In traditional business settings there’s performance review “seasons.” In sports, every game during a season offers its own performance review. Certainly fans weigh in on individual performances (usually by cheering, booing or their reactions on Twitter) but here’s what is more relevant to our conversation - coaches and players are forced to evaluate effectiveness each and every game.

Athletes can’t avoid what shows up in the stats. Coaches can’t ignore the effectiveness (or ineffectiveness) of plays that were called.

When coaches and players evaluate games and outcomes its usually based in facts, like stats and outcomes. Seattle Seahawks defensive coordinator Clint Hurtt lays it out in this Learn From A Leader video. 

It’s a model that works for all types of performance reviews. Deal in facts. Know your numbers. Don’t just say, “I improved from last year” provide specifics like “I increased by sales by...

Busy, hectic, full... if all of these words could be used to describe your schedule these days, I get it.

I also understand that its easy to skip the small talk and just get down to work. Some days it's the best way to stay on track, but it's also worth remembering that you can have a complete conversation in less than a minute.

These sports conversation starters can help with short exchanges this week. 

The NFL regular season is underway and if you need a default conversation topic from now until the Super Bowl on February 12, football is a safe bet. Just consider the TV ratings from last season. NFL games accounted for 75 of the top 100 most watched TV programs in 2021 and the Top 5 most-watched programs were NFL games.

Millions of fans tune in for weekly games. They might not like every outcome, but they generally enjoy talking (or venting) about what happened.

The popularity of the NFL and football in general is why it’s most-often at the top of our weekly Conversation Starters list. You don’t have to go far to find a good talking point but there’s plenty of other options this week too.

A few weeks ago I suggested using NFL training camps to start conversations so you could circle back around with those football fans at the beginning of the regular season. This week marks the beginning of the NFL regular season. Now is great opportunity to circle back around and ask questions like these.

• How are you feeling about your team after watching them in the preseason?
• How many wins are you predicting for your team?
• Who do have winning the Super Bowl?

There’s more than just football to talk about, take a look at these topics making news this week.

I talk to losers.

It is literally part of my job.

When people find out I work in sports broadcasting they automatically jump to the cool parts of the job like being on the field and talking to players after a win. But that’s only part of my job. I talk to players and coaches win or lose. I talk to players after making spectacular plays and after they dropped a pass that could have been the game-winning touchdown.

Not all interviews are fun. Not all interviews are easy. Sometimes those conversations are tough and ones that I would rather not have, but as I mentioned it’s part of my job.

It’s also part of your job to have tough conversations and address mistakes, errors and shortcomings. I know you want to avoid them. I also know it’s better if you don’t. As someone who’s forced to have these conversations on a weekly (if not daily) basis here’s what I know to be true: Being direct and straightforward is the kindest and often easiest way to...

Are you bored by your colleagues’ small talk every Monday?

Tired of hearing what they did over the weekend?

Not interested in seeing another video of a kid’s baseball tournament?

If you don’t like the topics they bring to the table, beat ‘em to the punch with a conversation starter of your own. If you don’t want to think too hard about it, use one of these sports topics to get the ball rolling and steer the conversation to where you want it to go.

College football starts this week, but what I hope you're starting this week is a new relationship as a result of small talk. 

Purposeful small talk can help you do that. These sports conversation starters can get the ball rolling. 

A quick search about small talk and effective small talk reveals lists of questions, articles on the “necessary evil” of it and hacks to make it easier.

What if you tried to personalize it instead of trying to avoid it? Instead of arming yourself with a list random questions or looking for an easy way out, what if you prepared for the conversation and walked away from the interaction having accomplished something? 

If you consider small talk a necessary evil of course you’re going to try and avoid it. If it’s always awkward you’re not going to initiate it and if you think it’s a waste of time you won’t bother putting yourself in position to have the conversation in the first place.

Small talk can be all of those things. Often because it’s not the conversation we prepare for.

We prepare for the big moments and the “real” conversation. We think small talk is something we endure or blow off altogether.  

...

Last week I told you about my goal to not respond with “Busy” when someone asked, “How are you?” Update: I mostly succeeded. But I also caught myself giving 1-word answers that weren’t very helpful in sparking conversation. I was also guilty of delivering a half-hearted response and not being present enough in some of my interactions to ask the obvious follow up question or make a real connection.

So the goal will stay the same this week.

I talk for a living, but even I need to prepare for conversations and remember to stay in the moment. Every interaction, including small talk, is more gratifying when you do that. Here are a few sports conversation starters to help you prepare for those moments this week.

This week I’m making it my goal to not say “Busy” in response to a question like “How are you?” or “How are things?”

It’s accurate to say that I’m busy, but that’s not an interesting answer. My life is always busy (especially when sports season overlap this month) and everyone is busy too.

Telling people we’re busy isn’t a great conversation starter. I understand that sometimes we really are too busy to talk, but often I give that answer because I haven’t taken the time to come up with a better one. (Because I’m busy, of course.)

So here’s what I’m going to do: This week, I’m going to try to answer the question “How are you?” accurately and in a way that could prompt a conversation, or at the very least make for a more interesting exchange.

Here’s what I’ve workshopped so far:

• “Satisfied I crushed my interviews today.”
• “Excited about the...