How To Be Interesting in Conversations
When I was a management consultant, we interviewed for people to pass the airplane test.
The airplane test was a hypothetical exercise where we imagined we are stuck at an airport with the other person. How long we could stay stuck in the airport with them was a measure of how much we wanted to be around them. The logic was that if management consultants were going to spend a lot of time around our teammates, we wanted teammates who we could hang out, i.e., were interesting in some way.
I didn’t go through the traditional interviews as I was an experienced hire, but I did learn a few tips for how to be more interesting (if you weren’t already and I’m assuming you are).
Ask questions and make it about other people
The easiest way as Dale Carnegie says is to be interested and not interesting. Think about the most ‘interesting’ people you have met in your life. Go ahead, take a few seconds to do so. Now think about how much you got to know that person in the conversation. If it’s like most people I ask, the answer is “not much”.
The most interesting people in your life are probably those that show an incredible interest in what you are doing in your life.
