This will appear in the second edition of Fiona’s new book, but she shares the results here so that you can start a conversation about conversation where you are.
Every segment of the framework in ‘Take a Breath: Conquering Small Talk’ had to earn its place. Before I asked you to trust The BREATHE Framework, I wanted to check my own assumptions against real people, so I shared a short survey with friends, family, clients and a scattering of willing strangers. I first answered the questions for myself. Forty-nine other people spoke to me, answering honestly, generously, and in a few cases with more detail than I expected. Does this resonate with your own conversational memories? Read on and find out.
Names have been removed throughout. What is left is generation and gender only; enough to spot a pattern, not enough to identify a person.
Who took part?
The group skewed slightly male (twenty-seven to twenty-two) to reflect my typical client base and spanned five generations, from Baby Boomers to Gen Alpha, with Gen X and Millennials making up over half the total between them. Sixteen different national or cultural origins were represented, and two thirds of respondents now live somewhere other than where they were born. If you have ever worried that your accent, upbringing or background makes you an outsider in a conversation, take heart: nearly everyone in this survey has navigated that exact shift.
When did conversation begin?
I asked people to imagine when their very first conversation took place. Several asked me what I meant by ‘conversation’; I asked them to decide. Two thirds placed it before they started school, most somewhere between being a toddler and their fourth birthday. A few pinned it to a single vivid moment: a kitten spotted under a coffee table, a gooseberry bush argued over with a neighbour, a sister who could talk to anyone anywhere. The rest placed it later, at the start of school or even further into adolescence.
The takeaway for grown up, capable, credentialed professionals who still dread small talk is this: conversation is not a talent you either have or lack. It is a skill you started building before you could walk properly, and like any skill built that early, most of us have forgotten we are even doing it and take it for granted.
How did people learn?
Nobody said they were consciously taught to talk. They absorbed it. Observing, overhearing, listening and watching accounted for the overwhelming majority of answers, ahead of any formal instruction. Parents and wider family were named by nearly every single respondent as the source, followed by friends, teachers and grandparents.
“I’m a software engineer, happy not speaking!” – Male, Gen X
“Not a lot of talking going on from children. Eat your food, then talk.” – Male, Millennial
“I can strike up a conversation with anyone in a socially inept manner. That comes from personality, nurture, self-confidence, and lack of it.” – Male, Gen X cusp
Who did you learn from?
Parents, overwhelmingly. Mentioned by nearly every single respondent, sometimes as a pair, sometimes as one standout parent doing most of the talking while the other, in a few cases, was noted for being quiet. Where parents were not the whole story, the wider family filled the gaps: grandparents, aunts, older siblings, a nan, a great aunt, a nine-year older big sister with an opinion on everything. Beyond the family circle, the next most common answer was simply everyone nearby: neighbours, childminders, community, church, school friends, teachers, even the people on the television or radio the household happened to have on. Nobody named a coach. Nobody named a course. The people who taught us to talk were, without exception, the people who were already in the room.
“My dad, who had an opinion about everything, and my big sister, nine years older than me.” – Female, Millennial cusp
“Mum and aunties and nan. Dad was in the RAF and quiet.” – Male, Millennial
Where did it happen?
The setting was almost never a classroom. It was the kitchen, the dining table, the living room, the garden. Domestic, unglamorous, everyday spaces where conversation simply happened around people rather than being staged for them. People from warmer countries have more outside memories of conversations; families with gardening as a priority were the exception in colder countries. Older generations mentioned walking to family. No one recalled the car as a memorable place from those early years.
“Next door neighbour, about gooseberries over the garden wall.” – Male, Millennial
“We always ate together.” – Female, Millennial
Notice what is missing from that list. Nobody said a training course. Nobody said a public speaking class. The room that shaped most of us into conversationalists was the one with a kettle in it. Perhaps the course I roll out should be set in a kitchen…
How easy do people find it now?
On a scale of one to ten, respondents rated their current ease with conversation at an average of just over seven, though the full range ran from one to a self-declared, scale defying twenty-five (that respondent, it should be said, was answering a slightly different question in her own head, and I loved her for it). The most common answer was eight, closely followed by seven and ten.
What this tells me is that most people are already doing reasonably well, and still do not feel entirely at ease. Confidence and competence, as I’ve experienced with all my clients, are not the same thing. You can be seven out of ten and still walk into a networking event with your stomach in knots.
A few more things people wanted me to know
“It’s interesting to think about the effect of culture on conversation. An Irish wedding has everyone sitting around tables, an Indian wedding is often different, people eat quickly and then go and speak. My Indian husband prefers to focus on eating at mealtime!” – Female, Millennial cusp
“I prefer to listen first and then have my input.” – Female, Gen Z
“I enjoy talking sometimes maybe too much.” – Male, Gen Z
“I find making jokes and using humour helpful.” – Male, Millennial
One respondent, now a journalist, traced his own curiosity back to being praised as a child for asking his aunt a proper, grown-up question about the news of the day. A small compliment, decades ago, still doing its quiet work.
What it means for you
None of this is a lecture. It is evidence. Evidence that conversation is learned young, learned informally, and learned in ordinary rooms, which means it can be relearned the same way, one small step at a time. That is the entire premise of The BREATHE framework. I am glad forty-nine strangers, friends and family members helped me prove it before I asked you to believe it.
What are you waiting for? Pull up a chair. The kitchen table is still where the good conversations happen.
