I think most of us want to be good listeners. We want to be good partners and parents to our children, and good children to our parents and good friends to our friends. It’s in the listening to these loved ones that we can strengthen our relationships and deepen our social bonds. Likewise, if we’re managing someone, we want to really listen to them to understand who they are, how they like to work, what motivates them and what they need to thrive and grow in their role. Listening well is one of the easiest ways to build trust and respect in workplace relationships.
And yet, it is often in the striving to be that good listener that things come undone. Am I staring too much at them? Did I just miss a sentence while mentally perfecting a response to the last one? Have I heard enough or just assumed I know the rest of what they’re going to say? Maybe you are also guilty of zoning back into the middle of a conversation and realising with chagrin that you’d been listening so well that you had drifted into reflections on how much of a model listener you are.
These problems may be more or less familiar to you. Due to innate differences in our brains, the amount of practice we’ve had, or the environment we’re in, some of us have more difficulty not mentally wandering off than others, but our attention and focus is certainly something that can be improved.
Various things can distract us, whether external, such as physical discomfort and other deadlines or internal, such as stress, hunger, opinions, boredom, any biases on what is being said, or being reminded of our own experiences. A pitfall many people fall into is “relational listening”. This is when we compare an experience of our own to what the speaker is saying. There is a time and place for this form of response, but we risk making the speaker feel that we are not really interested in their experience for its own sake, and we might also fail to miss the point of their story.
So how do you draw yourself back in when the mind has wandered?
When that happens, the brain processes information from our senses in a less detailed manner. So we need to re-engage the senses. Try:
- Shifting your position. Sitting up when you’ve been slouching might make you feel more alert.
- Breathing from your diaphragm. Some discreet deep breaths can re-ground yourself in the present moment.
- Re-engage eye contact. Look at the speaker and deliberately notice the colour of their eyes to draw your attention back to them.
- If you can, touch something cold. Sensations like holding a metal water bottle can help re-centre your awareness.
And when you’ve re-mastered your focus, what does listening brilliantly look like?
I was recently in a conflict management skills workshop run by one of our facilitators. She was introducing a listening skills task when she paused, took an egg out of her bag and made to throw it to a manager directly across the room. The energy in the room noticeably changed: people sat up, alert, attention riveted on the scene in front of them. Would she really throw it? What if it broke? The facilitator moved around the room a few times, seemingly assessing the most opportune angles, before lobbing the egg across the room. When the manager caught it unbroken, the room audibly relaxed and sat back with a sigh, possibly of faint disappointment. That, the facilitator said, is how I want you to be listening to one another in this next exercise.
Listening exercise 1 – picking up on the little things
To really listen to someone, you’ve got to be watching them, and not only watching but paying attention to what you’re seeing. The words people use are important, but behind them is a much larger source of thoughts, feelings and intentions. Anyone who uses coaching skills in their work knows that body language and other non-verbal signals – fidgeting, sighing, fleeting expressions, leaning forwards or glancing away – these are all key data points to pick up on. You don’t have to be a mind reader or a natural at interpretation to draw attention to what you’ve seen and ask – what makes you sigh when you say that? What other thought has caught your attention? What do you really think about that? In a psychologically safe environment, these questions are a surefire way to delve deeper into what the other person is really saying and communicating to you, even if not with words.
Listening exercise 2 – reflecting what you’ve heard
We often want to respond to people with some new thought or idea to move the conversation along. But people rarely mind having their own thoughts and feelings directed back at them. So after someone has spoken, try playing it back to them to check your understanding. Phrases like “I get the impression that you…”, “I get the sense that…” and “It seems to me that…” can be really helpful. If you have misunderstood something, they will correct you, and move the conversation on themselves, re-assured that you are now on the same page.
As a more advanced version of this activity, have someone describe someone or something else, perhaps a boss they particularly enjoyed working with or a team experience that had not gone to plan. Reflect this back to them, but instead of talking about the person or experience, offer a view of what it says about the speaker. For instance, if someone talks about the excellent boss who gave them the opportunity to write for an industry publication, you might say you get the impression they are a creative person who valued the chance to try something different. Or if they mention a boss who always had time to discuss ideas, you might say you feel that the speaker probably does their best thinking in collaborative, supportive environments.
The purpose of listening should always be to understand. A team that feels understood is more motivated, more effective and more open to collaboration. Direct reports feel safer sharing challenges and more confident bringing forward new ideas. Relationships deepen, trust grows and communication flows more freely in every direction. Even the rejection of an idea or the denial of an opportunity will be received more easily if it is clear that the issue has first been properly heard and considered in good faith.
To discuss how these skills can be coached and developed among your teams, get in touch with Sheridan today for an introductory call.
