they’re earning less — or awkward feelings among those earning the most.

The poll above states that 58% of Americans think making salaries public "would cause conflict between employees rather than increasing fairness of pay within the company." After all, who wants to admit to their own hardworking friend that they’re paid a different amount, especially if they're working same job?

Despite the taboo, salary transparency has huge potential to protect against unfair wage discrepancies.

Think about it this way: If you find out you’re making less than a coworker and decide to talk to management about it, your boss has a couple of options. Yes, they could give you a raise (yay!), but they could also simply explain why you’re making less and give you a clear idea of what you would need to do to earn a raise (also yay!).

As long as there are strong, valid reasons for the wage discrepancy, the company has nothing to fear. As NPR puts it, "[salary] transparency is a defense against the games that bad bosses can play." What kind of games might that be? Ones that involve basing salaries and bonuses on factors like an employee’s race or gender.

Even in 2016, men typically make more money than women do for the same work. Image via iStock.

We may never know exactly why Jennifer Lawrence made so much less than her male co-stars in "American Hustle," but it’s not outrageous to assume the gap had something to do with her gender. What would the stars' salaries have looked like if Sony had an obligation to disclose them before the film was made?

Being open about salaries can also help with negotiating, budgeting, and even employee satisfaction.

That’s right. A PayScale survey of 71,000 employees found that “one of the top predictors of employee sentiment is a company's ability to communicate clearly about pay.” Even among employees who know they’re underpaid, 82% still feel "satisfied with their work" if the employer is honest about the reasons for that smaller paycheck.

And for those who are underpaid, knowing what your coworkers are making is a great starting point for negotiating your own compensation up to a fair place.

Whatever your number is, you can choose to keep it a total secret or shout it from the rooftops — it’s your call.

But the more conversations we have about why we have certain money norms, the easier it is for us all to determine which ones make sense and which ones may be causing us to sell ourselves short. And the better off we'll all be — financially and otherwise.

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