I despise what I call leader statements. What is a leader statement? I define a leader statement as one that requires the listener to respond or inquire for more information. Basically it is a setup statement made by a person who wants the listener to need to know more, and thus they are required to ask for more information and thus the person who made the leader statement is now doing the listener a favor by telling them more.

Example: “Gosh, I have had such a bad day…..”

This person expects you to respond with something like:

“Oh I am sorry. What happened?”

GOTCHA! You are now on the hook to listen to their entire mindless diatribe. In fact, you asked them to tell you their entire day’s story. They are doing you a favor! Hell, you owe them one!

This is why I have opted to answer leader statements with one word, and it always shuts down the conversation.

“Ok.”

Let us look at our previous scenario:

“Gosh, I have had such a bad day…..”

“Ok.”

What can the leader statement maker do? Go on? Certainly not, you just killed the conversation. The other thing you can do is reply with something completely off handed as it will totally derail their thinking, however this can be dangerous.

“Gosh, I have had such a bad day…..”

“Agreed.” or “I like.” or “Man, I can’t believe my friends, sometimes.”

Try these tactics and I swear you will no longer be forced to listen to Monica the annoying co-worker tell you about her bad day at the spa again.