How to speak more confidently and persuasively | Matt Abrahams (professor, speaker, author)

1. 0:00 – 4:50

   Matt’s background

   1. MAMatt Abrahams0:00

      Visualization is a really useful technique. And you see yourself not just in the moment of speaking, but getting up to the stage, seeing it being well-received, thinking about how you step off the stage. We see athletes do this kind of thing all the time, and there's good research to say that this desensitizes people.

   2. LRLenny Rachitsky0:16

      Most of the public speaking we do is on the spot. It's not often you give a prepared talk.

   3. MAMatt Abrahams0:20

      You actually have to prepare to be spontaneous, and that's counterintuitive, but when you think about it in athletics or jazz music, it's like, of course, you would prepare and practice.

   4. LRLenny Rachitsky0:28

      Are there any other techniques that you love, that you find people find really helpful in calming their anxiety?

   5. MAMatt Abrahams0:34

      Strive for connection over perfection by daring to be dull. Just answer the question. Just give the feedback. Just be engaged in the small talk. By doing that, you dial down the volume of self-evaluation, freeing up resources that can be used to really help you succeed.

   6. LRLenny Rachitsky0:51

      (Instrumental music) Today, my guest is Matt Abrahams. Matt is a professor at Stanford University's Graduate School of Business, where he teaches a very popular class on communication and public speaking. He's also the host of the incredibly popular podcast, Think Fast, Talk Smart, and the author of the very popular book, Think Faster and Talk Smarter. Matt also coaches people one-on-one on public speaking and communication skills. And in our conversation, we focus on the two areas that people most need help with. One, reducing their anxiety before and during any form of public speaking, and getting better at speaking on the spot, including giving better toasts, giving feedback, doing Q&A, and even apologizing. Like we talk about in the actual conversation, speaking well is a superpower in your career, for interviewing, for being great in meetings, for pitching your manager on ideas, to leading teams. And this skill becomes even more important as you grow in your career. The good news is that you can get better at it with a bit of help. I've worked on this a lot over the course of my career, and I still get really nervous before big talks, and even before every podcast episode. But many of these techniques I actually put into practice, and I share that in our conversation. If you pick just a couple things from this episode to put into practice, you will become a better communicator, you'll be less nervous, and you'll get better at dealing with on-the-spot moments. If you enjoy this podcast, don't forget to subscribe and follow it in your favorite podcasting app or YouTube. It's the best way to avoid missing future episodes, and it helps the podcast tremendously. With that, I bring you Matt Abrahams, after a short word from our sponsors. Let me tell you about a product called Sprig. Next-gen product teams like Figma and Notion rely on Sprig to build products that people love. Sprig is an AI-powered platform that enables you to collect relevant product experience insights from the right users, so you can make product decisions quickly and confidently. Here's how it works. It all starts with Sprig's precise targeting, which allows you to trigger in-app studies based on users' characteristics and actions taken in-product. Then, Sprig's AI is layered on top of all studies to instantly surface your product's biggest learnings. Sprig's surveys enables you to target specific users to get relevant and timely feedback. Sprig Replays enables you to capture targeted session clips to see your product experience firsthand. Sprig's AI is a game-changer for product teams. They're the only platform with product-level AI, meaning it analyzes data across all of your studies to centralize the most important product opportunities, trends, and correlations in one real-time feed. Visit sprig.com/lenny to learn more and get 10% off. That's S-P-R-I-G.com/lenny. This episode is brought to you by Dovetail, the customer insights hub for product teams. Are you working in a feature factory building filler that nobody wants? Probably, because the sad truth is that most SaaS features are rarely or never used, costing the industry billions every year. Let's change that. Product managers, Dovetail is holding their first industry conference. It's called Insight Out, and they want you to come. Over one day in San Francisco, the product community is coming together to learn how to better leverage customer insights and build products that people actually love to use. It's on April 11th, and you can hear from product leaders from Uber, Twitch, Meta, and Netflix, as they share their strategies for driving innovation, thriving in uncertainty, and balancing customer-centered work with business needs. And here's the kicker, it's absolutely free for online tickets. Just go to dovetail.com/lenny to register. This is thanks to Dovetail, the best way for product teams to get the most out of customer insights. Check it out at dovetail.com/lenny.

2. 4:50 – 10:57

   Techniques for managing anxiety in public speaking

   1. LRLenny Rachitsky4:50

      Matt, thank you so much for being here, and welcome to the podcast.

   2. MAMatt Abrahams4:54

      Lenny, I am excited for our conversation, and thank you for having me.

   3. LRLenny Rachitsky4:57

      Thank you for being here. I'm even more excited for the conversation. So what I want to do with our time today is, there's kind of two areas I want to focus. One is talking about techniques to help people manage anxiety when public speaking, and two is helping people get better at speaking on the spot, which you wrote a whole book about. And if you think about it, I think that's like most of the public speaking we do is on the spot. It's not often you give a prepared talk. It's usually, like you said, Q&A, or a toast someone wants to give you, or s- ask for feedback, or things like that. So, I'm excited to dig into those things. How did that sound, broadly?

   4. MAMatt Abrahams5:33

      Absolutely. I, I look forward to that. And, and those are topics I'm very excited to talk about, have done a lot of research in, and, and look forward to, uh, sharing more.

   5. LRLenny Rachitsky5:41

      I suspected as much. Okay, so let's talk about anxiety. So you have a bunch of really novel techniques in your book and your podcast for calming your body down, calming your mind down, when you're planning to give a talk, when you're actually about to give a talk, when you're giving a talk. And a lot of these I haven't actually seen anywhere else, and I've used a few of them, and they are really great. So, what I was thinking we do is let me sh- go through the ones that I found most useful and interesting and just share your advice on those, and then see if there's any I missed and then maybe add those at the end. How's that?

   6. MAMatt Abrahams6:14

      That sounds great. That sounds great.

   7. LRLenny Rachitsky6:16

      Okay.

   8. MAMatt Abrahams6:16

      I love that you've applied some of these techniques and found value from them.

   9. LRLenny Rachitsky6:19

      Mm-hmm. I'll talk about those. I'll talk about those. Okay, so first of all, just to touch on this. You're not a fan of the, uh, picture people in your audience naked approach, correct?

   10. MAMatt Abrahams6:27

       (laughs) The Brady Bunch advice is not good advice. I don't know about you, and I don't know anybody who, who could imagine seeing a bunch of people in their underwear and feel more comfortable with that, and I think if you do, uh, there are other issues you need to be dealing with than, (laughs) beyond speaking anxiety.

   11. LRLenny Rachitsky6:41

       Yeah. It feels like highly inappropriate and now, just that idea, (laughs) trying to-

   12. MAMatt Abrahams6:45

       Right.

   13. LRLenny Rachitsky6:45

       ... picture everyone.

   14. MAMatt Abrahams6:46

       Well, but you know, underlying that, if you'll give me a moment, there is some, there is some value. This notion of visualization as a tool of desensitization actually can be very helpful, but you're not visualizing the audience half naked. What you're doing is you're visualizing yourself in that space. You're visualizing the audience responding to you and what you're saying. So, just like a pilot might do a flight simulator, having a visualization can actually really help you feel more comfortable and confident. It literally puts you in the room, even though you're not there, and there's some tools, and I, I'm fascinated by these tools, that are virtual reality tools that can also serve to desensitize you. So, this notion of seeing your audience, uh, in advance of actually speaking can actually impact your level of comfort. It's, let's keep everybody clothed and let's keep them all focused on your topic.

   15. LRLenny Rachitsky7:36

       Let's actually talk about this one while we're on it, 'cause I think this is a really powerful technique, an idea just to, just to kind of summarize. You picture ahead of time what it's gonna look like and feel like, you talking, looking at the audience. Can you talk about e- that and just how to go about using that technique?

   16. MAMatt Abrahams7:50

       Yeah, absolutely. So visualization allow, uh, and thi- this is some of the oldest research on public speaking anxiety. It was research done in the '80s from the University of Oregon. So visualization, it, what it does is it allows you to see the event in a way that you have much more control over it, so you can think about it. So a good visualization involves some deep breathing to calm yourself. Either you close your eyes or you just, uh, look at a picture. Maybe you can get a picture of the environment you're speaking in. I often recommend speakers, uh, see the room even if they're not physically present, but get a picture online, uh, or, or s- some way envision yourself in the room. Envision yourself s- in the room with the people you'll be speaking to. Often we know the individuals or some of them. We can also go online and figure out who they are. So visualization is a really useful technique, and you see yourself not just in the moment of speaking, but getting up to the stage, delivering the presentation, seeing it being well received, thinking about how you step off the stage, and by taking yourself through that, you, in essence, are doing a dress rehearsal even though you're not physically in the room. And there's good research to say that this desensitizes people. We see athletes do this kind of thing all the time, where they'll do visualization to help them, and, and it really does work. And like I said, there are virtual tools now that can help you do this, where you can actually program it to pu- uh, to have a certain size audience. You can even program some of these to have a responsive audience or a distracted audience. All of this in service of just preparing you for what you're really going to see, and the bottom line is this. What you're doing for yourself is making sure it's not new and novel.

   17. LRLenny Rachitsky9:30

       Mm-hmm.

   18. MAMatt Abrahams9:30

       It's something been there, done that, even though if it was, uh, virtual or visualized in your mind, to help you feel better about the circumstance. It gives you a sense of agency.

   19. LRLenny Rachitsky9:42

       I've done this myself actually. I gave a TEDx talk once and it was the, probably the scariest talk I've ever given, and I spent a lot of time doing this, and it doesn't actually have to take that much time. Like, it could be like a five-minute thing where you sit down, calm yourself, and then just picture the stuff, and ideally you do it a couple times, I imagine.

   20. MAMatt Abrahams9:57

       That's right. Good for you, and congratulations on giving a TEDx talk.

   21. LRLenny Rachitsky10:00

       Ah. Thank you. (laughs)

   22. MAMatt Abrahams10:00

       That was a high stakes talk.

   23. LRLenny Rachitsky10:01

       That was, that was, that was before TEDx became super uncool. It was like (laughs) when it was still pretty early. Uh, it's out there in the internet in case people wanna find it.

   24. MAMatt Abrahams10:08

       Don't say they're uncool. I'm doing one in two day, uh, two weeks, so.

   25. LRLenny Rachitsky10:11

       They're so cool. That is so-

   26. MAMatt Abrahams10:12

       They are cool. That's right.

   27. LRLenny Rachitsky10:14

       ... incredible. I'm-

   28. MAMatt Abrahams10:15

       They are-

   29. LRLenny Rachitsky10:15

       ... so impressed.

   30. MAMatt Abrahams10:16

       I've done, I've done a number and I, I've done a number of them and I've coached many people, and I think they, there's a lot of value that they can provide people.
3. 10:57 – 13:40

   Dare to be dull

   1. MAMatt Abrahams10:57

   2. LRLenny Rachitsky10:57

      Okay. One of my favorite techniques that, it might be in this bucket, it might be in the on the spot advice bucket, but I think it works great here is to, is what you call dare to be dull. Can you talk about that? 'Cause I love that.

   3. MAMatt Abrahams11:08

      Yeah, so I, I really leaned into this with the spontaneous speaking work that I've been doing as of late, but it applies to anybody speaking. Uh, this is a notion that comes from the world of improvisation, and when people hear improv, they often think of standup comedy, having to be funny, and that's not what improv is all about. Improv is all about being present, being collaborative, being open, and it's a wonderful tool just to help you get present oriented. Uh, uh, think of it as like meditation in action, but also it teaches lots of valuable skills for communication. When we communicate, especially spontaneously, we want to do it really well. Uh, we wanna answer the question with the best answer. We wanna give the right feedback. We want to be the most interesting in small talk, and that puts a lot of pressure on ourselves, and, and you can think of it this way. It's, it's really taxing our cognitive bandwidth.Your brain in many ways is like a CPU, a computer. It's not a perfect analogy, but it works. And if I am constantly judging and evaluating everything I am saying against some standard of perfection, whatever that is, it means I have a limited amount of bandwidth to focus on what I'm actually saying and connecting to my audience. If you have a laptop or a phone that has lots of windows and apps open and you are, your each one of those is performing less well because of the other ones being open. So I often say strive for connection over perfection by daring to be dull. Just get the task done, just answer the question, just give the feedback, just be engaged in the small talk. And by doing that, you dial down the volume of self-evaluation, freeing up resources that can be used to really help you succeed. So dare to be dull is all about giving yourself permission to just be present and do what's needed. And when you do that, you find that you actually do quite a good job at it.

   4. LRLenny Rachitsky13:04

      That last point I think is really important, you talk about this in your book, is when you start with, "Okay, I'm just gonna say something, it'll be fine." Without that pressure you end up saying something better and more interesting and more insightful 'cause you're less nervous about it.

   5. MAMatt Abrahams13:16

      That's exactly right. That we- we are our- we are often our biggest impediments to good communication because of the anxiety we bring to the party.

   6. LRLenny Rachitsky13:23

      That's awesome. And I think this can apply to prepared talks too. When you're preparing a deck, like don't put this pressure on yourself this has to be the best talk ever. Just like, I'm gonna do my best, let me just start with something that's good enough. People learn something, and then from that you end up, their editing ends up leading to something great, in my experience.

   7. MAMatt Abrahams13:39

      Right.

4. 13:40 – 16:08

   Reframing anxiety as excitement

   1. MAMatt Abrahams13:40

   2. LRLenny Rachitsky13:40

      Awesome. Okay, let's go to the next technique, and this is another one I practice, and another guest on the podcast actually suggested this, and these two remind me of using this one, which is to tell yourself when you're gonna give- be giving a talk, "I'm excited, this is gonna be a lot of fun. I'm so excited to give this talk," and kind of reframe it from, "I'm nervous," to like, "No, I'm excited. This is gonna be amazing." Can you talk about that technique?

   3. MAMatt Abrahams14:04

      Absolutely. So this is a- one of many cognitive reframing techniques, uh, it is often attributed to my friend and- and colleague, Alison Woods Brooks, she's at Harvard Business School, who did some research into this. And what she found is... Uh, well first, take a step back. When you get physically aroused by anxiety, you're under that fight or flight threat response. It turns out that same response happens to your body when you're excited. The- the human body has pretty much just one arousal response; our heart beats faster, we breathe more shallow, we get a little shaky, uh, but the big difference is how we label that. So if I say, "Hey Lenny, guess what? Uh, your colleague couldn't show up today and you need to go teach the class," or, "You need to go give that, uh, presentation," you might feel your heart rate go up, uh, get a little shaky, sweat on your brow, and you're seeing that as negative. But if I said, "Hey Lenny, guess what? You just won the lottery," same physiological response would happen, but you would see that likely as more positive. So how we label the arousal matters, and what Alison's research and others have followed up with sh- uh, suggests is that when we feel those symptoms of anxiety, rather than seeing it as negative, say, "This is exciting. I get to share my point of view. I get to- to demonstrate my value." And in so doing, by seeing it as more positive, it causes us, by definition, to relax. And her research fascinatingly f- found that people actually were perceived as communicating better. And again, that's because that pressure was taken off of them. So I challenge everybody to think about what are the exciting elements of the communication opportunities you have and really lean into those, and when you feel those anxiety symptoms, remind yourself these are signs of excitement, this is- this is me being excited about sharing this information, and it can really help.

   4. LRLenny Rachitsky15:56

      This is another one I've done and it super works. It sounds so trivial and so like what- why would this do anything? But I find you just say that, just like, "I'm gonna have so much fun. This is gonna be exciting." Like that does, it does make an

5. 16:08 – 18:45

   Using mantras to boost confidence

   1. LRLenny Rachitsky16:08

      impa- an impact. So another one to try, even though it sounds really trivial. Kind of along these lines, there's another technique you recommend which is a mantra, having a mantra that you repeat to yourself. I don't know if it's kind of the same general idea, but you have a couple mantras that you recommend to people, like, "I have value to add," and things like that. What advice do you have there?

   2. MAMatt Abrahams16:27

      Yes. Thank you. And that's mine, uh, the one that I, that you shared is "I have value to add." So i- if you, if we were to really listen to the voice in our heads when it comes to communication, uh, we say a lot of negative things to ourselves. We say things like, you know, "I'm not prepared. I'm not gonna be as good as this person. I'm an imposter." We- we carry around with us a lot of this chatter that actually sets us up to not do well or to be more nervous. So if we can actually change that talk track, it can help us. So I'm not saying you have to go to an extreme and say, "I'm going to be the best communicator ever." Rather you can simply say as I do, and as you alluded to, what I'll say right before I speak is, "I have value to bring." Often when we are in communicative situations, especially at work, people want to hear from us. We've been invited to speak, uh, we're on the- the agenda for the meeting. There is value people can take from our communication and we just have to remind ourselves of that. So having some little mantra that you can say that's- that's not over the top but just makes sense. It could be as simple as, "You've got this," or, "I'm prepared," or, "I know my stuff." And I actually encourage people to write it on a Post-It note if you're old school, sometimes people put it into their phones as a reminder, so like a minute or two minutes before they're set to give the presentation or participate in the meeting, it flashes up. We just have to turn off or turn down the noise of that internal negative self-talk.

   3. LRLenny Rachitsky17:58

      What are some other mantras that you found helpful or that people use?

   4. MAMatt Abrahams18:02

      Uh, they've, uh, and they're very personal to- to different people. I was just coaching a senior leader the other day who his mantra was, "Last time this went well."He's a leader. He does a lot of the same presentations, and just by saying, "Last time this went well," reminds him that it's likely to go well this time.

   5. LRLenny Rachitsky18:19

      Hmm.

   6. MAMatt Abrahams18:19

      We are very susceptible to catastrophizing when we're very nervous about things, especially when we're exposed in front of people. Uh, not in the Brady Bunch exposure we talked (laughs) about earlier, but you know, when we're out there, uh, speaking or communicating and, and simply re- reminding ourselves that often they go very well is helpful.

   7. LRLenny Rachitsky18:36

      Yeah. There's another one that I think you shared, which is, "It's not, it's not about me. It's about my content."

   8. MAMatt Abrahams18:41

      Yes, exactly. That's another one. That's a good, that's a great one and can be very helpful.

6. 18:45 – 20:03

   Managing negative self-talk

   1. MAMatt Abrahams18:45

   2. LRLenny Rachitsky18:45

      The one you shared about I've got this reminds me, my wife took a course with The, um, Artist's Way writer, Julia Cameron, I think was her name.

   3. MAMatt Abrahams18:53

      Mm-hmm.

   4. LRLenny Rachitsky18:53

      And she has this piece of advice where you name your critic, your inner critic-

   5. MAMatt Abrahams18:57

      Yeah.

   6. LRLenny Rachitsky18:57

      ... that's always telling you to stop doing stuff-

   7. MAMatt Abrahams19:00

      Right.

   8. LRLenny Rachitsky19:00

      ... you name a- him or her. So I named mine Jim. And then you say like-

   9. MAMatt Abrahams19:04

      Oh.

   10. LRLenny Rachitsky19:04

       And then when he or she is giving you things you don't wanna hear, you're just like, "Jim, I got this. Jim, I don't need this advice right now."

   11. MAMatt Abrahams19:10

       I've, uh, there, there is a lot of evidence on personifying, uh, the things that challenge us-

   12. LRLenny Rachitsky19:16

       Hmm.

   13. MAMatt Abrahams19:16

       ... and then having conversations with it. And it makes it, it's a, it's a way of, um, rationalizing some of the things that we do that are quite negative. So, um, something, something there for sure to, to be thinking about.

   14. LRLenny Rachitsky19:30

       There we go. Mm-hmm. Bonus advice. That was-

   15. MAMatt Abrahams19:32

       Bonus advice, yes.

   16. LRLenny Rachitsky19:33

       ... oh, I didn't expect that.

   17. MAMatt Abrahams19:34

       The way... And the cool thing that what you're, that what you're highlighting is there is a lot of advice out there on how to manage anxiety. Many of us feel like we're the only people who feel this nervous 'cause we see our colleagues, our friends, our TED Talks, as you were talking about, and we see these people communicating just so effortlessly. Often a lot of work went into that, and we don't see that work. Uh, and sometimes just knowing that others experience it makes us feel better. If, if you'll allow me, I'll tell this very quick story. I was in the San Francisco airport, uh, this

7. 20:03 – 23:12

   Normalizing speaking anxiety

   1. MAMatt Abrahams20:03

      was, uh, several years ago after the, my Speaking Up Without Freaking Out book came out, and my name was called over the PA system at the, at the airport counter. They, they, they, my s- the seat that I was supposed to sit in was broken and they wanted to talk to me about it. So when I came away from that, somebody came up to me and said, "Hey, you're the guy that wrote that book on speaking anxiety." I said, "Yes." And, and I said, "Wh- what do you know about it?" He goes, "Oh, I bought the book." I said, "Oh, was it helpful?" He says, "Incredibly helpful, but I didn't read it." And I'm like, "This is weird. So you're telling me the book was helpful and you didn't read it." And so I said, "Tell me more." And he said, "Just knowing that a book like that existed made me feel better, because I don't know you and I know you certainly didn't write the book for me. So it implies that lots of people have this issue." And just by normalizing the anxiety, which by the way is the normal condition. Those of us who study this believe it is innate to being human to feel nervous communicating in front of others. So sometimes just reminding yourself that you're not alone and that others have it can actually help reduce the pressure that we feel.

   2. LRLenny Rachitsky21:01

      This is such an important point that I am kicking myself for not starting with this also, because I think this is something people don't realize. They see all their execs at their company speaking incredibly well, so confidently, so articulately, and just like, "Oh my god, how will I ever be someone like that?" Is there anything more you can share, just like, you know, you t- you have a l- tons of students that go through your class. You see these issues. They, they're more transparent I think about their challenges, I imagine. Is there anything more you could share there to help people feel better? Like, this is most people, even when you see someone amazing at speaking, they are also probably nervous.

   3. MAMatt Abrahams21:36

      With regard to that, I think we just need to talk about it more. We need to share about it. I mean, I always will share that I, I still have anxiety in speaking in certain situations, and, and it's something that's taken me a long time to work on. I also help people understand that it's not a light switch. It's not like you either have it or you don't. It's, it's a process. And so the idea is over time we will feel less nervous if we apply some of these principles you and I are talking about. Uh, a great technique to help people that I, that often isn't talked about is many of us feel much more comfortable in conversation than we do in presenting. And conversation is a back and forth. So you can actually set up a lot of your communication situations, a presentation, a meeting, et cetera, as conversations. That doesn't... And you don't even have to have a conversation with the audience. You can simply have it with yourself. For example, what would it be like if you were to start a presentation by saying, "Today I have three questions I'd like to answer. Question number one is..." and you state the question, and then you answer it. I am actually having a conversation with myself in that moment where I am asking myself a question. I happen to know the answer. I give the answer. This again, just like the reframing as excitement versus anxiety, this is a reframe. "I'm not presenting. I'm having a conversation." And in so doing it ratchets down that anxiety. So we need to talk about it, we need to share our experiences with developing anxiety management plans. We realize it's not binary. It's not y- I have it or I don't. And we start seeing where we feel more comfortable and how can we bring that, that comfort level into the types of situations that make us nervous, like simply having a conversation with yourself.

8. 23:12 – 24:52

   Using conversation as a communication technique

   1. MAMatt Abrahams23:12

   2. LRLenny Rachitsky23:12

      You have another technique I think that's different, maybe it's exactly the same, which is to ask a question of somebody else-

   3. MAMatt Abrahams23:18

      Yeah.

   4. LRLenny Rachitsky23:18

      ... as you're talking, what is-

   5. MAMatt Abrahams23:19

      Yeah.

   6. LRLenny Rachitsky23:19

      ... I think deflects attention from you. Can you talk about that?

   7. MAMatt Abrahams23:21

      Yeah. So, so, we, we, we talked about, uh, the way we desensitize through visualization. The other thing we can do is distract. Right?

   8. LRLenny Rachitsky23:28

      Mm-hmm.

   9. MAMatt Abrahams23:29

      So I, I coached a very senior leader at Google who got very nervous when he was up in front of people. And what we did is we distract his audience. So he would start every single presentation saying these words. "Good morning. Let's watch this video." And he'd show a 30-second video, video that was on topic about something they were gonna talk about in the meeting. When the video stopped, he would then facilitate a discussion of what that video was about, and then he would ease into his content. So he went from being a presenter to being a facilitator, somebody who's having a conversation with the audience. That made him feel so much better. And so, all of us can do things that can distract our audience. Now, when I say distract, I don't mean take them on a tangent that's not relevant to what you're saying. But maybe you ask them a question. Maybe you tell them a story. Maybe you show them a video or ask them to read something-So there are lots of things that you can do that will help get the attention off you for just a little bit, so that you can then focus on what works for you or take that deep breath that'll help calm you down. All of these are very useful techniques.

   10. LRLenny Rachitsky24:35

       Yeah. It's interesting how once you start talking, it's okay, usually. It's that beginning part that you-

   11. MAMatt Abrahams24:40

       Yeah.

   12. LRLenny Rachitsky24:40

       ... need to (overlapping) .

   13. MAMatt Abrahams24:40

       People are most nervous one, uh, minute before speaking and the first minute of speaking. And if you can find ways to get yourself through that, then it becomes much easier for most people. There are some people who that's not true for, but

9. 24:52 – 28:29

   Using the double-exhale breathing technique

   1. MAMatt Abrahams24:52

      for most people that's, that's the way it works.

   2. LRLenny Rachitsky24:54

      Awesome. Okay. Next technique that actually another guest mentioned, and we spent a bunch of time on this, a guest named Johnny Miller, which is a breathing technique. And just to give a little context from what he taught us is that 80% of our neurons go from our body to our brain versus 20% is our brain telling our body what to feel. And so this research shows that what our body's feeling is what our brain's gonna think. So if our body's like acting nervous, we're gonna think, oh, I'm nervous. And if you change the state of your body, your mind feels different.

   3. MAMatt Abrahams25:23

      I love this stuff. The, this research, embodied cognition is what it's called, is fascinating to me. Uh, I'll, I'll share one of my most-

   4. LRLenny Rachitsky25:30

      Yeah.

   5. MAMatt Abrahams25:31

      ... favorite studies in this. There was a researcher at Duke, I think it was Duke, who, um, he's all, the, the only experimental variation that he did is he had people hold something that was cold in their hand, like a, an iced coffee versus a hot, a warm coffee, and then he asked the, the participants to make ratings of people. And if you were holding something cold, you saw the person as a colder person, as more aloof and more distant, and if you were holding something warm, you saw them as more collaborative and embracing. I find this stuff fascinating, what our body feels, our minds think.

   6. LRLenny Rachitsky26:03

      Awesome. So along those lines-

   7. MAMatt Abrahams26:05

      Yeah.

   8. LRLenny Rachitsky26:05

      ... there's a technique that you recommend that he recommended but I think it's a great reminder of the double exhale-

   9. MAMatt Abrahams26:10

      Mm-hmm.

   10. LRLenny Rachitsky26:10

       ... where you breathe in and then you exhale twice as long. Can you talk about that and tell people?

   11. MAMatt Abrahams26:13

       Yeah. So breathing is, is very helpful in managing so many of our anxiety symptoms. It slows down the heart rate, makes our voice sound more normal because when we, we get nervous, we breathe shallow and, and that changes... Our voice is a wind instrument, it changes the way we sound, can reduce some of the shakiness. So deep belly breathing, the kind you do if you've ever done yoga or tai chi, qigong, really important to do. And there are a whole bunch of variations on it. The one you're talking about is the double inhalation, where you take an, uh, an inhale in till you feel completely full, and then you sneak in a little extra air, and then you take a long exhale. There are things, uh, people call it box breathing and other types of breathing. The bottom line is this, what's critical to the relaxation response is the exhale. Lots of ways to inhale, lots of ways to exhale. You want your exhale to be longer than the inhale. The magic of the relaxation happens during the, the exhale. So I have a rule of thumb, I jokingly call it the, a rule of long. You want your exhale to be twice as long as your inhale. So if you take a three count in, even if you sneak in a little extra air as we were talking about, take a six count out, and it is that way that you will feel n- you'll, not only will your body physiologically feel less stressed, you will be more focused in a present moment and not catastrophizing about all the things that might happen in the future.

   12. LRLenny Rachitsky27:36

       Great. Yeah. So it's like another example of, this sounds so trivial, I'm like, "Why would breathing differently do- have any impact on my nervousness?" But one, there's all this research that shows that it does, and two, if you try it, and this is another one I use, is like it actually works like very quickly and you do it a few times and like, "Wow, I feel really different."

   13. MAMatt Abrahams27:53

       Yeah.

   14. LRLenny Rachitsky27:54

       And-

   15. MAMatt Abrahams27:54

       Absolutely.

   16. LRLenny Rachitsky27:55

       And it's interesting you put these together. From the way I've seen it, these are two different techniques, but I've never tried 'em together. One is, I think Huberman is big on this one, all his clips are always talking about this one of you inhale fully and then you inhale a little bit more and there's like some capillaries or something in your lungs that fill up that helps a lot.

   17. MAMatt Abrahams28:12

       Yeah, expand. Yeah.

   18. LRLenny Rachitsky28:12

       Expand. And then there's the four, four, eight is the way this other guest shared is like breathe in four seconds, hold it four seconds, breathe out for eight seconds, but I'm gonna try both. Wow, that's a, it's gonna double up my calmness.

   19. MAMatt Abrahams28:25

       (laughs) You'll be so mellow, nothing will bother you.

10. 28:29 – 29:46

    Getting present-oriented

    1. MAMatt Abrahams28:29

    2. LRLenny Rachitsky28:29

       So mellow. Okay. Are there any other techniques that you love that you find people find really helpful in calming their anxiety?

    3. MAMatt Abrahams28:39

       Well, so the, the, the first book had 50 techniques, and not all 50 techniques work for everybody. Uh, one that I personally think is a lot of fun, uh, is getting present-oriented, because when I'm in the present, by definition, I'm not worried about the future. And many of our anxiety comes from our fear of a potential negative future outcome, like I'm not gonna achieve my goal. So if I can do anything to be in the present moment, that helps me out a lot. Something I do as part of my personal anxiety management plan is I say tongue twisters. Tongue twisters for me are a great way to get present-oriented. You can't say it right if you don't say the tongue twister, uh, if, if you're not pro, focused on the present moment, and it also warms up your voice. A lot of nervous speakers get so inside their head that they don't warm up their voice. And we all know if you've ever done any exercise or competed in any sports, you should warm up first. We have this mistaken notion that we can go from silence to brilliance without warming up, and I like saying tongue twisters out loud to get present-oriented and to warm up my voice. So that's one that I al- I often recommend. People think it's silly, but I have people who are like, "That really works. It really helps me to get centered and to warm up." And so I like that one a lot.

11. 29:46 – 33:34

    Using tongue twisters

    1. LRLenny Rachitsky29:46

       Well, let's share a couple of tongue twisters. What are some recommendations?

    2. MAMatt Abrahams29:49

       (laughs) Well, I, I will only share my tongue twister, I say, Lenny, if you promise to say it after me.

    3. LRLenny Rachitsky29:53

       Absolutely. I'm so ready.

    4. MAMatt Abrahams29:55

       Okay. This is my favorite tongue twister. Takes five seconds to say, it's three phrases long, and if you say it wrong, you say a naughty word. So I'm gonna be listening, as were all your listeners.

    5. LRLenny Rachitsky30:04

       Mm-hmm.

    6. MAMatt Abrahams30:04

       Are you prepared? Uh, so it, it goes as follows. I slit a sheet...

    7. LRLenny Rachitsky30:10

       I slit a sheet.

    8. MAMatt Abrahams30:11

       A sheet I slit.

    9. LRLenny Rachitsky30:13

       A sheet I slit.

    10. MAMatt Abrahams30:14

        And on that slitted sheet I sit.

    11. LRLenny Rachitsky30:18

        And on that slitted sheet I sit.

    12. MAMatt Abrahams30:20

        Very good. You didn't say that naughty word. I'm sure you can imagine what it would have been.

    13. LRLenny Rachitsky30:24

        There's a lot of, a lot of danger, a lot of minds there.

    14. MAMatt Abrahams30:26

        Yeah, a lot of danger. But in that moment, you weren't thinking about, "What's the next question I'm going to ask Matt?" Or, you know, "How much longer do we have in the podcast?" No. You were simply focused on what we were saying and trying to say it without saying a naughty word. So that's that personal indication.

    15. LRLenny Rachitsky30:38

        And not have to censor this podcast.

    16. MAMatt Abrahams30:41

        (laughs) I've only had-

    17. LRLenny Rachitsky30:42

        Cool.

    18. MAMatt Abrahams30:42

        ... to bleep one guest in all my years of doing this, so.

    19. LRLenny Rachitsky30:46

        Okay, cool. We're get a link to that. Is there any other ones you want to share before we move on to getting better at speaking on the spot?

    20. MAMatt Abrahams30:52

        Well, so, uh, the last one I'll say is, uh, and this one is another one that falls in the kind of funny category. But there's research that says that when you swear, curse, it actually helps you reduce anxiety. When you curse, you release a flood of neurochemicals that blunt out the neurochemicals-

    21. LRLenny Rachitsky31:09

        Ah.

    22. MAMatt Abrahams31:09

        ... a- associated with anxiety. Cortisol being a big one. So you get a big dopamine hit, for example, serotonin, you know, when you swear. So I'm not saying get up on stage and drop an F bomb. But, you know, you might, you might... My students love this, right? I mean, it's like, "Matt's giving me permission to swear." No. That's not what I'm doing. But, but, there, the, it, it's an interesting technique that, that seems to help some people is to, is to curse, uh, not necessarily, uh, in front of people, but that can help. And it, it also has a, uh, analgesic effect. It actually reduces pain, um, as well, so.

    23. LRLenny Rachitsky31:44

        That's interesting. I can see-

    24. MAMatt Abrahams31:45

        Yeah.

    25. LRLenny Rachitsky31:45

        ... during birth, people going around screaming-

    26. MAMatt Abrahams31:47

        Yeah.

    27. LRLenny Rachitsky31:47

        ... curse words.

    28. MAMatt Abrahams31:48

        (laughs)

    29. LRLenny Rachitsky31:48

        Or parents.

    30. MAMatt Abrahams31:48

        Yeah, I'm not going to say what I heard when my kids were born, but, uh...
12. 33:34 – 38:35

    Broad advice for speaking on the spot

    1. LRLenny Rachitsky33:34

       Okay. Let's shift to talking about talking on the spot and-

    2. MAMatt Abrahams33:39

       I see how you enunciated very ca- You said shift very carefully. I appreciate that.

    3. LRLenny Rachitsky33:43

       (laughs) Now I'm going to be so, so careful. I don't want this podcast flagged and, uh-

    4. MAMatt Abrahams33:49

       (laughs)

    5. LRLenny Rachitsky33:49

       ... and for adults only. Okay. Shift to, uh, a new topic. So you have a whole book about how to get better at speaking on the spot, and I think why this is important is, again, what I said at the beginning that I think most of our "public speaking" in quotes is not planned public speaking. There's people asking for feedback in a meeting, uh, people wanting you to give a toast, Q&A as you talked about. So what I want to do is, do you have advice for broadly getting better at these things? And then you have advice for very specifically how to get better at giving better toast, doing better Q&A, getting better at small talk and things like that. So I want to start with the broad advice and then get into each of these. That sound good?

    6. MAMatt Abrahams34:27

       Absolutely.

    7. LRLenny Rachitsky34:28

       How about you share your favorite techniques for broadly getting better at speaking on the spot and then we'll see where that goes.

    8. MAMatt Abrahams34:37

       Sure. So the first thing in helping yourself feel better speaking spontaneously, which is the vast majority of our communication, the planned presenting, the, the practiced pitch, the, the meeting with agenda pale in comparison to the times that we are spontaneously speaking. And the first thing that is important for everybody to know is you can all, we can all get better at it. That's the fundamental bottom line. Many of us feel like we're either born with the gift of gab or we're not. And so the first thing we have to realize is we can get better at it. The second big point to make is you actually have to prepare to be spontaneous. And that's counterintuitive, but it is through preparation that we get better at it. And if you think about it, if you think about an athlete, you know, when an athlete is doing their sport, they are being spontaneous. They are, they are responding to the conditions that present themselves to them. What helps them do well is the, all the preparation and practice that they've done. So there are lots of analogs to, to this, but when we think about it in terms of communication, it seems foreign, but when you think about it in athletics or jazz music, it's like, of course you would prepare and practice. So those are the two big underlying principles to helping people get better. The next level has to do with we have to attack both mindset and approach and the actual messaging itself. The only way I have found to help people get better at this is to, to look at how we approach it, our mindset, and then how we actually craft the messages through structure and focus that help us be better. So that's the gradual process from the, the, the broadest level about how we have to go about making this better for ourselves.

    9. LRLenny Rachitsky36:14

       Maybe let's dig into the structure.

    10. MAMatt Abrahams36:17

        Sure.

    11. LRLenny Rachitsky36:17

        What is your advice for how to think about structuring? If you're on the spot, like, "Oh, shit. How do I share something smart in 10 minutes?"

    12. MAMatt Abrahams36:22

        No, see? That, that the bad word came out. Um, so-

    13. LRLenny Rachitsky36:24

        (laughs)

    14. MAMatt Abrahams36:25

        ... be, you're ready for my tongue twister, but the, um, so structure is critical. In spontaneous speaking, most of us, because we, we feel the intense pressure, the anxiety we just talked about, we just spew out information. We list and itemize information. We take our audience on the journey of our own discovery of what we wanna say as we're saying it. And our brains are not wired for lists of information. Uh, in fact, you know, Lenny, how many items do you need to buy from the grocery store before you actually have to physically write it down? For me it's four.

    15. LRLenny Rachitsky36:58

        Mm-hmm. Yeah. (laughs)

    16. MAMatt Abrahams36:58

        Anything over four, I'm gonna forget something.

    17. LRLenny Rachitsky37:01

        I think maybe three.

    18. MAMatt Abrahams37:01

        Our brains aren't wired for lists, right?

    19. LRLenny Rachitsky37:03

        Yeah.

    20. MAMatt Abrahams37:03

        And so-

    21. LRLenny Rachitsky37:04

        I text myself. ?<|agent|><|en|>

    22. MAMatt Abrahams37:05

        Yeah, right. Exactly. Yeah, no, I, I'm, I'm old school. I actually put it on a piece of paper. But the, the, the point is that we're not wired that way. Our brains are actually wired for story, for connection, a logical connection of ideas. So it's about connecting those pieces together. So a structure is nothing more than a beginning, a middle, and an end, a package of information. The, the structure that almost everybody listening in is familiar with is one that comes from the world of advertising. Most advertisements are set up as problem, solution, benefit. There's some problem in the world, here's how we solve it with our product or service, and here's how you benefit from it. That's a structure. It's a logical beginning, middle, and end. These items have a connection. So by finding a structure that you can rely on when put on the spot, it halves your burden. When you're put on the spot, you have to think about what to say and how to say it. The structure tells you how to say it, and then you just have to think about what to put into it. So it's like having a recipe. And if I have a recipe and I have good ingredients, I can cook a good meal. So there are lots of structures. The whole second part of the book, Think Faster, Talk Smarter, is specific structures for specific situations. Introducing yourself, making an apology, giving feedback. And I'm not saying every time you give an apology or ma- or, or ha- give feedback that you have to follow these structures. It just gives you a place to go when you're in that moment where you're like, "Where do I go? How do I start?"

    23. LRLenny Rachitsky38:33

        Cool. So we're gonna talk about some of

13. 38:35 – 38:59

    The PREP structure

    1. LRLenny Rachitsky38:35

       those examples. One of the structures that I liked, that I wrote down, is called PREP, which is make your point, give a reason for making that point, give an example, and then is the last one point again?

    2. MAMatt Abrahams38:47

       Yeah. Restate your point. Review it.

    3. LRLenny Rachitsky38:48

       Restate your point. That feels like something that, say, in product teams can come up a lot is just like, "Here's what I think. Here's why. Here's an example. And then let me just remind you again what the point I'm making."

    4. MAMatt Abrahams38:57

       That's right. You know, uh, the, the,

14. 38:59 – 42:10

    The What? So What? Now What? structure

    1. MAMatt Abrahams38:59

       yes. I love PREP, and the structure I really like, uh, is, is a three-question structure. What, so what, now what? And people on product teams I think could benefit so much for this. What is your product, your service, your offering, your update, your feedback? It's the what of the what, why you're speaking. The so what is why is this important and relevant to the people you're talking to or to your company or to pr- prospective clients? And then the now what is what coming, what, what comes next? So on a product team, if you're describing a feature, here's what the feature is, here's why it's important, and here's what we're doing about it. If you're giving an update in an update meeting, a stand-up that you're having, here's what I'm working on, here's why it's important, here's what I'm doing next. By packaging the information up in what, so what, now what, it becomes much more digestible, much more memorable. Just like PREP. PREP works really well for a point you're making. What, so what, now what works really well for a broader presentation, update, feedback session that you're giving. So having a whole series of these tools in your toolkit can really make a difference.

    2. LRLenny Rachitsky40:05

       So we've talked about three structures so far. Uh, what, so what, now what. PREP, which is make the point, give a reason example, and then restate the point. And then problem, solution, benefit. So people li- listening to this are like, "Oh, amazing. All these structures are great." Do you have any advice on how to, like, remember these? You're like, "Oh, Matt, what do you think of this, uh, design?" Like, "Oh, shit, which one should I go with?"

    3. MAMatt Abrahams40:28

       I, I try to give each structure a catchy name. What, so what, now what rolls off the tongue. Uh, there's a structure in the book for giving feedback called four Is, for apologizing triple A. So part of it is just coming up with a mnemonic that works for you, and you can name them whatever you want. But really the way to get familiar with them and to, to have them at the ready is to use them.

    4. LRLenny Rachitsky40:48

       Mm-hmm.

    5. MAMatt Abrahams40:48

       So if, when I coach people on what, so what, now what, I encourage them at the end of a podcast they listened to or something they read, take a moment and say, "What was it about, why is it important to me, and what can I do with that information?"

    6. LRLenny Rachitsky41:01

       Mm-hmm.

    7. MAMatt Abrahams41:01

       And if you do that, not only do you get better and more comfortable at deploying that structure, but you also remember the material better. Because there's a whole bunch of research that says when we interrogate the material that we listen to or read, we, we digest it and remember it more. So in 30 seconds, you're really helping yourself at least in two ways, by getting the structure down and remembering. So you have to put it into practice. The, the other way to do it, which we do a lot in my classroom, is we have people dissect communication. So you listen to somebody or you see it, and then you say, "What structure did they use?" And so it's just, it, it's about awareness building and then actually getting the reps. The only way you get better at communication, spontaneous or planned, is the way you get better at anything, repetition, reflection, and feedback. You gotta practice. You gotta think about what worked or what didn't. And then you have to get feedback from others. We are not always the best judges of our communication. And in so doing, repetition, reflection, and feedback take your communica- takes your communication to the next level.

    8. LRLenny Rachitsky42:00

       That's a lot of work, Matt. That's a lot of work. ?

    9. MAMatt Abrahams42:01

       It is work.

    10. LRLenny Rachitsky42:02

        Lot to do.

    11. MAMatt Abrahams42:02

        There is no shortcut.

    12. LRLenny Rachitsky42:05

        Got to be.

    13. MAMatt Abrahams42:05

        Uh, but that's true with most things in life that are really important. There's no shortcut.

    14. LRLenny Rachitsky42:08

        That's right. That's right.

15. 42:10 – 45:31

    Toastmasters and improv

    1. LRLenny Rachitsky42:10

       As people are thinking about this and listening to this, there's your course obviously. They teach at Stanford, and only Stanford students can take that. There's your book obviously.Is there anything else just in... If there's nothing, that's totally fine, that you can point people to, to get to actually practice these outside of the workplace? Are there courses that anyone can take that you recommend? Anything else you can point people to?

    2. MAMatt Abrahams42:31

       Absolutely. There are a lot of resources out there. So, uh, one, I'm a huge proponent and a former member of Toastmasters.

    3. LRLenny Rachitsky42:37

       Yeah.

    4. MAMatt Abrahams42:37

       I think Toastmasters is a wonderful organization, uh, designed primarily to give you the reps, right? They do some teaching, but it's really to give you the reps. So, uh, I- I- I highly recommend Toastmasters. Improvisation is another way to get comfortable with these skills. When people hear improv, they think, "Uh, oh, I gotta be funny, and it's about performing," and it's not. Improv is really just about being more comfortable, being present, and really focusing on collaborating with others. And then there are courses. So y- y- you m- you mentioned obviously that- that people have to be MBA students to take my MBA class, but Stanford and other institutions have continuing studies, classes, or extension classes that are open to the community. So, I, every quarter, teach a class that's open to anybody who registers, all over the world. It's virtual. I have students this very quarter who take a class on a Monday night Pacific Time, 7:00 PM. I've got somebody in Egypt, I have somebody in China. You know, so- so there are ways to- to take advantage of things happening at universities, uh, without being an enrolled student. So, I would point people to all of those. And then clearly, listening to podcasts, reading books, checking out blogs and videos can be really helpful.

    5. LRLenny Rachitsky43:44

       I think, to your point, it's like you can read about this and listen to podcasts all you want, but you're not gonna actually that- get that much better. And with your course, I imagine there's practice you're doing as a part of the course.

    6. MAMatt Abrahams43:53

       Everything is applied. The, uh, the only way to get better at communication is to do communication, to watch communication. And that's why in- in the books I write, I have these try this. It's literally, "Put the book down, go do this, and then come back," because that's how you learn communication. And- and so yes, any avenue to help you get the reps is gonna be helpful.

    7. LRLenny Rachitsky44:13

       I'll be honest, I n- did none of the try this.

    8. MAMatt Abrahams44:15

       Oh.

    9. LRLenny Rachitsky44:15

       I just- I'm just like, "That's too much work." So, I think that's why it's important to take something where you have to do it, 'cause it's too easy to just like, "Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sure."

    10. MAMatt Abrahams44:24

        Yeah. And so- so there are... But you know, you're not the first person to say that they don't- they don't take the time to do that. There are others who say they really appreciate that. Uh, and for people, uh, such as yourself, the- at the very end of my book, I have a QR code that takes you to a bunch of videos. So, if you don't want to do it yourself, you can actually watch people do it or watch me do it. And so- so that's- that's at least better than not doing any of it.

    11. LRLenny Rachitsky44:46

        Awesome. I'll also give a shout-out to Toastmasters. I did Toastmasters for a while.

    12. MAMatt Abrahams44:50

        Yeah.

    13. LRLenny Rachitsky44:50

        And two things there. One is, there's a special focus on on-the-spot speaking that's a part of the sequence every-

    14. MAMatt Abrahams44:56

        Yeah, they call them table topics.

    15. LRLenny Rachitsky44:58

        Table topics, yeah, and that's like a 60 second... Someone gets up and just has to talk on something. So, it's a big part of that method. Also- and I did it for a long time- and all I did was I was the um-counter or the timer. Like, you can do it without having to give any talks for as long as you want. It's- and it's like very cheap, and they're everywhere. There's like a local chapter wherever you are.

    16. MAMatt Abrahams45:17

        Absolutely. And many companies sponsor their own Toastmasters groups, yeah. So, that's great. Yeah, and- and they are very good at easing people into it. You're not forced to do any of... And- and the same is with improv. A good improv teacher never forces anybody to do anything.

16. 45:31 – 51:05

    Getting better at small talk

    1. MAMatt Abrahams45:31

    2. LRLenny Rachitsky45:31

       Great. Okay. We went way off-topic, but let's get back to our agenda ahead, which is, let's talk about specific situations and advice you have for getting better at these. Okay, so maybe we start with small talk, and there's one that I love and I find so important and so subtle, which is, have comparable levels of disclosure. And then the question basically is, how do we get better at small talk? And here's one technique.

    3. MAMatt Abrahams45:55

       Yeah, so let me get to that point in a second, because that's a- that's a more refined point than- than some general principles. So, when it comes to small talk, many people dread small talk. Uh, they- they feel really awkward about it. I think small talk has a bad reputation and needs to be rebranded. I think a lot of big things happen in small talk. We learn about ourselves and others. We- we form and foster relationships. You know, I- I challenge everybody listening to think about some of their friends or closest friends. How did you meet them? Probably some component of small talk played a role, especially early in those relationships. So, it does good things for us. The best advice I have ever heard for small talk came from a guest on my podcast. Her name's Rachel Greenwald. She's a- she's an interesting person. She's an academic and a matchmaker, really fascinating, and her advice was this: "Be interested, not interesting." Many of us go into small talk thinking we have to be super interesting, we have to spike the ball over the net every time, when in fact small talk is more like playing the game of hacky sack, where it's simply just, set the other person up to be successful and get the ball back to you. So, if we go in with that mindset, it makes it easier. Now, there's some rules that we can follow. Uh, one rule is the one that you shared, that in small talk there should be a balance of disclosure or depth of disclosure over time. So, if you're telling me about the first time your first pet died and I'm telling you my favorite color is blue, there's a discrepancy in disclosure there. Clearly, you've revealed a lot more than I have, and we have this notion of reciprocity, that if you share something that is appropriate but is more disclosive, that I should at some point match that level or come close. And if we don't, then it feels very awkward and we feel like we're- we're not jiving in that way. I don't want everybody sitting with a little card that they're checking off, but having that general notion in mind can help. And- and the trick here is not to be too disclosive too quickly, right? So, if- if I- if we start small talk and we're talking about the meeting that we're at, and you immediately jump into the fight you had with your significant other that might lead to divorce, that's- that's w- a deep s- a big step that might (laughs) feel a little inappropriate. But over time, if we continue to disclose, it might be perfectly natural for you to share that. So, there- there's sort of expectations, and we just have to be mindful of those. Another thing we need to be mindful of that I think is really important is this distinction between s- shifting and supporting responses. In a conversation, I can be supportive. That is, you might say, "Hey Matt, I just got back from Costa Rica."I could say, "Oh, great. Did you spend time in San Jose? Did you get to any of the beaches?" Those are supporting responses. I'm asking you to keep telling me more. A shifting response would be like, "Oh, you went to Costa Rica? I went to Hawaii." And the goal in a co- good conversation is to have more supporting responses than shifting, but to have some shifting responses. Because if all I do is continually support you, it looks like I don't want to share. I'm, I'm not being disclosive at all. So, there are these subtle things that we can be aware of to help the conversation go and to breed that intimacy and immediacy that we feel. But it takes, uh, a congruence, a balancing of doing that.

    4. LRLenny Rachitsky49:16

       This is awesome. I feel like everyone needs this class to just like-

    5. MAMatt Abrahams49:20

       (laughs)

    6. LRLenny Rachitsky49:20

       ... how do I, how do I talk to people (laughs) ? What's the right way to talk?

    7. MAMatt Abrahams49:24

       Well, and the, the, the, right, the point that you're bringing up there, Lenny, is we're never taught this stuff, right? And yet we have to do it all the time, and that's why focusing on it, I think, really matters. And it, and it can really, as you said, superpower. It can be a superpower because so many people don't do this or spend the time getting better at it. We all operate under this notion of y- that definition of insanity, doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results, and that's not good for small talk and other communication situations.

    8. LRLenny Rachitsky49:53

       I love this balance you just shared of so, (clears throat) the primary piece of advice for small talk is be interested, not interesting. Ask a person questions, get excited about what they're telling you. There's a book, classic book, How to Win Friends and Influence People, which is very much about this. I highly recommend it. It's, like, very old-school now, but there's so much good advice there, like, the per- them- there's no better sound to someone's ears than their name. Just saying their name, they're like, "Yeah, I love that." And then just, like, smiling. There's all these, like, very simple things that that book shares. Uh, sounds like you're, you recommend and you're a fan of that book and it's something you-

    9. MAMatt Abrahams50:27

       I know, I know the book. Some of the stuff, I, I, uh, some of that stuff has, has been true for, for a long time. Some of the stuff, I'm not a big fan of ingratiation and manipulation, so I, I, I like authenticity in some of the advice in books like that can sound like, "Smile, nod your head," you know? And all of that, yeah, and all of that can sound a little manipulative and inauthentic, but I think some of those principles are, are important, and if you can in an authentic, true, appropriate way leverage some of that, I think it will help you.

    10. LRLenny Rachitsky50:57

        Yeah. Somebody once, uh, shared a story where their kid, like, and then they're 13, they read that book and it just effed them up for a while (laughs) 'cause they just started putting these into practice

17. 51:05 – 52:33

    The importance of sharing back

    1. LRLenny Rachitsky51:05

       way too young.

    2. MAMatt Abrahams51:05

       Yeah, but one thing, I mean, all of a sudden you're focusing on y- uh, y- you can get so wrapped up ins- in doing these things that you're actually not connecting. It's like people who travel on vacation and all they do is take pictures of where they are instead of experiencing where they are, right?

    3. LRLenny Rachitsky51:19

       Yeah. Yeah.

    4. MAMatt Abrahams51:19

       And, and that's, that's not where we want to be with this advice.

    5. LRLenny Rachitsky51:23

       But I love this other component of, 'cause a lot of people hear this advice, ask questions, be interested, be excited, this version of it of, but you need to have somewhat equal levels of disclosure is really important.

    6. MAMatt Abrahams51:35

       Yeah.

    7. LRLenny Rachitsky51:35

       'Cause I, I fall into this sometimes where like, "I don't care about myself. I just want to ask you questions and this is, like, going great, I'm just gonna keep asking." And if you're not sharing anything about yourself, it gets really strange. Even when they ask you, you're like, "No, no, no, let's keep talking about you," like nobody... You think they want that, but they don't. They actually wanna hear about you.

    8. MAMatt Abrahams51:50

       Ye- yeah, absolutely. And, and you do such a lovely job as a podcast. I mean, so a podcast host is a great job for you if you like asking questions.

    9. LRLenny Rachitsky51:57

       (laughs)

    10. MAMatt Abrahams51:57

        But I bet you you will, you have found, 'cause I have found this for me as mi- as being a host of Think Fast Talk Smart is that, that sharing a little bit about your own experience actually makes the conversations go better, you know?

    11. LRLenny Rachitsky52:10

        Yeah.

    12. MAMatt Abrahams52:10

        And so, so I, I think that's a lesson for all of us and y- and you don't have to have your own podcast to learn that lesson. (laughs)

    13. LRLenny Rachitsky52:16

        Yeah. There's a, I read this book on podcast interviewing when I first started and one of the big piece of advice is if you share more about yourself, you'll hear more stories that they can share, they'll feel more vulnerable. Not that I think about that, but that's in my, that's in my head sometimes.

    14. MAMatt Abrahams52:29

        Yeah. Well, you do a good job of it, even if it's just-

    15. LRLenny Rachitsky52:31

        Well, thank you.

    16. MAMatt Abrahams52:32

        ... intuitive.

    17. LRLenny Rachitsky52:32

        Appreciate it.

18. 52:33 – 56:31

    Giving feedback

    1. LRLenny Rachitsky52:33

       Let's talk about another version of on the spot talking, which is giving feedback.

    2. MAMatt Abrahams52:39

       Mm-hmm.

    3. LRLenny Rachitsky52:39

       Oftentimes, people listening to this podcast, they're asked, "What do you think of this design? What do you think of this roadmap? What do you think of this strategy?" What are some tips for getting better at on the spot feedback?

    4. MAMatt Abrahams52:48

       First and foremost, we need to look at and define feedback. Uh, feedback to me is an opportunity to problem solve. Certainly, there are some behaviors that we absolutely have to shut down. It's inappropriate, it's inexcusable, we have to shut it down. But often, feedback is really an opportunity to problem solve, and if you take it as an opportunity to problem solve, then what you're looking for is collaboration with the other person, which means that we have to invite them to join us as we do this. So, it's not me bestowing upon you my opinion. It's me inviting you to together work on whatever this issue challenge is that we have. And I am a huge disciple of Kim Scott, Radical Candor. I, I think a, uh, what she said, uh, I really like her approach to it. Kim's a friend. She's actually a neighbor.

    5. LRLenny Rachitsky53:33

       Oh, she's been on the podcast, by the way.

    6. MAMatt Abrahams53:35

       Oh, great. So, you know Kim and y- your listeners know Kim. Yeah. She's great. Where I think I can add a little value to what Kim talks about, and she does talk about structure, but I think having the structure to package up the information to make it easier to digest by your audience, the person or people you're talking to, but also to formulate your thoughts can help. And we've already talked about one mechanism, one structure for feedback. It's what, so what, now what? So, imagine, Lenny, you and I come out of a meeting and you say, "Hey, Matt, how'd that go?" I could say, "I thought the meeting went really well, Lenny, except when you talked about the implementation plan. You spoke a little quicker than you did with the other parts and you didn't go into s- the same level of detail." That's my what. "When you speak quickly without a lot of detail, people might think you're not as prepared or you're really concerned about this part." That's the so what. "Next time, I suggest you slow down and you include these two or three bits of data so that people see you really are, are, uh, knowledgeable on this area." So, that's the now what. So, that what, so what, now what helps me very quickly structure information and package it in a way that helps me as the giver of the feedback think through what are the things I need to say-I need to think through what's bothering me, what, what it is I think you, uh, why, what the consequences are of that behavior, and then what I think you should do. There's a more robust structure I talk about in the book called the four I's. And, uh, each I stands for, uh, something starting with the letter I. But four I's also like glasses, it helps you see more clearly. So in the four I's structure, the first I is information. You're just setting the, the playing field, so the person knows what you're giving the feedback about. The second is impact, and this is impact on you, the feedback giver. The third is the invitation that you make, and then the final is the, the implications or consequences. So imagine I have an employee who doesn't show up to the meetings on time and prepared. I might say, "This is the third time that you have showed up late to this meeting. I feel you're not prioritizing this meeting the same way others of us are. What can we do to help make sure you show up prepared for the next meeting? Because if you do, we're going to finish the project on time and get a new cool project." So information, impact, i- invitation, and implications. Now certainly I can vary the tone and, and the directness of some of those responses so it sounds very differently, but thinking through in my mind, I have to level set what we're talking about, I have to share why it's important to me at least, make the invitation, and talk about the benefits or, or consequences, uh, makes a lot of sense. So there are lots of structures and lots of ways to communicate, especially in feedback. Find one or two that work for you so when you're put on the spot, you can default to it. Maybe a big takeaway here is pick one of these f- structures that you want to use once somebody asks you for feedback. And the two you shared are what, so what, now what? Or these four I's, information, give information, show the impact it had on you, of invitation, and then implications. That's

19. 56:31 – 1:02:57

    Improving toasts and tributes

    1. MAMatt Abrahams56:31

       correct. Yeah. Okay. Well, let's talk about another category, which is not a work category, but I suck at toasts. (laughs) . And I'm always trying to get better at this, and you have an, a bunch of awesome advice for how to give better toasts. Can you share some stuff

    2. NANarrator56:45

       Yeah.

    3. MAMatt Abrahams56:45

       Any thoughts? So we have all been victimized by bad toasts, you know. The, the, the toast that goes on too long, the toast that's more about the person giving the toast than, than the event or the person. And when I say toast, I don't just mean at weddings, bar mitzvahs, quinceaneras. You know, we give tributes at work all the time. Congratulations to the team, or somebody's anniversary, or somebody's retirement. So we give toasts and tributes all the time. In fact, uh, I heard a statistics once, statistic once, and it is the most frequent public speaking event across people, is giving toasts and tributes. So, we should learn how to do these well. So I have an acronym, it works, it's called WHAT, W-H-A-T. So the, the W stands for why are we here. Now, if I'm at a wedding, I don't have to tell the audience why we're here. We get it. But if we're doing an all hands, and I'm called up to speak, it might be in my best interest to share with everybody, "I'm here to celebrate the release of this product that that team put out." Right? So, so you might have to say, "Why are we here?" The H is how are you connected to the event. So if I'm at a wedding, people might not know who I am. I could say, "Hey, I've known the groom for 25 years." People are like, "Oh, okay, now that makes sense." If you're giving a, a tribute at work, you don't have to say, "And I'm the boss." Everybody knows your, your position. So again, these are choices you make. So why are we here, how are you connected? The A stands for anecdote. Tell a story or a quick example that is relevant and accessible to everybody, uh, there's no insider knowledge, and keep it concise. And then ultimately, the last part is the gratitude, the thank you. So, so express gratitude, express some kind of thanks. In a, in a toast at a celebratory event, you might say, "Cheers," or whatever's appropriate for the culture you come from to signal closure. But again, what, uh, why are we here, how are you connected, anecdote or two, and then the gratitude or thanking at the end. And if you follow that structure, it can navigate just like a GPS your way through the toast. This is such an easy structure to remember. Yeah. There's so much of it that I love. What I wanna understand is where do you put the actual content of the tribute and the toast? Is it like the anecdote expands into here's what I wanna say? Like, there's an example or story in there that's like... Exactly. So it's, it's typically part of that. You might, you might do it i- in, as part of the why we're all here. "We're here to really celebrate the Herculean effort of the, the, this particular team to get this product launched. I'm so honored, uh, to have supported it. I'm the manager of the team. Here's a story about how Lenny worked overtime to get this done, let's raise our glasses, uh, and give them a salute." So yes. You, you could do it in, in the why are we here or through the anecdotes. Okay. And I know one of your other piece of advice which connects to what you just said is be brief. Yes. Yes. So I, I, uh, you, nobody has ever complained about a toast that's too brief. I'm sure it's possible, uh, but, but the, the complaints, the majority of complaints are that the toast went on forever. Do you find that it would ever make sense to give a couple anecdotes or make a couple points in a toast? Yeah, and it depends. It depends, uh, you know, toasts are opportunities for teaching and learning as well, especially in a work environment. So it might make sense to tell a couple anecdotes. I'm a huge fan, I mean, y- your listeners know, you know minimally viable product design, uh, agile development, really critical. What is it about? It's about understanding your audience, your users. And it's about rapidly prototyping and iterating. I believe in minimally viable communication, uh, trademark pending, right? Uh, where, where you're, you, it's the same principles, right? Know your audience, put together a s- a, a, a rough draft of what you wanna say, test it out. So if you're gonna give a big toast in front of an, a company all-hands, run it by a few people and say, "Is it too many anecdotes? Would it benefit from having another story?" Get people's feedback. We are not the best judges of our communication. So, uh, th- the answer is yes, but test it out.

    4. LRLenny Rachitsky1:00:44

       Another element of a great toast that you recommend is to be emotional. Can you touch on that?

    5. MAMatt Abrahams1:00:50

       Well, so emotion connects with people, and as long as it's genuine and authentic, uh, it's really important. Um, and I've been thinking a lot about emotion in communication. My, my father recently passed away, and I ga- I, you know, everybody in my family said, "Well, Matt's gonna do the eulogy." I mean, I had, it was like I had no choice, 'cause what do I do? I'm the guy who, who teaches communication. So I felt added pressure, not only to honor my father's life, but like, everybody's like, "This is the way you do a eulogy." And so I wanted to do some research on, what's all the advice out there on eulogies? And there, there wasn't a lot, so I actually wrote an article on, on my experience, and you know, hopefully it'll help people. But the point is, in those circumstances where there's a lot of emotion, it's important because it connects to the audience. It's, it makes it human. But sometimes the emotion can get in the way. For you as a communicator, imagine giving, I mean, I, I was very concerned that my emotion would cover up or overshadow the honoring I was trying to do of my father. But the same thing can happen in, in any kind of toast situation. So think about emotion. Emotion is a tool to use. The best way to convey emotion in a toast is through the anecdotes you use. The anecdotes reveal the emotion. Uh, it's one thing to say, "I am so sad." It's another thing to tell a story that is sad. Uh, I was very fortunate to interview, uh, for my podcast coming up soon, uh, a one-panel cartoonist. So she has to create everything in one panel. And her advice is, "Don't tell, show." And, and that, uh, you know, so don't tell somebody you're angry, show that you're angry in the panel she writes. So showing the emotion through story and anecdote is the way to do it.

    6. LRLenny Rachitsky1:02:22

       Have you had Matthew Dicks on your podcast?

    7. MAMatt Abrahams1:02:25

       I, uh, y- so it is so funny. I have not, and I want to. His name comes up more than anybody else's. Uh-

    8. LRLenny Rachitsky1:02:31

       Okay.

    9. MAMatt Abrahams1:02:31

       ... and, and, and I know of his work and his advice. So I might ask you to connect me.

    10. LRLenny Rachitsky1:02:35

        Absolutely. I was, I thought of him as you were talking because-

    11. MAMatt Abrahams1:02:39

        Yeah.

    12. LRLenny Rachitsky1:02:39

        ... he does a, he helps people create their eulogy-

    13. MAMatt Abrahams1:02:42

        Yeah.

    14. LRLenny Rachitsky1:02:42

        ... ahead of time before somebody passes away-

    15. MAMatt Abrahams1:02:45

        Yes.

    16. LRLenny Rachitsky1:02:45

        ... before you get really emotional and you have to rush it, so that's one of his services, is he helps you write eulogies for people in your life.

    17. MAMatt Abrahams1:02:50

        Yeah, yeah. No, I'd love an introduction. His work is-

    18. LRLenny Rachitsky1:02:52

        Oh.

    19. MAMatt Abrahams1:02:52

        ... very influential.

    20. LRLenny Rachitsky1:02:53

        Absolutely. He's amazing. Uh, we'll link to his episode about storytelling.

20. 1:02:57 – 1:07:25

    Mastering Q&A sessions

    1. LRLenny Rachitsky1:02:57

       Okay, let me talk about a couple more. Uh, Q&A. Getting better at, uh, question answer once, uh, at the end of a talk, whether it's on the spot or not.

    2. MAMatt Abrahams1:03:05

       Again, I, I always start with approach. Many of us see Q&A as threatening or challenging. And in fact, we need to see Q&A as an opportunity. It's an opportunity to extend, expand, connect, learn. Even in the most hostile of situations where people are really coming at you with a lot of spice, or hot and heavy, you can get a lot of value out of it. So we have to come to the approaches, these questions are opportunities. We have to make sure that we take the question in without interrupting or over-validating the question. I have two pet peeves about Q&A sessions. One is saying, "Good question," to every question. And two, at the end of answering the question, saying, "Does that make sense?" Because, uh, i- i- in both cases you're trying to validate the asker when you say, "Good question." You're also trying to buy yourself time, and there are other ways to do that. Uh, and at the end when you say, "Does that make sense?" you've got a laudable goal in mind, which is, "I want a, did I answer your question," right? But I'd much rather you say, "Did I answer your question? Can I tell you more? Do you have a follow-up question?" Because if you keep saying, "Does, does that make sense? Does that make sense?" people are gonna start thinking, "Maybe he doesn't make sense, 'cause he's always asking." So some pet peeves there. Once the question comes in, and you have to answer it, I have yet another structure. This structure is related to the what, so what now struc- now what structure. It's called A-D-D, for adding value. You answer the question cleanly and concisely. You then give an example to reinforce the answer. And then you explain the relevance or significance of the answer so people know it. D- would you mind, uh, role-playing a, an example of this with me, Lenny?

    3. LRLenny Rachitsky1:04:43

       Absolutely.

    4. MAMatt Abrahams1:04:44

       Okay. Imagine you're hiring me. You're a hiring manager. And I'm, I'm interviewing to be a, um, what I do for my day job. I, I, I am a lecturer at Stanford's Business School, teach strategic communication. You so happen to have a position open for a strategic communication lecturer. I show up. What is a reasonable question you would ask that doesn't just have a yes/no answer? Um, so ask me-

    5. LRLenny Rachitsky1:05:07

       So wait, so you're interviewing for a role to be a lecturer in my school, and about communication.

    6. MAMatt Abrahams1:05:11

       Yes. Yes. You're, you're the dean, you get to hire me.

    7. LRLenny Rachitsky1:05:14

       Yeah. Um-

    8. MAMatt Abrahams1:05:14

       What's a reasonable question? I mean, you could ask a super hard one, but I want people to hear how ADD works.

    9. LRLenny Rachitsky1:05:19

       This might be too simple, but just how many, how many students have you worked with and taught over the years?

    10. MAMatt Abrahams1:05:23

        Okay. So I'm gonna morph that question, 'cause I, I could just say thousands, which is true. But I'm gonna turn it into a question about experience, 'cause really what you're asking me is what's my experience.

    11. LRLenny Rachitsky1:05:31

        Mm-hmm.

    12. MAMatt Abrahams1:05:31

        So because that I can give an ADD answer to. Uh, if it's just a numeric answer, just give a number.

    13. LRLenny Rachitsky1:05:37

        Yeah.

    14. MAMatt Abrahams1:05:37

        So I might say, "I've been doing this for 25 years, and I have taught over thousands of students. I've taught both at the academic la- in the academic world, but also in the, the corporate world. What this means is, is I can tailor my material to be relevant and useful to your students." So I answer the question. The question was, "What's your experience?" "25 years, thousands of students." I then give an example. "I've done this in the corporate world. I've done this in the academic world," so I, I ground it in some, some, something tangible. And then I show th- show the relevance. "What this means for you, as a dean hiring me, is that I'm gonna be able to tailor my experience." We often assume that people can connect the dots. If I give my answer, you're gonna say, "Oh, that's why this is relevant and important." Uh, but we need to actually connect those dots for our audience. I had a psychology professor once who said, "The funny thing about common sense is it's not so common." And we often make the assumption that, that people will connect the dots. So answer the question, give a detailed example, and then explain the relevance. And if you do that, it will help. And I challenge every one of your listeners working in companies that have FAQs, frequently asked questions, go back to those FAQs and put them in this structure.Not only will it help you digest and get familiar and comfortable with the structure, anybody looking at those answers begins to see that this is a way to give a complete answer. This is how our organization answers questions, and that can be so helpful to building consistency and helping yourself answer better.

    15. LRLenny Rachitsky1:07:06

        Just to clarify, the acronym is ADD?

    16. MAMatt Abrahams1:07:08

        ADD. Answer-

    17. LRLenny Rachitsky1:07:10

        A- answer.

    18. MAMatt Abrahams1:07:10

        ... detailed example-

    19. LRLenny Rachitsky1:07:11

        D- answer.

    20. MAMatt Abrahams1:07:11

        ... describe the relevance.

    21. LRLenny Rachitsky1:07:12

        Describe the relevance. I see how you snuck that D in there.

    22. MAMatt Abrahams1:07:16

        Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're like, "What the hell is that D?" Yeah. I mean, you can come up with whatever acronym you want that helps you remember. ADD because it adds value.

    23. LRLenny Rachitsky1:07:24

        Awesome. Okay.

21. 1:07:25 – 1:09:29

    Apologizing effectively

    1. LRLenny Rachitsky1:07:25

       And maybe, uh, one last quick one, apologizing. What's a couple tips for getting better and apologizing on the spot?

    2. MAMatt Abrahams1:07:32

       Yeah. So first and foremost, we, we need to take the time to apologize. Many of us don't. And when we apologize, we me- we need to make sure that we apologize for the transgression and not h- for how we made people feel.

    3. LRLenny Rachitsky1:07:44

       Mm-hmm.

    4. MAMatt Abrahams1:07:44

       So often, people will, will simply say, "I'm sorry that you feel bad." Well, that's not an apology. That, that, that's... You're, you know, you're not a- assuming responsibility. So we, we need to first start by, by talking about the, the issue that we are addressing, uh, or the, the, a problem that we, uh, caused somebody. So we need to think about, uh, apologies in that way. So an apology, to me... I have a triple-A, like, roadsides, uh, repair service here in the United States, triple-A. Uh, and it's three steps. Acknowledge, appreciate, and amends. So I have to acknowledge what I did. So imagine we're in a meeting and I interrupted you. You were in the midst of speaking, and I interrupted you. So I might say, "I'm very sorry for interrupting what you were saying. I overspoke when you were talking." That's my... I'm acknowledging what I did. Then I appreciate. "I can imagine my doing that made you feel bad, and, and you feel that you didn't get your fair share of sharing your point of view. Next time..." So that's the, the appreciation. The amends part is, "I will work not to do this. In fact, I will wait 'til you're done, and I will actually paraphrase what you said before I contribute my point." So I'm signaling I understand it, and here's the very specific thing I'm going to do to try to remedy it, which of course, you can comment on. You can say, "No, I don't think that's enough. I think you..." Whatever, or, "Thank you. That, I think that's even more than is needed." Whatever. So you acknowledge the actual behavior and offense, not how you made the person feel right away. You then express appreciation for the difficulty you might have caused, and then you make amends. And the triple-A approach, I think, can really be helpful to people to be better at in the moment apologizing.

22. 1:09:29 – 1:11:57

    Closing thoughts

    1. LRLenny Rachitsky1:09:29

       Amazing. Matt, I think we've packed this episode with so many tactical golden nuggets to help people become better communicators, especially on the spot. Is there anything else you wanna share or leave listeners with before I ask you how they can find you online and things like that?

    2. MAMatt Abrahams1:09:45

       So again, I wanna go back to how we started this segment, talking about spontaneous speaking. Everybody can get better at communication, and I, I encourage, I challenge people to take the steps that they need to take to do it. So it starts with initiative. It's followed by grace and, and compas- self-compassion. It takes time. But in so doing, you can improve your communication and help others, right? It's not just about you finding your voice. It's about you sharing that voice with others. So taking the time to work on your communication is critically important, and I encourage everybody to do so.

    3. LRLenny Rachitsky1:10:18

       All right. I'm hoping people follow that advice. And if not, think back to what we talked about at the beginning of just how much impact this can have and how many people are also going through the same challenges you're probably feeling speaking and being on the spot. All right. Where can folks find your podcast, your book, and also, how can listeners be useful to you?

    4. MAMatt Abrahams1:10:37

       Oh, I love that last question. So, uh, mattabrahams.com, great place to go to, to find things. So at mattabrahams.com, you'll find a whole bunch of resources, my own and others. I've curated a bunch of resources. You can find Think Fast, Talk Smart wherever you get podcasts and on YouTube. Uh, and then the book, Think Faster, Talk Smarter is available everywhere. I'm a huge user of LinkedIn, and to answer that last question you asked, I invite people to connect on LinkedIn. I'd love to hear their stories and find ways to, to collaborate.

    5. LRLenny Rachitsky1:11:06

       Awesome. And your podcast is ranked higher than this podcast. You're in a different category, which is a very competitive category, the business category. I've moved myself to the technology category, which feels more natural to me.

    6. MAMatt Abrahams1:11:18

       Yes.

    7. LRLenny Rachitsky1:11:18

       But, uh, your podcast is killing it, so congrats.

    8. MAMatt Abrahams1:11:20

       Thank you.

    9. LRLenny Rachitsky1:11:21

       Thank you. Thank you for sharing your wisdom with us. Um, that's it. Matt, thank you again for being here.

    10. MAMatt Abrahams1:11:27

        Uh, great pleasure to have the conversation with you, Lenny. I enjoyed it thoroughly.

    11. LRLenny Rachitsky1:11:30

        Same. Bye, everyone. (instrumental music) Thank you so much for listening. If you found this valuable, you can subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. Also, please consider giving us a rating or leaving a review, as that really helps other listeners find the podcast. You can find all past episodes or learn more about the show at lennyspodcast.com. See you in the next episode.

Episode duration: 1:11:57