Get off the phone faster
Do you ever get stuck on the phone with a friend who keeps talking and talking and talking? If your problem is the length of your telephone calls and not that you no longer want to speak with them, here are some tips to get off the phone with a chatty friend minutes faster!
Set a time limit on the conversation and inform your chatty friend of it
You don’t need to start the conversation with “I have a stopwatch and once 10 minutes have passed my phone will automatically hang up” but you can let your friend know ahead of time that you really only have 5 minutes to talk. You may be uncomfortable setting a time limit on the conversation, especially if you’re the one who called, but the fact that you called means you want to keep in contact with and talk to your friend, and that is what your friend should focus on.
Listen more
If you’re stuck on how to be a good listener, read this. If you allow your friend to do most of the talking during the conversation, when the conversation ends, he or she will likely feel that it was a good (albeit short!) conversation, compared with if the talk is dominated by you and then cut off by you. If your call is purely to catch up, allow your friend to spend more time talking about what has been going on in her life (you probably won’t have to twist her arm to get it out of her!). Ask questions but let the majority of the talking come from your friend.
Wrap up the conversation firmly
Have you ever told somebody on the phone that you “have to go”, then ended up taking for an extra 20 minutes—or longer? If so, you need to bone up on how to close a conversation quickly and definitively (without slamming down the phone). Once you have said your closing, if your friend responds with anything other than a closing, you have to interrupt and say something along the lines of “I’m sorry to interrupt but I really do have to go. Can we talk about this next time?” This last question is rhetorical and unless it is a matter of life and death that cannot wait, try to avoid getting sucked into this new conversation. To placate your chatty friend, why not even set a time and date to discuss this new topic? Something along the lines of “I really don’t have time right now to discuss your new outfits but how about next week? Same time?” or something suited to your friendship might be just what your friend needs to hear so that she doesn’t feel that she’s being given the brush off.
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Try these tips and see how many friends you’ll be able to keep up with now that your conversations aren’t allowed to drag on forever!
talking on the phone, keep conversations short, stop a chatty friend
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