INTRODUCTIONS & SMALL TALK IN ENGLISH for Meetings
Sabrena Doherty 
Use these common phrases in English conversation when you meet someone for the first time, or someone you don´t know very well.
When you meet people in work situations, you usually need to have a certain amount of conversation - called small talk - with them before you get down to business (start talking about business). This can be difficult and can make you nervous if you are not very confident about your English yet.
In this article, I will briefly give some expressions and advice on what to talk about, what questions to ask, and how to respond in this situation.
If it is the first time you meet the person, you need to introduce yourself.
In this situation you could say something like:
- Hi, my name is Sabrena
Or
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- Hello, I´m Sabrena, nice to meet you.
If someone says this to you you can reply with:
- Nice to meet you, I´m (your name).
If it is the first time meeting people or not, you may have to have a casual conversation with them while you wait for the meeting to begin. This is called small talk.
The most popular topics of small talk include:
- Weather
- Weekend
- Something current at work or in the area you are working on
- Current news topics such as COVID
Let´s look at each of these four examples - what questions you could ask and what you could say in reply if someone asks you.
- Weather:
- It´s cold /hot/ warm, isn´t it? Here I use a question tag (isn´t it) to invite the other person to agree with you.
The answer could be:
-Yes, it is, or Do you think so? if you don´t agree.
2. The weekend
- How was your weekend?
or
- Did you do anything fun at the weekend?
Possible answers could be, ´Not much, we just relaxed´, or ´Yes, we went hiking / for a walk / for lunch / to the beach ´etc. Then you could say, ´How about you? Did you do anything exciting?´
If it is Wednesday, Thursday, or Friday, it may be more appropriate to ask about the next weekend. You could ask a question like, ´Are you doing anything exciting at the weekend?´
If someone asks you, a possible reply could be, ´No, nothing special, what about you?´ or, ´Yes, actually, we are going for dinner/hiking/to a concert. Are you doing anything?´ etc.
It is always good to answer a question with a question, this keeps the conversation flowing and directs the conversation away from you if you are not very confident with your speaking ability yet. It is also polite to show interest in the other person of course and gives that person a good impression of you.
3. Something current at work or in the area you are working on
It is common to talk about something work-related with a colleague or person you are having a meeting with, especially if you don´t know them well. Possible conversation starters and answers could be:
- How are things in your project / your office / your department?
- Fine, thanks. And yours?
- How is the project going?
- It´s going well. We are having some issues with (topic) but we are managing. What about you?
4. Current news topic
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Big news topics are always a popular conversation starter. You could start by asking, ´Did you see the news about…?´Possible answers could be ´Yes, I saw it last night. What do you think of…? ´or, ´No, I didn´t, what happened?´
I already mentioned that it is polite to ask questions to have a good conversation and also reduce your speaking time if you would like to. We also use some noises such as ´mmm´, ´uh-huh´, and body language like nodding our head to keep a conversation flowing. Some expressions we use to encourage the other person to continue are:
-Yes, that´s right
-True
-Isn´t it?
- Mm, that´s interesting, what happened then?
- Oh, really?
- Wow, that sounds fun.
You could try to incorporate these to make your English sound more natural.
A final tip is to try to listen carefully to what the other person is saying and not how you will reply or what you will say next, as this can distract you and in the end you don´t know what is happening in the conversation. It is also a good idea to plan ahead. if you know that a meeting in English is going to be difficult, try to listen to English, or, better still, speak in English a little before the meeting, to help you to already be ´in the zone. In fact, we often speak with students before an interview, important meeting or a presentation in English, to help them to feel prepared.
On a final note, if you don´t understand something, just use one of the following expressions:
-´Sorry, I didn´t catch that, what did you say?´
-Sorry, what was that?´
-I don´t follow, what did you say? Sorry.´
Or simply:
-Sorry?
-Excuse me?
Or
-Pardon?
Hopefully, these expressions will help you with your small talk and introductions, especially before having meetings in English. Remember, learning English is a process and to be able to speak and understand confidently you have to practice. You will make mistakes, you may feel shy and embarrassed, but keep trying and in the end, you will be more fluent and more confident!
If you would like step-by-step instructions on how to improve your English by yourself, download our free guide HERE.
To learn 30 common expressions or phrases that native speakers usually use, read this article: 30 natural expressions that native speakers use.
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