We are all guilty of dismissing small talk as a waste of time and I know I’m not the only one who has loudly declaimed how much I hate it.  However, a little more thought and study shows that far from being a waste of time, it is a vital piece of social glue.  Think about monkeys and their mutual grooming routines, these build trust and interdependence.  The thing is we are never going to reveal our secret heart to a total stranger (at least not without a significant amount of alcohol first!)  Think about it, the first thing you want to know about a stranger is what are they like, or more importantly, are they like us?  Do they come from the same ‘tribe’ or background?  We explore to discover if we have the common ground or history we can build a relationship on.  So what happens first is a series of relatively bland questions that create a space which we invite the other to step into.  Think of it like a dance, we each take a turn around the floor and then make space for the other person to follow suit. 

I found it interesting when researching this to discover that people who study this kind of thing have categorised (and ranked) our communication on a scale according to the amount of task related (or ‘real’ content) it carries, thereby dismissing all else as ‘small’ talk.  Feminists have described this as patriarchal disrespect for the important and more female task of building relationships and maintaining harmony.  This kind of language is now referred to by sociolinguistists ‘social language’.

I have often noticed when attending networking meetings, that once I have ‘bumped into’ someone more than about 3 times, I tend to think of them as someone I know and feel warmer towards them; they are a safe, friendly face in a sea of strangers.  Familiarity (and the absence of negative experiences) tends to breed trust.  This then opens the door to a more substantial exchange of ideas and stories.  In other words, you have to earn the right to share and build a relationship and ‘small’ talk is the entrance fee we pay.

So next time you are feeling like it is a waste of your time, think of it a token down-payment on a new relationship.