BENEFITS OF LISTENING

Learning to listen better can absolutely transform your relationships with your team members. Here are three major benefits in developing your listening skills:

1. From a practical business point of view, you learn and find out:

• How the business is doing;
• What your customers are saying and what they really want;
• What your competitors are doing;
• How to save time and work more efficiently;
• How to minimise mistakes and solve problems quickly.

2. More importantly, from a team motivation point of view you become better at understanding and appreciating:

• How your team members think and how they feel;
• What goals and ambitions they have;
• The day-to-day challenges they face both business and personal;
• What motivates them.

3. You develop your motivation skills:

• By allowing people to relax and open up;
• By building trust;
• By building self-esteem;
• By allowing people to have their say and make their point.
• Listening also compliments the team member.
• It indicates that you value them and think that what they say is important.

EIGHT STEPS TO POWER LISTENING

‘Seek first to understand then to be understood’

Stephen Covey, The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

• Actively listen
• Keep an open mind
• Make notes
• Keep eye contact
• Ask questions
• Listen to tone
• Watch body language
• Practise

1. Actively listen

Listening is an active, not a passive, process; in other words, look like you’re listening; concentrate completely on the speaker. Express lots of open body language; keep good eye contact; nod your head and change your facial expression relative to what’s being said.

Obviously, you don’t want to ‘go over the top’, but merely show your feelings to the other person. Women are good at this and men not so good. The next time you’re among a group of people at your place of work or even in a social situation, watch two women or a group talking with each other. You’ll see lots of open body language and loads of different facial expression. Without listening in, you could almost tell what the conversation is all about.

Men, on the other hand, tend to listen impassively, just like statues. They may be taking it all in, but the message to the person talking is, ‘You’re not interested, you don’t care and you’re probably thinking about something else.’ That’s often what causes the troubles between couples; women don’t get enough visible indications from their men and assume they’re not listening (and before you say it – maybe they’re not).

And while we’re on the subject of the differences in the sexes, be aware that men tend to use direct speech and women indirect.

Let me give you an example of what I mean. Imagine that a couple are driving home from work and she says to him, ‘Would you like to stop for a drink?’ He interprets this as a direct question and answers, ‘No thank you.’ They arrive home and he now finds her in a grumpy mood. ‘What’s wrong?’ he asks. ‘I wanted to stop for a drink on the way home’ she says. ‘So why didn’t you say so?’ says he. ‘I did’, she says – and so it goes on.

Her question – ‘Do you want to go for a drink?’ – was her indirect way of saying that she wanted to go for a drink. He interprets it as a direct question and responds accordingly. So if you’re listening to someone from the opposite sex, be aware and actively listen.

As well as all the active listening and the open positive body language, make sure you say the occasional.

• ‘I see’
• ‘Really!’
• ‘Uh-huh’
• ‘That’s great!’
• ‘Wow’
• ‘I understand’
• ‘That’s a good point’
• ‘I see that you feel strongly about that’.

You’ve got to work at it to be successful.

2. Keep an open mind

The trap that many people fall into is to allow their own beliefs and perceptions to interfere with what they’re hearing.

I often run a listening skills quiz in my seminars and one of the first questions I ask is, ‘How many animals of each species did Moses take onto the ark?’ I then move on quickly to the next question. Most people believe that I’m asking some kind of trick question. However, they answer question number one with two animals. Of course it was Noah who took the animals onto the ark but that’s not what I said. Most people hear part of the story and make a quick decision. It would be difficult for most people to pick up this answer right away but it illustrates the importance of really listening.

During an ice-breaker introduction exercise on one of my recent training workshops, I teamed up with one of the participants. I told him about my background, gave him details of my career to date and my personal circumstances. I explained to him that, although I had lived most of my life in Scotland, there was a spell of six years when I lived in England. He asked me if I liked living in England and I told him that I did – very much! He seemed slightly surprised at this and asked me again if I really liked living ‘south of the border’. I again confirmed this to him and went on to relate how I eventually returned to Scotland to further my career.

This ice-breaker exercise required each of us to tell the others about the person sitting next to us. When my partner started talking about me, he explained fairly clearly about my background. When it came to the episode in my life when I lived in England he said, ‘Alan lived in England for six years. However, he didn’t like living there and eventually returned to Scotland and found another job.’ I was totally taken aback by this statement as it was the total opposite of what I’d said to him.

When we had a moment at the coffee break, I discussed this with him, trying not to cause embarrassment but still wanting to point out his total misrepresentation of what I’d said. After much discussion, we established that what he’d said, he believed to be true. He was sure that I’d said exactly the opposite of what I did say. The only explanation that he could come up with was that he wouldn’t like to live in England and couldn’t understand why I would like it.

He had heard what I’d told him but his powerful subconscious mind had said, ‘No; that’s not what Alan means. I know better. He didn’t like being in England and that’s why he came back to Scotland.’

It can be very difficult to keep an open mind and really listen to what’s being said to us. We all have ‘filters’ in our subconscious through which all incoming information travels and is adjusted to suit our understanding.

Have you ever told a friend something only for them to totally disbelieve you? You tell them that you’re going to a pop concert and they say, ‘You couldn’t possibly like that kind of music!’ Or you tell them that you’re going to Outer Mongolia on vacation and they say, ‘Why on earth would anyone want to go there?’

We’re all different in how we view the world; so if someone is telling you something, listen hard and accept what they’re saying.

3. Make notes

In a social situation it would look a bit strange noting down what people say. However, in a business situation taking notes is very important. It obviously means that you have a record of what’s being said. It also tells the person who’s speaking that you regard what they say to be important.

Learn the trick of looking at the speaker and writing notes at the same time. It helps if you only write bullet points which are meaningful for you later.

A friend of mine called in a carpenter to estimate for some refitting work in her house. He walked round with her, made all the right noises, measured things but didn’t write anything down. He either had a fantastic memory or he just wasn’t interested in the work. It turned out that he did have a good memory; however, my friend didn’t give him the job. She felt that he just didn’t care enough about her house or his work.

4. Keep eye contact

I’ve already admitted to not being a great listener. I’m easily distracted by things that go on around me, which is a bit of a challenge when someone is speaking to me. In a business or social situation, I find my eyes wandering, particularly when the person speaking is less than interesting. It is rude, it doesn’t help you make a positive impression on the other person and it certainly won’t help you become a Motivational Manager.

You need to look at people when they’re speaking. Don’t stare and make them uncomfortable but keep your eyes on their eyes, only looking away briefly and occasionally.

5. Ask questions

This is another good listening technique. Occasionally, and politely, interrupt the person speaking to clarify something they’ve just said. They won’t normally object and it helps check your level of understanding. It also tells the other person that you’re deeply interested in what they’re saying. This is sometimes called ‘paraphrasing’, as you’re taking ‘chunks’ of what’s been said and repeating it back. You are summarising facts and figures.

Asking questions is also an excellent way of taking control when the other person is starting to ramble and talk too much.

6. Listen to tone

We are all fairly good at picking up on a person’s tone of voice and most of us realise that the tone will ultimately decide the meaning of the words.

Picture this scenario: You return home one evening and ask the person you share your life with, ‘Have you had a good day?’ ‘Yesssss,’ they reply grumpily. So you then say, ‘Has something upset you?’ ‘Noooo,’ they say, again grumpily.

We all know that in this situation, ‘Yes’ means ‘No’ and ‘No’ means ‘Yes’. The person we’re speaking to may want to cover up the fact that they’ve had a bad day or they don’t want to talk about it or perhaps you’ve done something wrong and they don’t want to tell you.

The point is, you will believe their tone of voice before you believe the words they’ve used. More often the tone can be very subtle, so you need to listen closely to pick up on a meaning.

Many people don’t pick up on what people really mean and often give an inappropriate response. The Motivational Manager develops this skill and works hard to ensure an understanding of what people really are saying.

7. Watch body language

Do you think your ears are the main instruments of listening? Wrong! It’s your eyes. Observing body language tells you so much about how a person is feeling and often what they really mean.

If you ask one of your team how they are and they reply, ‘Fine thank you’, it’s going to be a bit hard to believe if their face looks miserable and their body language is slumped in a dejected manner.

Body language will usually confirm or contradict what is being said.

A business colleague of mine recently attended a seminar where the speaker spoke of his success and about everything he had achieved. My friend was, to a certain extent, impressed by what the speaker was saying. However, he couldn’t understand why he was wearing such poor shoes. The speaker’s shoes looked cheap, were a bit down at heel and could have done with a polish. If this speaker was so successful, then why couldn’t he afford a decent pair of shoes?

Maybe the speaker was as successful as he said he was. However, he was sending out a mixed message. People tend to believe what they see rather than what they hear.

If you are to become a Power Listener, take into account what you see in the other person but don’t fall into any traps. Body language does send out many messages. However, we need to become skilled in understanding what these messages really mean. It’s such an important area of human communication and we’re going to look at it again later in the book.

8. Practise

Commit to practising your listening skills every day. Whenever you come into contact with someone, be it in business or socially, really listen to that person. It’s like any other skill, the more you practise the better you’ll become. (And just think how much you will learn.)

So here are the key points for Power Listening:

• Listen logically – stay emotionally detached and listen for facts, ideas and details.
• Stimulate the speaker – nod your head, lean forward and concentrate totally.
• Make notes – get all the details down.
• Shut out distractions – change your environment or shut out all distractions in your mind.
• Listen between the lines for hidden meanings – listen to the emotional meaning of the speaker, use your intuition and trust your gut feeling.
• Observe non-verbal clues – listen for what people are not saying.
• Listen for what people would like to say – but have difficulty putting into words.
• Don’t pre-judge – keep an open mind.
• Don’t interrupt or jump in with an answer or solution.

THE SECRET LANGUAGE

The Motivational Manager needs to be a Power Listener. However, it’s also important to be aware that the people who are listening to you may not be doing it particularly well. So if you want to get your message across then it’s important to take into account all the points above, particularly 6 and 7.

In 6 and 7 the point was made that tone of voice and ‘listening’ to body language are vitally important. The words we use, although essential, can be contradicted by our tone and our body language.

Many people are now familiar with the results of research conducted by Dr Albert Mehrabian. This tell us that the impact of a message is dependent 7 per cent on the words we use, 38 per cent on tone of voice and a whopping 55 per cent on body language.

I’ve read articles that take issue with these figures, suggesting that words are more important and have greater impact than Dr Mehrabian suggests.

I wouldn’t be prepared to put any figures on these three aspects of communication. However, I am totally convinced that how you look and how you sound are far more important than what you say.

Recently I conducted a one-to-one training session in selling skills for a director of a small computer software company. A video camera was used to record this director’s sales pitch to a potential customer, a role played by me. When I replayed this recording, my director client was horrified to watch his presentation. In his pitch he used words such as, ‘Young exciting company – staff with lots of enthusiasm for their product – lots of energy and passion for what they are doing.’ The only thing was that he, the person in the video, had about as much excitement, enthusiasm, energy and passion as a plate of cold porridge.

He was saying the words but they just weren’t convincing. He was dull, monotone and boring, and he knew it. The good thing was that once he’d realised it, he could do something about it.

On occasion people say to me, ‘I am as I am, I’m a quieter sort of person. I can’t leap up and down and get excited about something even though I feel it inside.’

My answer to these people is, ‘Don’t change your personality but do make a slight change to your behaviour. Turn up the energy a little bit, put a bit more power in the enthusiasm, and warm up the passion just a tad more.’

If you were to ask these same people about their football team, their children or their hobby, just watch them get fired up or at least get a little bit warmer.

One quiet unassuming chap held me spellbound one day telling me about his hobby of beekeeping. It wasn’t so much what he was saying but how he was describing it. His eyes were shining, he was speaking quickly and he was using his hands to describe this subject which he had now made very interesting.

So if you want to get your message across to your team members, show more of how you feel. Other people will respond more to your feelings than to what you actually say.

More secret language

The point has now been well made that it’s not what we say that influences other people but more how we say it. Non-verbal communication is so powerful and we can use it much more to our advantage; this doesn’t mean in a manipulative way but more in a way that builds rapport with your team members.

People ‘buy’ people first and they tend to buy people who are very much like themselves. Now, you can’t become exactly like any member of your team. However, you can make slight adjustments to your behaviour that will build rapport and improve communication.

Let’s say that you have a fairly strong voice or you speak fairly quickly. If you’re communicating with someone in the team who has a soft voice or another team member who speaks slowly, then they may feel you’re a rather different person from them and they may even feel intimidated. The obvious answer is either to talk with a soft voice or speak more slowly.

This technique is known as ‘mirroring’ and it basically means behaving as closely as you can to the other person. Speak at the same level they do, speak at the same speed and with the same tone. This doesn’t mean mimicking the other person – this would quickly switch them right off you. It’s about subtly becoming more like the other person.

You can also learn to mirror words and phrases, posture, eye contact, facial expression and hand gestures. Some people say they feel uncomfortable doing this; however, they often mirror people unconsciously. Just watch someone talking to a small child or a baby. They crouch down to the child’s level, they put a soft smile on their face and they talk in a childlike way. If we can do it with children, then we can do it with adults, particularly if you want them to accept you and what you say.

Many people believe that to be a Motivational Manager you need to be a good speaker: in fact, you need to be a great listener!