Listening – Does it matter?

In the fast pace environment (both personal and professional) art is listening is a lost for most of us. As the quote goes

Most people do not listen with the intent to understand; they listen with the intent to reply

Stephen R. Convey

Why do people not listen?

• Not interested
• Distracted
• Do not see the value in the topic
• Thinking about what they want to say
• They think they already know what you are going to day

What does it cost not to listen?

• Decrease in productivity
• Misunderstanding
• In personal world it may cause loss of relationships

What are the challenges for listening?

• Wrong channel of communication: Sending an email for something delicate that needs to be spoken about face-to-face
• Listening just the words and not focusing on the perspective
• Letting emotions control communication
• Making assumptions and passing judgment before understanding what is being said

What is Active Listening?

Active listening is listening with all your sense and giving you full attention to the speaker. It is not just the words that you are listening to but also the tone in which it is said, observing and understanding the body language when the words are being said.

Tips for Active Listening

• Create a safe environment by avoiding judgment and not interrupting
• Remove distractions
  • Do not look at your phone
  • Focus on the speaker
  • Make eye contact
• Ask questions
  • Seek to understand the core of the message
  • Restate and confirm
• Notice speaker’s body language: 80% of communication happens with body language
  • Facial expression
  • Posture
  • Gesture
• Seek to understand speaker’s emption
• Share ideas to help speaker clarity their own understanding by
  • Asking questions to shed new light on the issue
  • Offering ideas
  • Focus on speaker’s issues and not on issues that you may have

Keys to active listening

Empathy

Empathy is understanding other person’s thoughts, feelings and condition from their point-of-view; which is different than sympathy that focus on how you feel.

Emotional Intelligence (EQ)

Differs from empathy in a sense that it is understanding your own feelings.

4 areas

• Self-awareness: Understanding your own emotions
• Self-management: Managing your own emotions
• Social awareness: Recognizing and understanding other people’s emotions
• Relationship management: Using awareness of your emotions and emotions of others to build relationships