“Of all the skills of leadership, listening is the most valuable – and one of the least understood.” –Peter Nulty
Everyone knows that listening is a core component of leadership. But have you ever tried to rate your listening skills? How do you think you would do? If you’re anything like me, the results might just surprise you!
Early in my leadership journey, I would have given myself a solid score. I was confident that listening was a skill I had mastered in my youth, growing up in a very loving but very opinionated family. My dad used to tell me, “Son, there are two sides of an argument – my side, and the wrong side.” As you can probably imagine, this fueled a passion in me to prove him wrong. Like a prosecutor shooting holes in the testimony of the star witness, I learned to listen carefully so I could relentlessly rebut the opposing view. I got so skilled at this technique that I started using it in all my relationships. I genuinely believed that listening was measured by how well I could remember the other person's words. By that standard, I was an exceptionally good listener.
Years later, I received some 360 leadership reviews that caught me off guard. Based on those scores, people didn’t think I listened to them very well. I wasn’t convinced. Even while multitasking, I could still repeat back exactly what was said, word for word. I thought perhaps I listened too well, and people were just disgruntled because I could always prove my point. It turns out, I had a lot to learn about listening.
The problem was that my definition of listening wasn’t big enough. Listening isn’t just the ability to regurgitate back the words being said. It’s deeper than that. The other person should feel heard, through both verbal and nonverbal communication. Because of this, I couldn’t determine if I was a good listener or not… only the person talking could.
Once I realized this, I decided to humble myself and ask others how to be a good listener. I asked people who would be brutally honest with me. The first thing they told me was to stop listening to rebut and start listening to understand. In the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, Stephen Covey describes Habit #5 as “Seeking to understand before being understood.” But this advice didn’t originate with Covey. Its time-tested wisdom passed through the ages. In fact, you can find similar phrases in the book of Proverbs.
If listening was all about other people feeling heard, I needed to change my approach. I learned to slow down, ask more probing questions, and repeat back what I heard the other person say. I found re-stating it as a question was helpful. I would ask, “I heard you saying _____; is that correct?” If they said yes, I could move forward. They were feeling heard.
The second thing they told me was they didn’t feel they had my full attention–I came across as distracted. For example, people would often stop by my office to discuss something. As they were talking, occasionally, a new email would pop up, and my eyes would briefly dart over to it. While I justified it as being efficient, they sensed I had stopped fully listening to them and was giving my attention to something else. They were correct.
Once I realized the impact of non-verbal cues, like eye contact, the solution was simple. I moved the guest chair so that my back was to the computer when I faced it. I could no longer see emails pop up in my peripheral view… consequently, I couldn’t be distracted.
Moving an office chair and taking the time to rephrase a conversation might seem like small changes. But before long, people started to notice. They told me I had significantly improved as a listener; they felt like I really took time to hear them. I noticed the positive difference too. I was hearing people at a deeper level. In my professional and personal life, I realized that being a student of what people are trying to communicate is more important than being a critic.
The journey to becoming a good listener is a lifelong one, and I have found GiANT’s Active Listening Audit to be a helpful tool that I will continue to use. On a scale of 1-5, the people closest to you (family, friends, coworkers, or teammates) can rate your listening skills based on these five questions:
How good am I at taking the time to truly understand?
How good am I at asking open-ending questions to draw out what others are really trying to say?
How good am I at summarizing what I think I’ve heard from someone, to check I’ve gotten it right?
How good am I at using body language to convey interest/attentiveness in conversation?
How good am I at resisting the temptation to jump in, assuming I know what the other person is talking about?
My challenge to each of us is to use this tool to put our listening skills to the test. Be courageous, ask for brutal honesty, and then listen to the feedback. We can all be better at listening, and we will all benefit from the investment.
“Listening without bias or distraction is the greatest value you can pay another person”