Read this fascinating book and you'll become a better listener, a better conversationalist and better company' Adam Kay'A brilliant book on the art of conversation' Matt Haig'A compulsory book for these divided times' Sathnam Sanghera'An intriguing exploration of the importance of a proper chinwag' Sara Cox'A terrific book from a terrific broadcaster.

This month Craig Howells from Let’s Talk Talent interviews Richard Sinclair MBE, the Chief Operating Officer at Zzoomm for his perspective on how managers and leaders can have better performance management conversations. Now, from looking at the the structure, the cadence of those conversations, what are the key principles that should be in a good performance management conversation? Conversation is broken. And while we know that effective communication can lead to greater fulfilment in our personal and professional lives, evidence suggests we are having fewer meaningful conversations than previous generations. The pandemic has exacerbated the trend towards fewer face-to-face interactions, while the growth of social media has led to heated arguments online. We are losing the ability to talk to each other. If you build bridges, you improve relationships between people who are very different or do not like each other.That was good. Thank you so much for an amazing conversation today. I certainly felt the pressure, so hopefully from every podcast now on, I will get better and better following your advice in this episode. So, thank you for spending your time with us today. I loved having you on the show. Wow. So, one of the questions I also have is when we do think about topics at work, there are a number of things right now that feel really explosive around politics, and even things that you would've once thought are very neutral now might feel kind of loaded. Do you think there are topics that should be off limits at work?

So, do you think body language has anything to do with that as well? And I'm thinking of, you mentioned that video conferencing, it can be very taxing at the same time without the video, you don't see someone's facial expressions, things like that. And then as well, you also hear arguments right now for people to return to office that, if we're going to collaborate, we need to be together in person, we need to be reading each other's body language, looking at each other's faces. Do you think that that really matters to the quality of the conversation or not so much?Let me put it to you this way, I asked a scientist at one point if it was possible after all these years of evolution of focusing so much of our energy, our biological energy on becoming incredible communicators through our mouths and our ears, if it would be possible for text, for written communication to equal verbal communication at any point? And she said it's possible in five to 10,000 years. I am interested,” she said, “in conversations in which people gain new insights about each other, themselves or the world — the kind of conversations college students often have when they are living in the dorms and staying up much later than they should. I loved these conversations, and still remember some of them and the insights I gained. After college, I noticed that the people around me rarely had those kinds of conversations, and I missed that.”

And good conversation involves taking turns, not talking over someone – trying to silence people by talking more loudly, forcefully, and persistently than them. Now before you think here’s another critique of public debate from the liberal establishment – Arthanayake is an award-winning BCC radio presenter – Let’s Talk does something quite original by setting a bar for conversation that only the most open-hearted can reach. No matter what side you’re on in the culture wars, you’ve no justification for feeling smug.My gosh, the vitriol that I received for making that comparison. What I was trying to do was encourage people to look in on themselves, and the language they used, because people voted to leave the European Union for all kinds of reasons. The idea that you tell a huge group of people that they are just stupid for doing so is ignorant; or that they are all racists, it doesn’t further the conversation.”