Book Breakdown - Revealing: "What a Behavioral Scientist Says About Revealing in the 1st 5 Minutes" - 039

Most people worry about oversharing, but Harvard Business School professor Leslie John's research says the real danger is saying too little. In this episode, Bryan breaks down her book, "Revealing," and shows how too little information (TLI) quietly stalls conversations, weakens trust, and keeps relationships shallow. You'll walk away with five practical insights for turning surface level small talk into real connection, starting in the first five minutes.

Main topics covered:

• What TLI (too little information) is and why it's the silent killer of business conversations
• How disclosure decisions happen automatically, and how to catch them in the moment
• Why reciprocity has to work like a dance, not a monologue
• How asking a genuine follow up question builds trust and likability
• Why leaders who reveal a little more earn more respect, not less
• Three action items to apply strategic disclosure this week

Timestamps

0:00 - The Real Problem Is What You Withhold
1:13 - Why The First Five Minutes Matter
3:53 - TLI, Too Little Information Explained
5:50 - Insight One: Notice Disclosure Forks
7:55 - Insight Two: The Silent Conversation Killer
10:29 - Insight Three: Reciprocity Must Be A Dance
14:00 - Break And Free Book Breakdown Resource
15:09 - Insight Four: Questions Unlock Disclosure
18:58 - Insight Five: Leaders Go First
22:22 - Strategic Disclosure And Key Takeaways
24:49 - Three Action Items For This Week
26:09 - Next Episode Preview And Closing

Book Featured: Revealing: The Underrated Power of Oversharing

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Transcript

The Real Problem Is What You Withhold

SPEAKER_00 0:00

I want you to think about the last conversation you walked away from wishing it had gone differently. Not a conversation you blew up, not one where you said something terrible, just one where you left feeling, well, like you're never really connected, like you kind of stayed on the surface. Like both of you are present, but neither of you were really there. Now, I want you to ask yourself, was the problem what you said? Or could it possibly be what you didn't say? A Harvard Business School professor named Leslie John has spent 15 years studying exactly that question. And she just published a book called Revealing, The Underrated Power of Oversharing. And from the moment I started reading it, I kept thinking the same thing. She's describing everything that happens or doesn't happen in the first five minutes. So today I'm going to walk through the her five biggest ideas and show you exactly where they live inside the first five minutes. And here's my promise to you before we even get started. By the end of this specific episode, you're going to see the first five minutes of every business conversation differently. Are you in? Let's get after it.

Why The First Five Minutes Matter

SPEAKER_00 1:13

Welcome to the Elite Business Connector Podcast, where we believe how you interact with people will make or break your opportunity to develop a real and influential connection. Now, whether you're a rookie or a rock star with people, you're the right place right now. Let's do this. I'm your host, Brian Buckley, husband of one, father of five, and on a mission to help you develop, deepen, and master your business communication skills. And my promise to you, week after week, is if you listen and subscribe, I will bring my best content and energy to help you get better at communicating and connecting in a business environment. And if you're in sales, customer service, professional services, or even hospitality, or you lead one of these teams, then this podcast is for you. Now, once a month, I do a deep dive on a specific book that I found in my research that validates and strengthens the first five minutes framework, and then distill these lessons learned for you in a book breakdown. Now, these authors are Pulitzer Prize winners for Stanford and Harvard professors, PhDs whose life work is made available to us. But many of us haven't taken the time to slow down to read these incredible works. So I'm going to do it for you. As a curator that gives you the opportunity to learn from the best in an area every business professional experiences. The first five minutes. But nobody seems to be talking about it or working on it until now. So here's today's big idea. Most people are overly concerned about saying too much. But the research actually says the real danger, which is the one that's quietly killing your relationships and your business conversations, is actually saying too little, ironically enough. Leslie John calls it TLI, too little information. And I'm going to show you exactly how TLI is playing out in your first five minutes right now, maybe without you even knowing it. So here's how we're going to build this episode today. First, I'm going to give you context on Leslie John and revealing who she is and what the book is, and why I think you need to read it or at least apply the principles that I'm going to give you today. Then I'm going to walk you through five parallel insights, five places where Leslie John's Harvard research maps directly into the first five minutes framework. Each one is going to hit a little differently. Some of them are going to confirm what you already do, and a couple of

TLI Too Little Information Explained

SPEAKER_00 3:53

them might even challenge you the way you've been showing up in the first five minutes. We'll take a quick break in the middle, and then I'll close with the two things that I always want to leave you with, then three action items that you can use this week and a look at what's coming next on the next episode. So stay with me. This one's worth it. Now, before we dive into these five insights, let me give you 30 seconds on the author, Leslie John. She's a professor of business administration at Harvard Business School. She's a behavioral scientist. And she's been studying self-disclosure, the choices we make about what to share and what to withhold for 15 years. And her research has been published in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The Economist. And she just published her new book, revealing the underrated power of oversharing earlier this year. Here's her core argument in one sentence. We were obsessively about saying too much. But the research says undersharing, playing it too safe, keeping things service level, staying guarded, does far more damage to our relationships, our careers, and our well-being than oversharing ever will. Sounds intriguing, right? And she introduces two terms, TMI, you already know that one, too much information, and then TLI, too little information. And she argues that TLI is the silent killer. You never know you're doing it because no one calls you out on it. You just wonder why some conversations never really go anywhere, why some relationships are going to stay shallow, and why some deals maybe just never close. TLI. That's why. Now let's talk about where that lives in your first five minutes through these five specific insights from her powerful book.

Insight One Notice Disclosure Forks

SPEAKER_00 5:50

Here's insight number one. Disclosure decisions are happening every minute, and you're defaulting to silence. Here's where we start, and this is foundational. The author says that every conversation is full of disclosure decisions. These are tiny forks in the road where you choose. Do I share this or do I hold back? Do I go a little deeper? Or do I stand the surface? Maybe do I answer this question honestly, or do I have to give a safe, polished version? And here's what the research shows. Most people aren't even aware that they're making these decisions. They happen automatically, below the radar, if you will. And when they happen automatically, we almost always default to silence. We default to less. We default to safe. We choose TLI, too little information. Now think about your own first five minutes. Those first five minutes of a business conversation are nothing but a series of her disclosure decisions. Do I use my OQ, observational intelligence, and actually comment on something that I notice? Or do I play it safe and lead with the weather? Do I drop an LTP, a lead talking point? Something genuine, something human, something that invites the other person in, look at you, not look at me. Or do I lead more with my title and my company name? Front of the jersey or back of the jersey? Do I ask a follow-up question? Or do I just nod politely and move on? Every one of those is a disclosure decision. And if you're making them automatically, if you haven't been trained to see them, you are defaulting to silence, as she says. You're defaulting to TLI. And the first five minutes framework exists to make those decisions conscious, to interrupt the autopilot, to give you language and tools for a set of choices that most people don't even know they're making. Did you before this moment? That's insight one. It's awareness. You have to see the fork in the road before you can choose the right path.

Insight Two The Silent Conversation Killer

SPEAKER_00 7:55

Insight two. TLI is the reason conversations never go anywhere and it's silent. So I want to stay here for a minute because this is the one that could possibly hit the hardest. Leslie John in her books describes TLI, the too little information, as the silent killer of relationships. And here's what makes it so dangerous. When you say too much, you get feedback. People may wince, things can maybe get a little awkward. You feel what she calls disclosure hangovers. That cringe maybe the next morning or after the conversation, where you replay what you said and think, ah, well no. That feedback, as as comfortable as it is, well, it's actually useful because it teaches you something. But when you say too little, when you hold back, when you stay at that surface level, nothing happens. There's no cringe, there's no awkward moment, there's just a conversation that really didn't go anywhere. A connection that never really had a chance to form, an opportunity that quietly just walked out the door. You don't code it as failure, you code it as well, maybe just neutrality. And that's exactly why TLI keeps happening. Now bring this into your first five minutes. I've said this for years. The biggest mistake people make in the first five minutes isn't saying something wrong necessarily. It's not doing anything right. It's playing as so safe that there's nothing there to connect with. You've had those conversations, you know exactly what that means. It's staying in the shallow end of the conversation pool, and you're wondering why you never get anywhere meaningful with the people that you meet. It's getting trapped in what I call the small talk triangle. But here's what Leslie John's research confirms. When you undershare, when you hold back your OQ comments, when you skip the LTP, the lead talking point, and when you move past the first question without going deeper, you're making a TLI decision. And the relationship pays the price. You just won't know it because nobody ever tells you. But here's the good news you have a framework that was built to fight TLA, 2QM, the two question minimum. Exists because the second question is where real disclosure begins. The first question is polite, but the second question is purposeful. And that second question is the antidote to TLI. That's insight two. You create the environment to help someone come out of the TLI zone and feel comfortable to open up with you. Insight number three.

Insight Three Reciprocity Must Be A Dance

SPEAKER_00 10:29

Reciprocity is the engine, and it has to be a dance. All right, we're building something here, so stay with me. The author describes what she calls the dance of reciprocity in human connection. The idea she shares is this disclosure is not a monologue, it's a pattern. You share something, I meet you at that level, I share something, you meet me at that level. And then each exchange, each step in the dance, if you will, brings you just a little closer together for that connection. Each one lowers the wall a little bit more. She pulls here from author Aaron's famous research. It's the 36 question study, where pairs of strangers were led through a series of progressively deeper questions. And as a result, they ended up forming genuine emotional connections. You ready for this? In under an hour. The mechanism wasn't the questions themselves, necessarily. It was the reciprocal vulnerability, the dance, if you will. The point is closure should feel like a dance, not a monologue. One person shares, the other meets the lat level of vulnerability. And lopsided sharing breaks the dynamic that deepens that connection. In my Elite Business Connector book, I highlight three specific focus areas. All about me, all about us, all about you, which is a progression and a reciprocity engine. It's not a checklist, it's a dance. You go first in the personal minute with your LTP. You offer something genuine, and then all the all-in framework of ask, listen, and learn invites the other person to do the same. You move from communication to conversation to connection in the book Elite is this Connector. But here's the breakdown point, and Leslie John names it directly in her book Revealing. When the dance becomes a monologue, when one person is doing all the sharing and the other person is just nodding along, well, that connection never connects. It just glimpses along, if you will. It slowly dies. She calls this enough about me, let's talk about me syndrome. Love that line. See it all the time. And it shows up in your first five minutes when people get so excited about their own story that they forget to include the other person. They leave that other person standing on the dance floor alone. You may share, but you're not including the other person to share back. It's keeping them guarded. Reciprocity requires that you not only share, that you also invite. That's where it says, look at you, not look at me. That's where locked-in listening makes possible. It's the dance only works when both people are dancing. Does that make sense? It's a correlation between two people, but being completely aware of what's going on. And that's insight three. It's being aware of TMI and TLI for both of you and the other person with OQ to make those necessary adjustments. Insight one was disclosure decisions are happening every minute, and you're defaulting to silence. Insight number two was TLI is the reason conversations never go anywhere, and it's a silent, silent killer. Insight three was reciprocity is the engine and it has to be a dance. Three insights down from the book, revealing, and two to go after the short break.

Break And Free Book Breakdown Resource

SPEAKER_00 14:00

I found there are very specific habits of the most successful business professionals. I call them elite business companies. And one of them is they choose to take action and go deeper on what they're learning so they can constantly improve and grow. And one of these actions is downloading the free resources offered in this podcast. And I'm gonna offer a free resource. It's the book breakdown resource cheat sheet, with all the highlights from this episode in the book revealing. Those that want to continually and constantly get better and improve, they take the time to download it, review, and then apply what they've learned from the free resource cheat cheat. Well, everything's these book breakdowns, especially this one from a Harvard Business School professor. Take this masterpiece. Get better between TLI and TM. So if you haven't grabbed this free resource, go do that. There's content there that will make everything we're talking about today immediately executable. All right, two more insights. So let's finish strong and back to our regularly scheduled program.

Insight Four Questions Unlock Disclosure

SPEAKER_00 15:09

Insight four. The questions you ask are the most powerful disclosure tool you have. And this insight resonated the most with me. And this should be no surprise with my obsession with questions in the first five minutes. And throughout her book, Revealing, Leslie John comes back again and again to the power of questions. Not just any questions, the right questions asked with genuine curiosity, followed by real listening. Her research on follow-up questions, in particular, is striking to me. People who ask follow-up questions are rated as significantly more likable, more trustworthy, and more interested in the person they're talking to. And one of Leslie John's core research areas is the power of asking good questions. Did you catch that? Not just questions, but good questions. Her studies show that the right question, particularly follow-up questions, dramatically increase how much people share and how much they like the person who asked. So think about that. You don't just ask a follow-up question to get more information. You ask a follow-up question to signal that you care about the answer to the first one. That right there is worth the price of the book. Information is gathering for you, showing you care is for them. And here's what the research shows about dodging questions, which she also covers. When people sidestep or deflect or give a non-answer to a question, even gracefully, maybe even politely, that other person notices. They may not consciously register it, but trust goes down just a little bit. Something feels off, and the connection doesn't seem to deepen. Now, here's where this maps. Your 2QM, your two question minimum, is absolutely critical in these moments. The first question is maybe expected, and like I said, is polite. It's what any professional would ask, hopefully. But the second question, that's the signal. That's where you show the other person, I heard you, I care about what you said, and here it is. I want to know more. That second question is the most powerful disclosure tool that you have. It doesn't just invite the other person to share more, it creates the conditions for them to share more. And when people share more, well, they like you more. When they like you more, they trust you more. And when they trust you more, well, you know this where this goes, you develop influence. The author also validates something else that's critical in the first five minutes: listening. We call it locked-in listening, putting noise canceling headphones on, getting all the other noise out and focusing on what you're hearing right now. She talks about how one of the biggest TLI mistakes isn't even about what you say. It's about what people feel and they what they've heard after they're talking to you. It's their body language. Maybe it's the eye contact, your posture that's signals signaling maybe they're distracted, maybe that you're disinterested. They give you less. They notice that, they hold back, they go TLI on you. But locked-in listening isn't just courteous, it's a trust signal. It's the nonverbal invitation to keep going, to keep getting deeper, to take the dance to the next level. And that's insight four. Your ability to ask good questions, not just questions, is the key to unlocking the TLI in the first five minutes. The reality is you have more control over TLI of the other person than you even realize. How? Asking good questions. Here's the last insight.

Insight Five Leaders Go First

SPEAKER_00 18:58

Insight number five. Going first builds trust, and your leaders don't know that yet. This specific insight is for everyone in this audience who is any kind of a leader and has a leadership role. Leslie John's research on leaders and disclosure found kind of something remarkable. When leaders reveal just a little bit more than they think they should, and I'm talking trauma dumping, not inappropriate oversharing, but genuinely authentic, maybe slightly vulnerable disclosure. They actually earn more respect, not less. They gain more trust, not less. Maybe more influence, not less. And she ran a study with a Google executive who shared with his team that he had been rejected. Ready for this? From 20 jobs before landing this role. The result? People trusted him more. They were more willing to work with him. And they did not see him as less competent. If anything, they saw him as more human, more real, more worth following. She also found that leaders who share real but not catastrophic struggles. I'm working on my time management, or I get nervous before big presentations, or I could really get better in the first five minutes, create what she calls psychological safety. Their teams, as a result, open up. Their teams take more risk. Their teams connect better with each other because the leader went first. Now, bring this into your first five minutes. The personal minute. Your first minute is, well, that's not human minutes. It's where you go first. The lead talking point is not just a conversational starter, it's a leadership move as well. When you walk into a meeting and lead with something genuine, something real about who you are, not just what you do, you're signaling to the other person that it is safe to be human in this conversation. And in leadership, that is so critical. That signal is everything because most business conversations never create that safety peer-to-peer, let alone leadership to subordinate. Most people show up in their professional armor and nobody takes it off, and you finish the meeting having exchanged information, but never really connected. That's the crime in the first five minutes, especially as a leader. Your LTP is the first step in taking off the armor. And Leslie John's Harvard Data says that when you do that, even slightly, briefly, trust goes up, influence goes up, and connection accelerates. So go first. Every time. So, leader, I ask you, how are you doing in this area? Really? Are you too guarded? Care more about your reputation than connecting? That's insight five. Be the example and be human. You'll be surprised how much your willingness to reveal will indear not repel your team to connect with you. A great example of this leadership move is a past interview that I had with ATT's AVP, Ashley Siller, in episode 28. She breaks down how she manages this tension and how it changed her relationship with hundreds and hundreds of sellers who report to her. So I encourage you to go back and listen to episode 28 if you're a leader. So five insights.

Strategic Disclosure And Key Takeaways

SPEAKER_00 22:22

That's your focus. That's the book. And here's what I want you to see clearly before we close. According to the author, revealing is a skill, one that can be learned, it can be practiced, and you can improve on it. The goal is not maximum disclosure, but strategic disclosure. Not maximum disclosure, but strategic disclosure. Knowing your purpose, reading the situation, going first when appropriate, and matching the level of vulnerability in the room. Revealing this book is a roadmap for making smarter, bolder, and ultimately more satisfying decisions, but just how much you want to share and why. Well, as we wrap up, we talk about a two-front honesty. Front one, the honest truth and encouragement. Leslie John's research is confirming something that we should challenge and should be a challenge to every one of us. The problem isn't that we say too much to TMI, the problem is that we often play it too safe, TLI. We show up to business conversations in armor. We stay service level. We ask the polite first question, if at all, and move on without going deeper. We hold back our LTP, our lead talking point, because we're not sure if it's the right time. And when we wonder why the conversation didn't go anywhere, that's it. Seriously honest truth, TLI is a choice. It doesn't feel like one because it's automatic. But the moment you start seeing it as a choice, the moment you become aware of those disclosure decisions, you have power over them. And right now, for most of the people listening to this right now in our conversations, we're undersharing. And it's costing you connection, especially in those first five minutes, and you don't even realize it. But hopefully you do now. Front two is the hopeful reality and a challenge. You have a framework built to fighting exactly this. The first five minutes is the TLI antidote. OQ, observational intelligence, makes you see what others miss. The LTP, the lead talking point, gives you a reason to go first. It forces that second question that otherwise we may skip. And locked in listening sends a signal that it's safe to go deeper. The other person picks up on that. They read that and they want to respond. Leslie John spent 15 years building the science. You already have the framework in the first five minutes. Now it's time to apply

Three Action Items For This Week

SPEAKER_00 24:49

it. So here are three things, three action items I want you to do this week, not someday, this week. Maybe choose one of them. Action item number one. Name your TLI moment. After your next few business conversations, ask yourself was there a moment where I held back? Where had I, maybe somewhere in that conversation, didn't offer that genuine, I stayed surface and I could have gone deeper. Name it. Awareness is your first step. Or maybe action item number two could be this drop one real LTP, lead talking point. In your next conversation, lead with one genuine human talking point. Not your title, not your company. Something real. Something that invites the other person to be human back to you. Go first. See what happens. Or maybe action item number three is yours. Ask the second question. In every significant conversation, commit to asking at least two questions. Not back-to-back rapid fire. Ask the first, listen to the answer, then ask a genuine follow-up question based on what they said. It may be as simple as three words. Tell me more. That second question is where connection lives. Make it a non-negotiable for you.

Next Episode Preview And Closing

SPEAKER_00 26:09

So before I let you go, here's a sneak peek at our next episode. So a Harvard professor gave us the science today in this episode. The next episode, I'm going to bring in a practitioner. Dr. J.R. Briggs, doctorate in hand, author, coach, and one of the most intentional question askers I've ever sat across from, joins me to go deep on the one skill that makes or breaks your first five minutes. So if you think you already know how to ask a good question, Dr. Bridge is going to come in and respectfully challenge that. We're going to question everything in this upcoming episode. But this episode is officially in the books. In and out, nobody got hurt. Don't forget to follow and subscribe to the show wherever you get your podcast so you never miss an episode. I encourage you to download past episodes so you can listen to them anytime and not miss any episodes, past or present, especially if you're on the way to work or to see a client. You're ready to go. And if you're watching on YouTube, don't forget to subscribe and leave a comment. Let us know what resonates with you in this episode. And if you've not written a podcast review, would you be willing to take two minutes and do that for me? It's the best way for others to find the podcast. And personally, I would greatly appreciate you taking the time to do that. Doing me a solid. Lastly, if you want to bring the first five minutes to your team, your conference, or your next company event, reach out. I would absolutely love to have that conversation. Brian at BrianbuckleySpeaks.com. Again, Brian with a Y. As my Chicago Bears chant, good, better, best, never let it rest till your good gets better and your better gets best. Until next time, keep improving your communication, conversation, and connection skills every day. Put in the reps, become elite. As my dad always said, thanks for coming, but most of all, thanks for leaving. I'm out. You got this now. Now is your time to do something with this episode. And always remember to leverage your first five minutes to build connection, trust, and influence. You got this now.