Tactful ways of ending a conversation?

Ok.

I'd like to take a leaf from Tim Ferris' book and suggest that you don't answer phonecalls at all unless you're expecting a specific important call.

Instead, let them leave you a message- if it is important, call them back, if not, don't. That way you can avoid any conversations that will drain your time without delivering any real benefit to you.

If, on the other hand you called someone and the conversation isn't going anywhere (or if you're in a face-to-face situation), I suggest what others above me have already mentioned, and that is make it clear that you're busy and need to get on with something- asking for the information that you need. Of course, the best thing to do is to make this apparent at the start of the conversation, reducing the likelihood that the person you are talking to will go off topic and start wasting your time.

suggest that you don't answer phonecalls at all unless you're expecting a specific important call.

That's my policy.

There are some excellent reasons for this:

1. You don't have a record of what was said during a phone call. If an action item comes up, it's too easy for either party to forget.

2. Some people are in full-out attack mode on the phone. The best way to deal with someone who's incoherent and angry is to marshal your facts and formulate a calm response. You can't do that if they ambush you. You may not even remember the person.

3. In my ecommerce business, everyone told me I needed to be able to take orders over the phone as well as online. What they didn't mention was that if a customer finds their order was declined online, they will call you and without mentioning their card was rejected, have you try to place the order. I only needed to hear "The bank told me I was over my credit limit but that's not possible" a couple of times before turning off phone ordering.

4. I respond to phone messages by email. Always.

But yes, you need to be able to get out of phone conversations as well as face-to-face ones. Someone who lives in my house launches into what I can tell are going to be long, detailed, tedious stories of no interest to me whatsoever. I interrupt a couple of minutes in and say, "I have to go grocery shopping|use the bathroom|feed the cats|floss my teeth|contemplate suicide but maybe we can resume this conversation when I get back." He says, "Oh, okay, but I was just talking about how to adjust the framistat in the reverberator and how it's important to get it to the right tolerance and this came up just the other day when so-and-so..." I've walked out the door and he's still talking, sucking up all the oxygen in the room.

The moral of the story is sometimes there's nothing else you can do other than make your excuses and hang up, politely and firmly.

fLufF
--