“The greatest problem with communication is we don’t listen to understand. We listen to reply,” writes Roy T Bennet in The Light in the Heart.
“When we listen with curiosity, we don’t listen with the intent to reply. We listen for what’s behind the words.” Indeed, one of the most fundamental communication skills is often the most overlooked: listening. Or ‘active listening’ to be more precise.
Active listening is a term that was first coined by American psychologists Carl Rogers and Richard Farson as the result of years’ long research as to what made a good counsellor. Their 1957 book, Active Listening, was written as a therapeutic technique to encourage positive changes in clients. The men remark upon the importance of getting “inside the speaker” to grasp, from their point of view, “just what he is communicating to us”. “More than that,” they continue, “we must convey to the speaker that we are seeing things from his point of view.”
Studies have also shown that up to 65% of our communication is nonverbal, so paying attention to these cues might, at times be more revealing than what the person opposite you is actually saying. And being a good listener is about so much more than simply staying quiet, nodding and repeating back what is said in an attempt to appear engaged.
“Active listening involves mastering a whole host of other skills – from learning how to read subtle cues to controlling your own emotional response,” writes author and podcaster Amy Gallo, for the Harvard Business Review. “It requires both empathy and self-awareness.”
Some more points to consider in order to master listening well include:
- avoiding interrupting the speaker to demonstrate both patience and respect
- summarising and paraphrasing what the speaker has said to show that they have been understood
- asking open-ended questions as a means of continuing and deepening the conversation and encouraging the other person to expand on their thoughts. This is an excellent way of showing genuine interest
- practising empathy to try to understand the speaker’s perspective and feelings, while being open minded and non-judgemental – a surefire way to build trust and rapport
- maintaining good eye contact is another essential ingredient of active listening, but don’t focus so much on the other person that it becomes weird! Aim for 4-5 seconds of eye contact before briefly looking away
- providing feedback is another way of showing the other person that you are fully engaged and present during the conversation
Leadership consultants Jack Zenger and Joseph Folkman recommend that rather thinking of listening as a way of absorbing information like a sponge, it should be considered a “trampoline that gives the speaker’s thoughts energy, acceleration, height, and amplification”.
They devised a six-level system of listening:
- level one is for creating a safe environment where anything can be discussed
- level two requires all distractions – mainly the digital kind! – to be removed
- thirdly, aim to understand the main thrust of what the speaker is saying
- level four requires paying attention those nonverbal cues
- next, acknowledge the speaker’s emotions
- and the last level requires askingthoughtful – and thought-provoking – questions
One study concluded that sales professionals that mastered active listening boosted their revenue by 120%, while other research has shown it to be an essential element of successful leadership. As Jim Collins writes in his bestselling book, Good to Great, the best leaders understand that ‘having your say’ and ‘having the opportunity to be heard’ are not the same thing, so they therefore go about creating a culture for “truth to be heard”.
Employees that feel heard are nearly five times more likely to feel empowered to perform to the best of their ability.
Employees that feel heard are nearly five times more likely to feel empowered to perform to the best of their ability, yet a LinkedIn survey of 14,000 workers found that only 8% considered their leaders to be great listeners and communicators.
“Ultimately, it shows respect and value for the other person’s needs, concerns, and ideas as the listener is actively signalling the other person matters to them,” Dr Sabrina Romanoff tells Verywell Mind. “It helps people feel more understood.”
