We talk to people to achieve success in every aspect of business and life. Even though we do it constantly, and it feels like it should be second nature, conversation is surprisingly hard, especially for leaders. This course will sharpen your conversational awareness, confidence, and skills using the TALK framework:

Topics: choose good topics, and manage them well.
Asking: ask more, and better, questions.
Levity: use humor and warmth.
Kindness: care about others, and show it.

In this course, you will:

• Reflect on your conversational goals and values.
• Participate in many immersive conversation exercises (both silly and serious)--always as yourself (no role playing).
• Experiment with specific conversational approaches that may (or may not) work for you.
• Record and listen back to yourself to reflect on your conversational performance and progress.
• Become hypervigilant about conversation dynamics (this feeling will dissipate over time).
• Feel validated about your strengths, and improve on your weaknesses, in conversation.

In this course, you will NOT:

• Work on public speaking (this course is about human-to-human dialogue, not oration/monologue/public speaking).
• Learn surprising, outlandish, or controversial strategies (this course focuses on realistic, research-backed insights that help most people converse more effectively in most situations).

Course logistics:

• 12 session course: Experiential exercises, weekly reflections, and an individual final project
• 2 sections of 60 students
• Some class sessions will take place in the Hives
• Grading is based on class participation, assignments, and final project.
• Final project requires a recorded conversation (of your choosing), analysis, and short summary essay.
• No technical background required.

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