Get down to business Neutral

To stop with preliminary talk or small distractions and start focusing seriously on the main task at hand.

It’s often said out loud as a signal to shift a conversation or meeting from casual chat into productive, purposeful work.

Documentation of the phrase’s exact origin is thin — most language references note only that it emerged from general American commercial usage and became fixed through frequent repetition in meetings and negotiations, without pinning down a first citation or author. The word “business” itself has meant “serious matter requiring attention” since Old English (“bisignes,” busyness), long before its narrower modern sense of “commerce,” and “get down to” has long meant “apply oneself seriously to,” as in the related older phrase “get down to work” — so the expression likely formed gradually from these two already-established senses rather than from any single traceable event.

After some small talk, they got down to business.

Let’s get down to business — we only have an hour for this meeting.

The two companies finally got down to business after weeks of emails.

A: “Should we chat a bit more?” B: “No, let’s get down to business.”