Breaking the Ice

For many, starting a conversation with a stranger is a stressful event. We may be lost for words, and awkward with our body language and mannerisms.

Creating rapport at the beginning of a conversation with somebody new will often make the outcome of the conversation more positive. However stressful or nervous you may feel, the first thing you need to do is to try to relax and remain calm. By decreasing the tension in the situation, communication becomes easier and rapport grows.

When you meet somebody for the first time, there are some easy things that you can do, to reduce the tension. This will help both of you to feel more relaxed and communicate more effectively.

These include:

Use non-threatening and ‘safe topics’ for initial small talk

Talk about established shared experiences, the weather, how you travelled to where you are.

Avoid talking too much about yourself and avoid asking direct questions about the other person.

Listen to what the other person is saying and look for shared experiences or circumstances

This will give you more to talk about in the initial stages of communication.

Try to inject an element of humour

Laughing together creates harmony, make a joke about yourself or the situation/circumstances you are in, but avoid making jokes about other people.

Be conscious of your body language and other non-verbal signals you are sending

Try to maintain eye contact for approximately 60% of the time. Relax and lean slightly towards them to indicate listening, and mirror their body-language if appropriate.

Show some empathy

Demonstrate that you can see the other person’s point of view. Remember rapport is all about finding similarities and ‘being on the same wavelength’ as somebody else. Being empathic will help to achieve this.

Make sure the other person feels included but not interrogated during initial conversations. Just as you may feel tense and uneasy meeting and talking to somebody new, so may they.

Put the other person at their ease. This will enable you to relax and conversation to become more natural.

Non-Verbal Rapport Building

Initial conversations can help us to relax. However, quite a lot of rapport-building happens without words and through non-verbal communication channels.

We create and maintain rapport subconsciously through matching non-verbal signals, including body positioning, body movements, eye contact, facial expressions and tone of voice with the other person.

Watch two friends talking when you get the opportunity and see how they sub-consciously mimic each other’s non-verbal communication.

We create rapport instinctively. It is our natural defence from conflict, which most of us will try hard to avoid most of the time.

It is important to use appropriate body language. We read and instantly believe what body language tells us, whereas we may take more persuading with vocal communication. If there is a mismatch between what we are saying and our body language, then the person we are with will believe the body language. Building rapport, therefore, begins with displaying appropriate body language. This usually means being welcoming, relaxed and open.

The way we use our voice is also important in developing rapport. When we are nervous or tense, we tend to talk more quickly. This in turn can make you sound more stressed. We tend to vary our voices, pitch, volume and pace to make what we are saying more interesting, but it also has an effect on how we come across. Try lowering your tone and talk more slowly and softly. This will actually help you develop rapport more easily.