How to deal with a motormouth

[Jekyll]

I'm the nominal leader of a group, but I have no real authority. One of my groupmates is the kind of guy who you can count on to talk five minutes straight every time he opens his mouth. He's also the kind of guy who could easily turn all passive-aggressive and sabotagey. He's not completely stupid, but he does tend to waste a lot of meeting time. How do I tell him to shut the **** up without turning him against me?

 

[Nereis]

You can't be the team leader without authority. Put him in his place pronto before he wastes more time on useless trivia.

 

[Calnell]

You should probably talk to him individually before or after your group meets. Calling him out in front of the group will most likely cause him to get passive aggressive. If he acts up with you in front of the group after you had a private discussion, then he'll look more like an ass. It'll make it easier to get the rest of the group on your side

 

[acidboy]

jeesh... talk to him when you two are alone and tell him some people in the group that you cannot name have come up to you and bitched about his flapping gums.

 

[Joffrey]

After 30 seconds of his talking, feel free to interject to direct the conversation.

 

[texas_jack]



After 30 seconds of his talking, feel free to interject to direct the conversation.

That's what I do

 

[Medwed]

Pavlovian reflex development. Every time he talks you assign additional task/responsibility to him. Every time he brings up an issue you ask him to develop metrics or powerpoint presentation on that issue. Once he realises the more he talks the more he has to do, he will start to pace himself fairly soon.

 

[JayJay]



After 30 seconds of his talking, feel free to interject to direct the conversation.

This works for me most of the time.

 

[Jekyll]

It's what I've been doing. Whatevs. Thanks guys

 

[jgold47]

Do we work together or something?

coming from that guy, please dont call them out or be disrespectful. Chances are they dont even realize/cant help it. Its pretty demoralizing as a business professional to have something like that called out publicly. If your peers, and not +/-, you should definatley bring it up, in private, and let them know you appreciate their participation in the discussion, but need that person to back it down a notch as they are monopolizing the discussion. My boss and I used to trade meeting topics ahead of time so he could either respond to me offline or he would be prepared when I would bring something up. It cut down on my need to carry on.

 

[Concordia]

If he won't admit to talking too much himself, say that some of the other guys are too quiet (or have something important to report on) so you'll need his help letting them through.

 

[curzon]



Pavlovian reflex development. Every time he talks you assign additional task/responsibility to him. Every time he brings up an issue you ask him to develop metrics or powerpoint presentation on that issue. Once he realises the more he talks the more he has to do, he will start to pace himself fairly soon.

+1

 

[chrisjr]



Pavlovian reflex development. Every time he talks you assign additional task/responsibility to him. Every time he brings up an issue you ask him to develop metrics or powerpoint presentation on that issue. Once he realises the more he talks the more he has to do, he will start to pace himself fairly soon.

that's rich. if my boss was like that i would never raise issues in meetings.
we have a motormouth here. will take a good 2-3 minutes to explain something that could be expressed in 15 seconds. it's infuriating, and if i'm at my desk i'll usually start working on something else after i've got the gist of what he's saying.

 

[Joffrey]

Come to think of it, we have one here too. Easily adds 14 unnecessary minutes to our weekly meeting. She's endearing though. She also is well aware she talks alot but doesn't bother trying to censor herself.

 

[roastduck]

Either talk to him in private about it, or let him go for about 30 seconds before you ask him (tactfully) to make his point.