​I had a coffee this week with an old friend and colleague Richard Stephens who runs his own law firm LORS. He is an experienced IT lawyer and we are both past chairs of SCL. On this occasion one of the topics we debated was the extent to which listening or talking is the greater art at a networking event.
 
Listening is according to Dale Carnegie one of the essential skills needed to succeed in interpersonal relationships in business. On the other hand, there are many professional people who really know their subject and are inspiring to listen to.
 
So, at a networking event trying to win a new client is it better to be a good listener or an entertaining talker? Some individuals are able to “talk the talk” about seemingly anything. As Oscar Wilde said “I love to talk about nothing. It's the only thing I know anything about.”
 
Bu he also rather wryly said “I am so clever that sometimes I don't understand a single word of what I am saying.”
 
We never really reached a conclusion and it may be that a combination of being a good listener and a good talker is the ideal. Here, for example, is an article that suggests There are two sides to every conversation, and both are essential to the art of communication.
 
It did also make me think after we met about what makes a good leader in the professional world. Is it somebody, man or woman, who is flamboyant and extrovert inspiring followers by their wit and wisdom? Or rather somebody less obviously “the leader” who is more modest and actually gets things done?
 
It makes me think again of Jim Collins’s book Good to Great where he concludes that one of the key characteristics of great companies is Level 5 Leadership: Leaders who are humble, but driven to do what's best for the company. He suggests that “The good-to-great leaders never wanted to become larger-than-life heroes. They never aspired to be put on a pedestal or become unreachable icons. They were seemingly ordinary people quietly producing extraordinary results.”
 
At the same time history and business is full of inspirational orators and leaders like Winston Churchill and Charles de Gaulle or Jack Welch the legendary leader of General Electric who are hardly reserved or retiring characters. Interestingly Jack Welch was more than just a charismatic person and, for example, in this article about successful leadership concludes  "The trick is building truth and trust…People have to trust you. You have to build in trust for people."
 
Maybe at the end of the day whether networking or running a professional business it’s all a question of balance, being capable of listening to others and in turn inspiring them. As the American writer Edward Abbey suggests, perhaps more in a political context, “Balance, that’s the secret. Moderate extremism. The best of both worlds”. 

I was walking the dog this morning when a woman and her son rode by on their bicycles. Strictly bicycles are not allowed in this particular woodland walk but I decided to ignore this and smiled and said a cheery good morning.
 
No reaction at all. The woman just glared at me and looked practically unattractive as a result. I felt slightly hurt – maybe I should have ignored her as well.
 
It had been wet and I and the dog were going up and down the same relatively dry track when lo and behold we met the cyclists again. The dog has eventually learnt over his six or so years that bicycles are boring, so he generally ignores them. This time around for some obscure reason he tried to walk under the wheels of the woman’s bicycle.
 
Fortunately, she had slowed down and avoided him. I apologised for the dog’s stupid behaviour, but this time she gave me a broad smile and said not to worry they had a dog too.
 
It made such a difference – she looked far better as a person, younger and more vivacious, and I felt better because we had established some proper rapport. What a difference ten minutes and the dog’s unconscious behaviour had made.
 
Dale Carnegie in How to Win Friends and Influence People totally recognised the importance of a smile. He writes: The effect of a smile is powerful – even when it is unseen. Telephone companies throughout the United States have a programme called “phone power” …they suggest that you smile when talking on the phone. Your “smile” comes through in your voice.
 
And this is a serious matter in a business transaction. I have watched experienced negotiators join the first meeting on a major deal by walking into the room, sitting down with barely a cursory nod to the other side, opening their laptop, placing their phone on the table, checking a few emails - and then looking up and saying “OK” let’s start.
 
This is just wrong and misses the opportunity to get to know your opposition and to establish a relationship with them which eventually will be critical. The Japanese ritual of exchanging business cards at the initial meeting as a part of a get to know everybody absolutely works.
 
I am convinced in a recent difficult transaction that we got through to a final agreement because we took the trouble to arrange a face to face meeting and established a proper relationship with the other side as a result.
 
And go around the table and shake hands. As this article suggests A handshake can be a relationship maker or deal breaker. If you give a light, finger grab, you seem demure and timid. A bone crunching squeeze sends an anxious, or bullying message. A firm, but not too forced grip communicates that you are composed and self-assured.

This Harvard Business Review article says If you want to have a more productive meeting, focus on a strong opening. A good start to a meeting is like an overture: It sets the tone, introduces the major themes, and provides a preview of what you can expect.
 
Jay Danzie the American author and speaker said “Your smile is your logo, your personality is your business card, how you leave others feeling after having an experience with you becomes your trade mark”.

As Winnie the Pooh said "Smile more, worry less".
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​Many years ago, I was looking after the Far East division for a global IT company as an in-house lawyer. I enjoyed foreign travel and had already been to Singapore and Malaysia. Then in connection with some contract or other a senior finance person almost ordered me to “get on a plane” to Asia and sort it out.
 
As it happened it was not a very material contract and there was no point in having a face to face meeting in the context of the other priorities the department had. So, I didn’t go and though it caused some internal strife it was the right decision.
 
More recently working on one very large and one very small contract negotiation in parallel I had a similar choice of travelling albeit only into London by train – no planes involved – for a meeting on the smaller contract. I realised this was the wrong call (only very early in the morning of the meeting), stayed put and worked on the more significant transaction, dialling into the other meeting – which only went on for a short time as it happened.
 
Making this sort of call is about prioritising the many demands made of us in our working days as we receive floods of emails, IM’s, calls and meeting requests, but is particularly pertinent to business travel and commuting which take a toll on all of us, even when we can now work quite seamlessly on planes and trains.
 
This article from the University of Surrey, A darker side to hypermobility concludes that whilst aspects of glamorization in regard to mobility are omnipresent in our lives, there exists an ominous silence with regard to its darker side. It discusses the benefits and challenges of transport glamorization – what I call the “get on a plane at all costs” mentality.
 
And it’s not just about the potential stress of travel, it’s the time wasted in airport lounges and on commuter trains or in motorway rush hour traffic jams. This blog calculates that UK commuters spend over half of their lives commuting and comments that There is increasing evidence that [commuting] adversely affects our psychological and physical health – even after we account for the increased wages and larger home that commuting further may allow us to obtain.
 
All of this when the technology for audio and video conferencing and Skype meetings advances rapidly and allows global participation in meetings without leaving your home or local office.
 
And actually, the forgotten art of writing clearly and concisely still works and sometimes the right email with the correct attachment moves things forward more than the call or meeting where egos come into play. As Francis Bacon said: Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man.
 
Anyway, in the future if technology advances at its current pace we may be able to send our avatar or look alike robot to a meeting whilst we head off for the beach, thus avoiding travel or commuting, or even working, in the first place!

I hired a van this weekend to move some furniture. There was one man dealing with customers when I went to pick up the transit and I was second in the queue. Just after the previous customer had gone off to their vehicle, the phone rang and the man answered it - I thought here goes another 10-minute wait. Instead he explained he was with a customer and asked the caller to phone back.
 
I complemented him on his behaviour and he said the customer in front of him was always more important than the one on the phone. Full marks to Kendall Van Hire a down to earth company.
 
Too often these days the smartphone is king and woe betide anybody who dares to interrupt our messaging, surfing, whatsapping, instagramming or whatever else it may be that we are engaged on using these incredible devices.
 
I caught myself this week in one of those acts that are part of these everyday occurrences in our working and social lives that somebody described as “phubbing” or phone snubbing. I was texting something on my phone in a meeting room when a business colleague came in and started talking to me about something important. I said I was listening - but still went on typing my inconsequential text. Shame on me. We are above all else people and should recognise that face to face communication matters and is not subservient to electronic communication.
 
This is a serious business matter. Here is an American Express article from 2013 that  talks about how mobile phones may be actually damaging business communication The cell phone turns 40 years old this month. Are we less productive because of it?
 
Things have not necessarily improved in the last few years. Smartphones may be positively damaging to the way we think. See this comment from a Harvard Medical School blog According to a new study, the mere presence of your smartphone, even if it isn’t ringing and even if you aren’t looking at it, can hurt your performance on certain cognitive tasks.
 
The study it refers to is a University of Chicago paper  which summarises the advantages of smartphones but considers the challenges to human behaviour quoting Andrew Sullivan who is an English-born American author, editor, and blogger   We all understand the joys of our always-wired world—the connections, the validations, the laughs … the info. … But we are only beginning to get our minds around the costs.
 
 Don’t get me wrong. I recognise all of the advantages of our modern linked and connected electronic world and the opportunities and benefits it brings. I just think it helps to get it all in perspective. I like this quote from the author Vera Nazarian: “It's easier for a rich man to ride that camel through the eye of a needle directly into the Kingdom of Heaven, than for some of us to give up our cell phone.”
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​In October last year I acquired an SUV. In December I purchased a folding snow shovel for the princely sum of £10 in a Tesco supermarket. However, we had a really mild, wet Christmas and January so neither seemed a particularly good investment.
 
Then the first two days of spring in the UK were the coldest for 27 years and terrible snow and ice crippled the country. I didn’t need the snow shovel but the four-wheel drive car came into its own. Of course, you can still you get stuck in a traffic jam on a snowed in motorway behind jacknifed lorries, but even then, blankets and some provisions may help.
 
This all made me think about being properly prepared for events in professional working life, and the consequences if you are not. If lawyers, for example, go into court or negotiations the day after being instructed with little contact with their client or colleagues, having read the papers the night before, things may not go well.
 
This Harvard Business Review article emphasises that Preparation is the key to any successful negotiation, but few people spend enough time on it recommending that you should put at least as much time into getting as ready as you think the negotiation will take — at a minimum.
 
I also recommend this article from the Association of Corporate Counsel which comments Preparation includes knowing your needs and limits, understanding what the other party wants and anticipating their limits, asking the right questions, and being creative in your proposed solutions. Good preparation allows you to strategize and to think on your feet in the negotiation room.
 
Proper preparation involves getting the whole negotiation team in a room and “whiteboarding” the approaching negotiation, being creative, letting everyone contribute, considering your objectives and those of the other side, arriving eventually at an approach everybody understands and buys into.
 
This can then be socialised with key senior stakeholders who can understand and agree – which can be particularly important if the other side threatens as a negotiating tactic to go around the nominated negotiation team and appeal to their senior management.
 
There is nothing more powerful than being able to respond to such a threat by saying “Please feel free to speak to anybody in the company, but you need to understand than you will get the same answer because we represent the views of our company at the highest global level”.
 
Of course, this must be true and failure to prepare will expose weaknesses either within the team (where somebody doesn’t understand and follow the party line) or in an escalation. There is nothing more embarrassing and potentially damaging than having a carefully crafted position undermined by somebody on your own side who doesn’t truly understand and follow the agreed plan.
 
Preparation means you have covered all the bases and know your side and the opposition.
 
If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle. Sun Tzu The Art of War.