The seven essential techniques of great listeners

Great listening is about:

1. active attention;

2. empathy;

3. clarifying and interpreting;

4. questioning;

5. reflecting;

6. summarizing;

7. action.

Let’s look at each of these in turn.

Pay attention, actively

When you listen, the first thing to remember is that it’s not about you. You need to focus on the other person, what’s being said, and stop worrying about what you’re going to say. Don’t listen to have your ego stroked. Look at the speaker directly and put aside distracting thoughts. Avoid also being distracted by things around you. Try to put the speaker at ease by looking and acting interested. Smile and help that person to feel free to talk. This requires others to believe that you really want to listen. They must feel that if they tell you something, it will be received in the proper spirit.

Do your very best to avoid judging. Leaders who are judging are not listening. If you ask questions that have a judgemental tone to them, you will very quickly shut people up. People will also shut up if you keep interrupting them. How do you feel when you are rudely interrupted? If your train of thought is disturbed and you can’t thereafter return to your point, it becomes frustrating. Sadly, interruption is a common occurrence and shows huge disrespect. The more people are interrupted, the less they feel like persisting with their point and the result is disengagement.

Conversely, employees respect those leaders that do listen, because they know how difficult listening can be. Leaders earn respect from their peers and their followers by being patient listeners. You have to learn to stay in the moment. Concentrate, or take notes to signal that you are paying attention. Try to clear your mind and give the speaker your undivided attention. If something comes into your mind that needs your attention, make a note so that you can return to it later and remove it from your radar now. Some leaders I know talk of notebooks filled with notes taken during meetings that they never refer to again, because by taking notes they are both retaining the information and sending a signal that what the speaker is saying is noteworthy.

You need to show that you’re listening. Nod occasionally, smile and use other facial expressions, and encourage the speaker with small verbal comments like yes and uh huh. Watch the speaker for non-verbal clues –body language, facial expressions and eyes. People can say as much with their own non-verbal signals as they can with their words. Very often, when people are not giving voice to their opposition or disagreement, you will be able to pick up clear messages of negativity if you pay close attention to their body language. The tapping foot, a furrowed brow, clenching fists, bitten nails. These all reveal the feelings behind the words.

Watch out for your own body language – crossed arms or hands folded behind your head are negative signals. Lean forward, nod often, smile – recognize that your own facial signals will be conveying messages back to the speaker.

There are physiological reasons to explain why concentrating so hard is so necessary. People can listen about 5 to 10 times as fast as others speak. In the time it takes the speaker to say 100 words, the listener has the capacity to hear 500 to 1,000 words. It is easy to drift away and find other thoughts entering your head with that difference in speed. Having that much capacity allows you quickly to turn to worrying about the next meeting, planning your presentation, or even thinking about what you’re going to have for dinner tonight. One of the keys to effective listening is to use this capacity to analyse what is being said, instead of letting your mind wander.

Empathize

Demonstrate that you are aware of how the other person is feeling. They may not express their emotion, but the clues will be there. Name the emotions that you see. If you say something like ‘I can see you are angry about this’, they can either disagree and tell you how they are really feeling, or they will appreciate that you have recognized their state of mind. Better still, say ‘I can see you are angry about this, because you think that…’ This will allow speakers to know that you understand how they feel, and why they feel that way. They could just say, simply, that you understand. Or you might say: ‘I know how you feel, I’ve often felt that way myself.’

Don’t tell people that they shouldn’t feel the way they do. By doing that you are invalidating their feelings. If you try to solve their problems immediately they feel underestimated and disempowered, pressured or even controlled. Most often, what people really want is support, trust and encouragement.

To be able to identify the underlying cause of the other person’s perspective, you have to be listening for all the clues as to why they think and feel the way they do. Don’t just cynically name the emotions – you need to show that you empathize with how they feel. There is no harm in saying that you too might feel that way in the same circumstances. It will not weaken your stature or your authority as a leader. But it is a powerful way of encouraging them to open up further.

If, however, you allow your own emotions to interfere with your listening efficiency, you will rapidly close down the conversation. You have to listen objectively and keep a tight rein on your temper. If you allow your emotions to run high, you will tune out the speaker, become defensive or even attack the other person. Don’t argue with them – even if you win the argument, you lose.

Clarify and interpret

Use open-ended questions as often as you can. ‘What happened next?’, ‘How did you feel when that happened?’, ‘Why do you think they did that?’ Use clarifying questions such as: ‘Let me see if I am clear – I think you mean this…’, ‘I’m not sure what you mean, could you repeat that a different way?’ I often use the phrase: ‘You haven’t used these words, but it seems that you are saying…’, or ‘So you really felt undermined, is that it?’

Beware of too often using: ‘Why?’ It can be seen as quite an aggressive question, one that forces people to justify themselves. Soften it by saying something like: ‘Tell me more about why you chose that option?’

Question

Questions are the breath of life for powerful conversations. Learning to ask questions in a non-aggressive way is crucial to good listening. Your questions should be filled with interest and even curiosity. People are naturally inclined to answer questions that are posed to them. If the questions are honest and sensitive we usually answer them. We all respond to questions in a much more positive way than to pointed advice.

When people feel trusted and listened to, they will be much more open to the power of questions. What is the right question? That’s hard to say; it might very well be a closed question seeking a firm conclusion, or it might be an open question continuing to explore. The trick is to create an atmosphere in which searching questions can be asked. Try not to clutter your question with your own preconceptions, and especially avoid make a question sound like a lecture. The good leader asks incisive questions, but avoids making people feel beaten up.

Most of the leaders I have spoken with talk about the power of one particular question. That question is: ‘How did you feel about that?’ The reason it is such a powerful question is that it invites people to share their emotions with you. It is a powerful way to get to the bottom of issues very quickly, especially if people trust you enough to answer honestly. It is a valuable shortcut to getting to the real issues quickly. Until people have given expression to their emotions, it can be difficult to have a constructive discussion about how to solve a problem. Leaders have to give people the licence to be emotional.

You have to listen for what is not said and ask the questions that will surface the things that have not been expressed. Listen for opportunities in between the words. True wisdom doesn’t see opposition, it sees only opportunity. Where are the opportunities in what you are hearing?

Be reflective

A key listening technique is to rephrase what has been said. Reflect what the other person is saying to you, but make sure it is not in their words. It requires immense concentration, but when you reflect things back to people in different words, it can often help to crystallize or clarify an issue. By repeating things back in your own words, you also allow people to correct you if you have come to inaccurate views about what they are saying. Remember, your goal is to understand, and reflective listening is the most important technique to use to ensure understanding.

Do not simply parrot what they say, and avoid using reflective listening to develop data that you then use to move in with solutions, evaluation, judgement or even punishment. Use reflection with discretion, making sure that it aids progress and is not interruptive. Never assume that you understand the other person. The biggest challenge of communication is believing that it has actually taken place. Until you have checked the meaning with people, you are in danger of wrongly interpreting what they’ve said. Learn to listen beyond the words, and listen with your heart and your eyes and your ears.

Summarize and thank

Either at the end of a conversation, or periodically through the conversation, it is powerful to summarize what you have heard. Use the phrase ‘What I hear you saying is…’, or ‘What I have heard so far is…’ You could even ask the other person to summarize. This is the moment to make absolutely sure that you understand each other, in order to move on. If you now want to make some of your own points, the other person will feel much more able to listen to you now that you have demonstrated that you understand their point of view.

Never forget to thank people for sharing their thoughts with you, especially when they open up and reveal their innermost feelings, or contribute ideas. Even if you really don’t think that they delivered you any value, thank them for their time and input anyway. Remember that your job as a leader is to build relationships and trust. If you even go so far as to praise them for the way they express themselves, you will see people blossom before your very eyes.

Commit to action

Leaders must have a bias to action. Listening is all about action – it is about drawing people out so as to take action based on what they say. It is about getting people to focus on what good things they do that should be done more often, encourage them to try new actions that could generate better results, or stop doing things that are not productive.

When we listen, we are listening to learn, listening to share or listening to act. For example, we listen to our market or to our people in order to know what they think about us, our services and products. We listen to staff because they know about things going on every day that we don’t. We listen to all this data, to all these ideas and we learn. When leaders listen this way, they are likely to make much better-informed decisions. Sometimes, we listen in order to start or join conversations. This is listening to share.

Listening to act is the secret key to leadership. It enables change. When we listen to act we are positively seeking out things to do, barriers to remove, ideas to implement, people to bring together – anything that enables us to get closer to achieving our goals.

Always end a listening session by summarizing and then suggesting key next actions. Make a note of them and follow up. When you take actions but don’t tell people, you are missing a huge opportunity to further build the relationship. People will be far more committed and engaged when they believe you will act on what they’ve said.

There are, of course, times when you have to take control of the conversation and steer it in a different direction. This is more palatable when you first demonstrate that you’ve heard the speaker, and then state that you have a different perspective. You may also decide not to act on suggestions. All of this is in your remit as a leader. However, it is often cowardly not to explain why you are not going to take action. Explaining can further understanding and builds respect. At very least, it can further the relationship. Leaders are respected and trusted when they explain their decisions, even if people don’t agree with the course of action to be taken. If they feel their views have been heard and their point of view has been respected, it will be much easier for them to go along with the decisions and commit to the actions.