The Power of Listening (Part 1)

 

Last week, I had the honor of facilitating a communication competence workshop for a company that was looking to improve their employee's listening skills. The upper management in this organization was frustrated by the lack of listening that was occurring on a day to day basis. This organization understood the reality that effective listening directly relates to increased productivity, workplace relationships, and most importantly, revenue! I have been teaching listening skills for the past decade and am very aware that effective listening is imperative to both our personal and professional success. Unfortunately, too many of us don't realize the importance of listening in our everyday lives and fewer of us actually work towards becoming more effective listeners.

Effective listening is valued and expected in most professions. Whether you are a CEO, a computer engineer, a nurse, photographer, marketing manager, hair stylist, a teacher, stay at home mom, or student- listening is important to your professional success. Additionally, all of us are involved in personal relationships- whether they be with our families, friends, or romantic partners. Whether we realize it or not- listening is also imperative to the success and longevity of our personal relationships. 

Listening is a communication skill. That’s right- a skill that we can learn and fine tune with practice. However, effective listening is not easy- it takes effort! The problem with listening is that we as a society don’t value listening or understand how important it is to our personal and professional success. In the past decade of teaching listening skills, I have heard various accounts of how the lack of listening has caused relational fights, marital problems, and has impeded on professional success. Understanding the process of listening and realizing that it is actually a communication skill will only be of benefit to your personal and professional lives. 

Hearing vs. Listening

One of the obstacles in listening is being ignorant to the fact that   there is a vast difference between listening and hearing. Most of us have no problem hearing. In fact, if you have the ability to do so, it is impossible not to hear the everyday noises that surround us. Hearing occurs when sound waves hit your eardrums. Listening is not as effort-less and is far more complex.  According to Julia Wood, a celebrated author and professor of Communication Studies, listening is an active and complex process that involves being mindful, hearing, selecting, organizing , interpreting, responding and remembering.  One of the most difficult aspects about listening is being mindful. Being mindful means to be in the moment and focused on the communication that is occurring rather than letting your thoughts drift to think about the many other aspects of life that often consume our everyday thoughts. So when you are listening in on your next conference call, try your best to be mindful and to stop your thoughts from drifting away to your weekend plans, what you are eating for dinner, or all the tasks you need to get done that day. Mindfulness in Listening is much easier said than done! 

Active vs Passive Listening
In order to encourage effective listening, it is important to distinguish between active and passive listening. Passive listening is when a communicator non-verbally may indicate that they are listening but in reality the information is going in one ear and out the other. Passive Listeners do not make a conscious effort to understand or remember what has been said.  On the other hand, active listeners are in the moment, mindful, and try to understand and remember what is being said during the communication process.  It should come as no surprise that active listeners are more successful in their personal and professional roles when compared to their passive listening counterparts. Active listening may sound simple- but when considering the amount of information that is thrown at us daily and the various types of “noises” that exist as a barrier to effective listening- active listening becomes an art and something that skillful communicators must continuously work on doing.  Active listening is not easy to do- it takes concentration, effort, and energy!

Forms of Non-Listening 

 

Chances are that most of you have never thought so critically about listening. Before I review effective listening strategies (in my next blog post), I think it might be worthwhile exposing you to five forms of non-listening. Julia Wood discusses these forms of non-listening and highlights how they can be a hindrance to effectively communicating with others. Once you become acquainted with these forms of non listening, you may come to realize that most of us (including myself) engage in non-listening all too often. Non-listening can be counterproductive to personal and professional relationships, professional success, and effectively navigating everyday lived experiences. 

1. Psuedo-Listening is pretending to listen. Pseudo-listeners non-verbally communicate that they are listening by smiling, nodding, or making eye contact but in reality they are not paying attention. Sometimes we psuedo-listen to boring lectures, co-workers or friends that tell the same story over and over again, or even to our loved ones when we are just too tired to focus. Psuedo-listening is normal and probably inevitable for some of us. However, we should be aware of this form of non-listening and try our best to not engage in it unnecessarily.

2.Monopolizing occurs when we re-route or focus the communication on ourselves instead of the person who initiated the conversation. I am sure that many of you can relate to that one friend who always needs to make every conversation about themselves. It is natural for us to want to share our experiences and perspectives- but be mindful and make sure that you don't hog the conversation. Everyone wants a chance to speak! 

3. Selective listening involves selectively focusing on parts of the conversation rather than the entire message. We listen selectively when we screen out parts of a message that don’t interest us or with which we disagree. To some extent, selective listening is inevitable. If you are in a three hour training, you will select to the messages that you find more interesting and relevant. If you put the news on while you are getting ready for work in the morning, you may listening actively when you hear the weather being discussed but passively for the rest of the news broadcast. In professional context, try your best to be engaged and actively listen throughout the entirety of the communication interaction.

4. Defensive listening happens when we perceive personal attacks, criticisms, or hostile undertones in the communication when no offense is really intended. Defensive listeners assume that others don’t like, trust, or respect us, and we get offended no matter how innocent the speaker’s communication is. Defensive listeners hear threats and negative judgments when there might not be any present. Many times, defensive listeners feel insecure or negative about themselves. A colleague of mine who is insecure about her recent weight gain was asked by another colleague what she ate for lunch one day. The colleague who has been feeling down about her weight gain and ashamed of her eating habits had some harsh words for my other colleague who was just casually trying to make small talk. This real life example illustrates how defensive listening can lead to interpersonal conflicts and can be a major barrier to effective relationships.

5. Ambushing is listening carefully for the purpose of attacking a speaker. These types of listeners don’t mind distorting what the speaker says in order to attack a speaker. Ambushers are not listening to understand but usually listen so that they can use the speaker's words or thoughts in an attack against the speaker. I'm sure many of you have ambushed your relational partners during verbal fights or have seen ambushing happen in a court room, or political debate. The risk with ambushing is it usually causes further conflict and a communication breakdown between the individuals in the conversation. 

It is important for us as communicators to understand and attempt to decrease the amount of non-listening we engage in. As you can see, non-listening can create barriers and roadblocks to effective interpersonal relationships and professional success. However, it is important to realize that non-listening is natural and in some cases, inevitable. Being aware of the forms of non-listening and consciously trying to avoid them puts you one step in the right direction to being an effective and competent communicator. 

   

                                                 Stay tuned for more on listening....