I went to a funeral recently—a full house, standing room only. The eulogist took the podium silently, looked down at his notes, looked up at us, even scanned the crowd right to left and back again, down to his notes, then looked up and continued the story he started in silence.
His silent ascent to the podium and the silence continuing could not have been more than a minute or two, but it seemed longer—more reverent, more inclusive. And guess what? The crowd was completely silent. We were ready to hear what he had to say.
You can employ this too.
When I’m with a decision maker—an important person—and they’re looking at their screen, their phone, off in the distance, I simply say, “I’m OK, do you need to answer that?” or “Need to get that email off?” Or I put out a blank piece of 8.5x11 paper and I start drawing on it… usually geometric shapes, a Venn diagram, etc.
I do so slowly. This catches their attention and both of us are now looking down at the paper, and I have a collaborator instead of a judge or an impassive physician staring at PowerPoint slides.
The Venn diagram is a good one because the three interlocking circles create that middle circle. That middle circle need not have a name or anything on it. It often houses the future success or the critical question or the thing that we are researching. And of course, our distracted doctor is now looking at our material—our on-the-spot made material—not the company’s brochures (yet).
Use pauses to make sure that you are giving your physician time to take it all in, to think, and to respond. Coaches use W.A.I.T. as their professional mantra: Why Am I Talking?! You can too.
Slow your speech, allow for pauses, note overt and subtle physician interest (leaning forward, asking questions, brighter eyes, head nodding, guttural sounds, etc.). Like in The Princess Bride, “You let me in, prepare to be engaged!”