Talking together, alone
A conversation requires mutuality. But my friend Tom doesn't seem to know this.
He's enthusiastic and curious, genuinely so, about almost everything. But when we meet, the enthusiasm runs in one direction. I might mention I've taken my son Charlie to tennis practice, and Tom is off. About a racket he found and restored, about how racket materials and designs have changed over the decades, about how he ended up with one of the most technically advanced rackets in the world.
There’s no turn-taking, no real exchange. Just Tom and his enthusiasm for the topic..
When we part, he sometimes says: "Thanks Daniel for a great conversation!"
And I'm left thinking: was it?
A conversation requires more than words moving between people. It requires a level of mutuality. I’m not suggesting fairness, as in equal airtime or consensus, but that each person is adjusting to the other. A question that shifts the direction of what’s been talked about. A response that involves the other party in the story. A moment where what is said next is shaped by what was just heard.
Tom fills up my attention. I leave knowing more about tennis rackets than I ever wanted or needed. But nothing in the exchange seems to change either of us. There’s more information. But not more relation.
That's why it feels less like a conversation and more like a presentation. A monologue in the shape of a two-person setup. Sure, a presentation can be informative. A conversation should be transformative, however slightly, for both people. Not every conversation needs to do this of course. Some exchanges are purely functional, like coordinating logistics, confirming a time, catching up briefly. But when we sit down with someone, when we give time and attention to an exchange, when we call it a conversation rather than a discussion, or transaction, something more could and should be possible.
It would be easy to dismiss Tom as simply an awkward conversationalist. But the same pattern shows up in organisations every day. For example, in meetings where one person presents their view at length and calls it a conversation. In safety consultations where leaders ask for feedback but the decision is already made. In performance reviews that are really feedback delivery with a pause at the end. In leadership conversations where curiosity is performed but nothing the other person says actually lands or changes anything.
Such exchanges appear active. People are talking, asking questions, exchanging information, being physically close, nodding, smiling. It looks like a conversation, perhaps. But nothing is being moved. No perspective shifts. No trust deepens. No shared understanding emerges that wasn’t already there.
A useful question after any conversation is simply, "What changed?" Did I learn something I didn't know before? Did my thinking shift? Did I understand this person differently? Did they understand me differently? Did we move something forward that neither of us could have moved alone? Has something new emerged that wasn’t there before?
If the honest answer is not much, then something happened, but it probably wasn't a conversation.
Tom is enthusiastic. He's curious about the world. But his curiosity doesn't quite extend to the person standing in front of him. And I think that’s a gap most of us don’t notice in ourselves. Because from the inside, talking can feel like connecting. But expression directed at someone is not the same as exchange with them.
Conversation only really happens when something you say lands with me, and something of my worldview lands with you. If that doesn’t happen, we haven’t really talked together. We’ve just talked alongside each other.