– Val Gray
One of the drivers of achievement is the ability to listen; it is a significant factor in leadership success, and we call it ‘the mother of all behaviors’, since it gives birth to just about every other ‘people’ skill. What is your intent in life? Most will answer – to succeed, to be happy, to be the best person I can be, to survive, to thrive, etc.
But what is your intent whilst listening to someone else speaking? Be honest now! Stephen Covey captured it in his immortal words: “Most of us do not listen with the intent to understand, we listen with the intent to reply.”
Most of us will be thinking about our reply; whether we agree with the speaker, what our take on the topic is, whether the topic has any relevance for us, what we want to say, what is our opinion.
I can hear you shouting, “But I am listening!”
So how do you know if you are listening?
It all comes down to this – If you can’t repeat the last sentence someone has just spoken, you are not listening! Let me repeat that – if you can’t repeat the last sentence someone has just spoken, you are not listening!
You being in the IT industry where you have to deal with different types of people, vendors, distributors, customers start cultivating the habit of active listening.
Indeed it is hard work, especially when we do not want to listen. We are already angry, busy, tired, frustrated, if we do not like the person or the topic, that’s when we put least energy into it, because we are so wound up in our own thoughts and emotions, we stop focusing on the speaker.
When you are in a conversation start implementing the following things. Listen/repeat what you hear/question.
Summarize what you have heard/check for verification. You will see that people stop repeating the same problems, because they feel you have listened and understood their problem. This results in better conflict resolution, better relationships and better communication.
By focusing on the speaker, actively engaging through use of question/repeat/ summarize, we can all listen with intent to understand.
(The author is the founder director of Talent Makers and can be reached at val@talentmakers.in. The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not represent the views of Channel Times or any of the websites managed or operated by Trivone Digital Services)