How to Take the Floor Away from Someone Who Won’t Stop Talking
Good trainers, presenters and facilitators know the importance of audience participation. The experts tell us that audience participation sustains attention and interest, provides feedback that people are “getting it”, and enhances the retention of key points.
But, what about the dark side of participation? Specifically, when an audience member answers a question or otherwise obtains the floor, and is talking way too long; rambling, elaborating, elucidating, or tell a story, and is basically eating through your limited presentation time. How can you cut them off without confronting or embarrassing them?
In my experience, there are two strategies that have worked particularly well:
1) Breath-point intervention. There is a biological fact about people who talk too long…they do breathe. Watch closely for that slight pause, jump in, and do one of two things:
One, since they seem incapable of concluding, you conclude for them. For example, “So, Roger, what you are telling us is…” or “In essence, Samantha, your main point would be…” With any luck, they will agree with your synopsis, and you have successfully re-gained the floor.
A second “breath-point” intervention would be to take the “conversational ball” away from them and toss it to someone else. For example: “Interesting approach, Rick. Ahmed, have you ever tried that?” or “Sue, what’s your reaction to Jim’s experience?” If this works according to plan, you have now given the floor to someone less verbose, allowing you to quickly jump into the driver’s seat and proceed.
2) Blame it on the agenda. This works best if you set it up at the beginning of the session. Specifically, alert the audience that you are dealing with important information and a limited time frame. Consider saying something like: “O.K., we have some critical topics to cover and I know from past experience we are likely to get into some interesting discussions. However, you may occasionally hear me call a “time out” which means that, although we may talk further at breaks or at lunch, we’ve got to move on at this point or I’ll never get you out by 5 p.m.”
Using this approach, you are blaming the agenda for any interventions, not the substance or quality of what the talkative person is saying. You have set the audience up to expect or even anticipate interventions.