Archive for the ‘Listening and Relationships’ Category
Executive Presence and Listening Skills
A new client told me listening has always been a challenge for him because “There’s more firing in my head than my ears can handle.” I loved the expression, even though it was a lame excuse. He had some deeply entrenched habits that contributed to his reputation as a “lousy listener.”
At his suggestion I shadowed him for two days to understand how he interacted with people, and he took Hear! Hear? Your Listening Portfolio® to learn how he listened. As I watched him in meetings (group and 1-to-1), I didn’t actually know what he heard, but he presented himself as non-involved. He sat expressionless, pushed back from the table, asked only pointed questions, offered no ideas or feedback, interrupted with non-sequiturs, and sneaked looks at his iPhone.
Afterwards, I shared my observations and asked about the impact of those behaviors on others. He’s smart and quickly grasped that his actions were creating the opposite effect of what he wanted to project. What he wanted to project we named, Executive Presence (EP), and what he sometimes projected we named Executive Absence (EA). They became our standards and measures, as well as a language that quickly cut to the chase: e.g. “Was that an EP or EA?”
We crafted the critical few Executive Presence attributes as a guide to model. They are:
- Genuine: Sometimes called “walk-the-talk” it is the intention to live in truthfulness and not pretend or cover up.
- Clear: It is following the KISS principle to make all communication understandable—no jargon, code or spin.
- Present: Inquire, listen, process, use body language, facial expressions and tone-of-voice to demonstrate complete attention.
- Confidence and courage: Willing to take innovation risks that others are excited to join.
- Optimism and passion—not necessarily wildly outgoing, but deeply committed.
- Likes colleagues. Sees people in a positive light and treats everyone with respect.
- Laughs at own mistakes and willing to be vulnerable—no blame and shame.
He made a scorecard with the seven attributes and rated himself after various interactions. My job was to help him build skills in the weak areas and solidify the strengths. He was optimistic and passionate (5), confident and courageous (4), and laughed easily at himself (7). We unpacked what he did to make sure he consciously replicated those behaviors rather than relying on his subconscious to perform them well.
For the more challenging attributes, I showed him techniques and tools that aligned his Executive Presence to what he modeled. For example, he stopped taking his iPhone into meetings, pulled up to the table, asked probing questions that required preparation on his part and thought on the part of the responder, and made facial expressions that matched his internal processing.
We’re still working together and he’s making fabulous progress. He and I are even talking about conducting an Executive Presence workshop that would include his scorecard.
Do you have a list of Executive Presence attributes that you’d add?
The Classic Trap of Experience—Listening Case
Jonathan, the senior VP of Sales, and Francesca, the senior VP of Marketing, have had a contentious relationship for the year Jonathan has been in his job. At first their peers thought it was a matter of getting clear about roles, responsibilities and territory, and that it would smooth over, especially since working with Francesca was never a problem.
Yesterday at an Executive Committee meeting, Francesca presented three ideas for a new marketing campaign and asked the EC for feedback. Jonathan swiveled in his chair and said, “There’s nothing new here. We did almost the exact same things at my last company without success. Why didn’t you come to me beforehand? I could have saved you a lot of time and effort.”
Everyone in the room was stunned. The CEO pulled himself together and said, “Jonathan, let’s hear Francesca out, then we can discuss the ideas. Your response seems hasty.”
Unfortunately, interactions like those happen much too often in the workplace. Of course, there’s more than one explanation for what happened, but a big one is that Experience gets in the way of Listening. Because Jonathan sees himself as an expert, he reverts to what he knows and closes off new information that doesn’t match with anything in his past that has brought success.
Some considerations:
- New information is perceived to be a threat to what has been tried and made true
- Prior experience has been repeated enough to be trusted
- It takes time and effort to assimilate new information
- Success speaks for itself; there’s no need to start again from the beginning
- Reputation is built upon replicating winners
What advice do you have for the people in this case?
Priming Our Listening Skills
At the Conference on World Affairs (an excellent meeting of the minds conducted annually at CU-Boulder), Drew Westen, a member of the panel, “The Human Brain, Not Perfect, but Good Enough,” explained the Heightened State of Latent Activation principle. Let’s look beyond the academic words to assess what the term means to us when we listen.
Dr. Westen performed the following experiment with the audience:
- He repeated four words: two of which were “ocean” and “moon.”
- Next he asked: “What laundry detergent comes to mind?”
- Those of us who thought of “Tide” raised our hands.
- Drew estimated about 80% of the audience, the typical percentage, raised our hands.
Dr. Westen explained that our results were predictable and replicable wherever Tide is sold, not because it is the most famous brand in the world, but because he primed us with the words “ocean” and “moon” without our being aware of his ploy. He primed us with words that relate to tides, which put our brains into search mode for familiar connections.
Our brains gravitate to prior experiences: e.g. we leap to conclusions when the words we hear are similar to ones we’ve heard before. That’s part of why we don’t listen fully; we gravitate to existing networks to select what we listen to.
More research on this subject was reported in the March 24, 2012 issue of Science News in an article by Laura Sanders, “Brain cells know how you will bet.” She says, “…nerve cells deep in the brain know what to do. And these cells know the plan seconds before the person actually decides on a course of action.” Thus, those neural networks are functioning well in advance of our conscious decision-making.
So what do these studies show us about listening?
- There’s a constant battle between our conscious attention and the brain’s control function—we don’t know 80% of what’s going on in our brain, so we better take advantage of the 20%
- Listening requires focus and intention for the information to be of any value
- We use intuitive theories about what we’ve heard and make up answers for what we don’t know—that can be dangerous if we don’t listen well to what is being presented to us
- Since our brains tend to be ahead of our conscious selves, staying present is our best chance for alignment between sender and receiver—or as someone else on the panel said, “Our unconscious processes can’t think and do at the same time.”
Listen with all the openness you have. When you come from a place of knowing, it messes you up to think about it and blocks most of what the sender has to offer.
Part 2 of Notes from the International Listening Association Convention
Dr. Doyle Srader, Northwest Christian University, Eugene, Oregon
Performance Listening
Question: How is the act of listening sufficient to fulfill the duties of the listener and/or create relationship?
Some findings:
- There are three categories of performance listening:
- Listening toward relationship—calls relationship into being and establishes ties
- Listening toward leadership—enters without an agenda and allows interaction to establish meaning and directions
- Listening toward fairness—hear someone out much like in the judicial system where there is a hearing
- Measure of success is when followers are satisfied that the interaction has been effective and appropriate
- Communication is transactional and a co-created encounter
- Goal—use all three to be a credible listener so other person would say s/he’s been heard
Christopher Gearhart, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA
Sensory-processing Sensitivity
Question: Is the Highly Sensitive Person a Highly Sensitive Listener?
Some findings:
- No, highly sensitive people are easily distracted by stimuli and may not focus well as a listener
- fMRI shows more processing activity and less accuracy for a highly sensitive person
- fMRI shows longer and deeper processing activity for a less sensitive person
Sheila Bentley, Bentley Consulting; Graham Bodie, LSU; Jennifer Grau, Grau Interpersonal Communication
A Time I Felt Listened To
Question: Which techniques make a person felt listened to?
Some findings:
- People describe attributes first and behaviors second
- Sometimes the researcher had to ask, “What caused you to list that attribute to get the person to describe what the person did?
- Women square off more in an interaction while men take an open positioning
- 80% of all malpractice suits are caused by patient feeling “brushed off”
- An initial reaction determines degree of satisfaction/dissatisfaction with the entire interaction, even if the first person encountered is not the main interaction (e.g. person at the front desk makes a good/bad impression, and that colors every subsequent interaction, regardless of how others treat the person)
- Back-channel responses, those that are unconscious such as nodding or uttering “uh-huh” signal understanding
- The key attributes included in a Physician Listening Study:
- It is assumed the physician brings these attributes to the table:
Confidence, Empathetic, Humane, Personal, Forthright, Respectful, Thorough
Most important verbal behaviors: Answers questions, elaborates on topics being discussed instead of answering with short statements, asks questions, does not interrupt or change the subject
Non-verbal behaviors: Maintains appropriate eye contact, focuses body language and position, engages in appropriate composure, smiles/laughs
Random notes:
- Good listening gives you currency
- There are four stages of counseling/therapy
- engagement
- assessment in context
- insight
- action
- Babies borrow their sound from parents—that’s why many children have similar voices and speech patterns as their parents
- Listening is enhanced when the listener asks: Who/what am I as a listener in this situation?
- Anticipation of where the speaker is going next derails communication
- Metaphor: Listening is a cup. If it’s full with our own stuff, there’s no room for another’s.
There was a lot of validation of our work in Listening Impact, especially for Hear! Hear? Your Listening Portfolio ®
Active Listening might be a passé term: What would you nominate in its place?
Notes from the International Listening Association (ILA) Convention, March 22-24, 2012, Bremerton, WA
I’ve just returned from the ILA Convention in Bremerton, WA where I had the opportunity to learn about some fascinating research that expanded my knowledge of listening, and hopefully it will do the same for you. This post is part one of two of some of the take-aways from that conference.
It was quite an extended process to get to the convention—plane to Seattle, shuttle to the ferry terminal, hour ferry ride to Bremerton, and short walk to the convention center and hotel. Nevertheless, I’m very glad I attended because I heard some terrific presentations given by smart, smart people.
Graham Bodie and grad students from Louisiana State University
Supportive Listening
Question: What are the similarities and differences between a supportive person and a supportive listener?
Some findings:
- Supportive person is described in general, impressionistic terms such as: positive, intelligent
- Supportive listener described in specific, behavioral characteristics: involved in interaction, responds verbally
- Influencers on the relationship are
- non-verbal \immediacy (e.g. body language)
- verbal-immediacy (e.g. questions)
- Answer to question: How important is it to you that your relational partner is a good listener or good comforter, depends upon the importance you put upon it. Our level of satisfactions depends upon what we’re looking for in our relational partner to demonstrate.
Language Style Matching
Question: Does Language Style Matching (LSM) influence a relationship?
Some findings:
- Mimicry is automatic and mostly unconscious
- LSM is often used when people like one another
- LSM, use of emotional words, or cognitive (cause and effect) words didn’t make people feel better or worse. Or, nothing in particular made much of a difference
- But, negative emotional words and tentative words made people feel worse
- Major finding: We have expectations of listening behaviors, but they don’t matter much until they are NOT used. Then you’ll be considered a bad listener; however using them all won’t necessarily translate into your being considered a good listener.
Laura Janusik, Rockhurst Univeristy, Kansas City & Margarete Imhof, Gutenberg University, Mainz, Germany
Listening Construct Across Cultures
Question: What similarities and difference do three cultures exhibit in terms of conceptualizing listening? (Japanese, European, US American)
Some findings:
- Culture is communication and communication is culture
- Subjective listening concepts determine how/why one listens
- How one perceives listening could affect how one does listening
- Subjective concepts are culturally dependent
Metacognition
Question: Will we listen better if we think about it?
Some findings:
- There are three stages to metacognitive listening:
- Before: plan and set goals
- During: comprehend, aware of what’s happening in the moment
- After: reflect
- Bringing listening to consciousness increases likelihood of a positive interaction
Directed Learning
Question: What are some strategies that will enhance listening in the classroom/training room?
Strategies:
- All about connections
a. What do I already know about topic
b. What should I know that I don’t
c. Learning facilitator stops every 10-15 minutes to tell them to make connections between a and b
2. Voice Mirroring
a. Facilitator reads a script while the audience mirrors her words out loud
b. Initially, the facilitator faces the audience, then turns her back
c. Facilitator faces audience again but this time the audience silently mirrors the words inside their heads, and finally they close their eyes and mirror in silence
d. Technique brings yourself back on track to focus entirely on what the speaker is saying
3. Stop, Look, Summarize
a. Draw a line at the bottom of your page of notes
b. Periodically, put the information into your own words
c. Technique translates and summaries ideas into an understandable format
4. Big Picture, Little Picture
a. Look at details and tie them to the big picture
b. Look at big picture and tie them to details
c. Technique relates two extremes of thought process to one another
5. Think, Pair, Share
a. Write words/terms you don’t understand
b. Pair up to figure out meaning
c. Share with others who may/may not have figured out definitions
d. Technique uses group knowledge and reduces anxiety about not knowing what a word/term means. It’s particularly good for non-native speakers as well as for people from different functions/disciplines
6. Multi-Tasking is a Myth*
a. Can’t do two tasks even when tasks tap into same part of brain
b. Can’t do two switch tasks using different parts of brain
*If you don’t subscribe to this blog and you’d like a copy of the short exercise that demonstrates this strategy, sign up for the blog and we’ll gladly send it.
Some Listening Tips from IBM’s Sam Palmisano
Following is part of an interview that I thought you’d find interesting because it’s a slightly different twist on listening. Look for my comments at the end of the interview.
IBM’s Sam Palmisano: ‘Always Put the Enterprise Ahead of the Individual’
Published: January 18, 2012 in Knowledge@Wharton
Interview with Michael Useem, Management Professor
Useem: Let’s dwell on that for a second, around the issue of mentoring and coaching. I know that an axial principle of your leadership here is to provide lots of coaching and lots of mentoring. Looking back on your own career prior to 2002, who would you single out as the most important mentor you had along the way?
Palmisano: Well, it’s interesting, because so many people helped me. The key … is you have to be a good mentee. Because you have to listen. And what happens as you become successful is you forget the ingredient of being a good mentee, which is listening to the people who are mentoring you. But I’ve had obviously lots of previous managers, previous CEOs John Akers, Lou Gerstner, other guys on the outside who are always willing to help. If you ask and listen, people are always willing to help you.
I find that people aren’t always willing to listen…. You have to be able to want to be mentored. It starts with that. I see it so often. That is the key. But you have lots of role models along the way. People who were always a good role model for me [were those who] never put themselves first. They always put their institution or society or their enterprise first. And usually they get better results. If you say, “Well, why does it work?” [It's] because you get people more excited because they can contribute versus an individual trying to take all the bows for the team. And so you could say I’m comfortable in that style. But if you put that aside for a second, I actually think it’s a more successful product at the end of the day.
My comments:
I chose this piece because it was a different take on listening. Mr. Palmisano talks about the need to be a willing listener, to be the receiver. Think about the number of times you’ve walked by an interaction between two people and noticed equality between speaking and listening.
People with different listening habits will search for information that suits their styles, so even the best mentee will select what has the most value for her. Regardless, the point here is to remember to accept help when it’s offered and be grateful.
A Listening Formula with a Twist
I certainly did not invent the following formula for attentive listening, and I don’t know where to give credit either. Regardless, it’s a very nice four-step process to remember:
Receive, Appreciate, Summarize, Ask
It works as a general rule of thumb. The twist though is when you throw listening habits into the mix. Each of the four habits will respond differently to a step in the process.
For example an Inner-personal listener will receive information if it has personal value and ignore other kinds of information, let’s say that which would be of interest to a Problem-solving listener. While the Inner-personal listener might be very well-intended, but unaware of his listening habits, he’d gloss over the facts and details that would appeal to a Problem-solving listener. Furthermore, he probably wouldn’t be aware that had occurred. The outcome: limited reception.
A listener must learn to Appreciate that there are different listening habits and preferences before she can accept the variety in styles. If we continue with two different listeners from above, the Problem-solving listener will appreciate it if the Inner-personal listener picks up on all the details in the interaction because that would mean they are on the same wave-length (or have synchronized mirror neurons). However, when that doesn’t happen, the outcome is antipathy rather than appreciation.
I’m sure you’re getting the drift: Listening is not formulaic; it is a highly individualized activity that requires awareness, knowledge, and intent. While it’s very good to have a process like Receive, Appreciate, Summarize, Ask in your head as you interact with others, you must also remember to tailor each step to the styles of others.
~ Become a Better Listener ~
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Balancing Speaking and Listening
My friend and colleague, Jessica Pena, sent me this management tip from Harvard Business Review, November 14, 2011 by Whitney Johnson:
Listening is a critical, often underutilized skill. But if listening is already your forte, you may need to do more talking. Speaking up is a good way to demonstrate your expertise and gain the confidence of those around you.
Many of us would be amazed that anyone might need to talk more since there’s so little skilled listening that occurs in many a workplace. But then, I bet we can picture meetings in which the same person sits throughout the entire time without uttering a word.
Alas, there’s no indication the person is listening, all we can observe is that the person isn’t talking. So this tip is excellent in that situation. The lack of talking can be interpreted as disinterest, ignorance, fear, slowness, unwillingness, shyness, unconfident, or even being a misfit.
I coached one brilliant, funny and non-verbal Asian, who, when I asked about her reticence to speak in a group, responded, “I grew up being told the duck that sticks out its neck is supper.” That’s pretty darn hard to overcome. We worked for months on techniques to gradually help her to engage. In the process, I discovered that she wasn’t such a great listener either because she was so petrified someone would ask her a question that she neither spoke nor listened.
As she became more comfortable speaking up, her listening acumen also sharpened, and visa versa.
What’s important about this management tip is to balance listening with speaking and talking with hearing. Neither should overwhelm the other. They are integral parts and in service of one another, and both require practice to master.
~ Become a Better Listener ~
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Fusion or Integration in Jazz and Listening
Recently, at a family celebration, I spent time talking with Stanley Jordan, an amazing musician and spiritual man. I’ve known Stanley for a long time, but haven’t had a conversation with him in eons.
I was particularly anxious to talk to him about his new album, Friends. It’s lush, straight ahead jazz that includes some of the best musicians around today. Listen to it for yourself—it’s getting a much deserved following.
Stanley’s not much of a chatter-box, so I didn’t want to usurp his time or impose upon his attention, but he offered that he had studied with Ken Wilber, a Boulder-based modern philosopher. I asked why the interest.
In a very tiny and not well-understood nutshell, fusion indicates that separate entities are put together, or fused, until the original entities no longer exist. For example, jazz fusion isn’t a musical style, instead it’s a collection of various musical styles. In medicine, fused backs were once a series of disparate vertebrae, but when fused, become one strong mass.
Integration, on the other hand, also includes various entities, but they retain their integrity. On Wilber’s website it says, humanity lives with the awareness necessary to compassionately integrate the fragmented and partial perspectives of differing pursuits of the good life. I don’t have a medical analogy other than Siamese Twins who might share a body part, but they remain two different people.
Besides being fascinated by what Stanley was saying about his studies with Ken Wilber, and how they influenced his music, I wanted to know how they pertained to listening. So I briefly explained my work to Stanley and asked what he thought the relationship is.
I don’t remember his exact words, but he said a few insightful things that have stuck with me:
- Good listeners are probably integrators. They take in words or sounds, but they allow the words/sounds to hold their own meaning, rather than fusing them into a whole new, and maybe different, meaning. I interpreted that to say that a good listener hears what is said and doesn’t layer on personal assumptions that will change the intention or message. They might add to the information, but they won’t alter it.
- Musicians don’t need to use words to integrate their playing. They play and play together until their instruments blend. Their mirror neurons fire when they are in sync.
- Sometimes a musician is the lead, and sometimes the backup, but whatever the position, s/he’s always cognizant of what everyone else in the group is “saying” (playing) so there’s unified, not conflicting, statements.
How does fusion and integration show up for you?
To read an interview with Stanley, read Downbeat Magazine, February 2012. In it he expounds upon the difference between Fusion and Integration and Friends.
~ Become a Better Listener ~
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Maximum Utility for Minimal Cost
What do the art of bargaining and the popularity of sites such as Living Social and Groupon have in common? Getting the biggest bang for one’s buck. Something has to provide more value than the effort involved to secure it.
I might be stretching the point a bit for people who enjoy bargaining at a bazaar in a far off land. I’ve been told that those people enjoy the haggling process, the game, more than actually getting the possession. But, for most of us, we love the idea of greater returns on our investment, which defines Maximum Utility for Minimal Cost
So, how does Minimum/Maximum Utility apply to listening? Let me site a situation as an example:
Barbara, Rolph, Maria, and Sergei are in a meeting to decide on whether to expand their line of goods by purchasing items or making their own—the classic make/buy conundrum.
At the start of the meeting, Sergei says, “I have all the figures in front of me and there’s no question that we should buy the items.”
Barbara, almost levitating out of her seat counters with, “Figures aren’t the only thing that we need to make this decision. What about employee morale, brand identity, relationships with local businesses, word-of-mouth…”
Before she can get another thought out, Sergei comes back with more data and facts to support his argument. The two of them just debate while the other two sit in disgust and growing disinterest.
Finally, Maria asks, “You guys, we’re not getting anywhere, you’re wasting everyone’s time and we’re nowhere close to making this very important decision.”
Maria’s comments describe a situation with minimal utility and maximum cost: time, progress, decision-making, collaboration, relationships. Rolph brings them around with, “Obviously, you two have very strong opinions about how we should proceed. How about if we give each of us five minutes to talk, uninterrupted, about what we think is the real problem and propose a couple of ideas about how to address it?”
Everyone agrees and follows the process, which shifts the interaction towards maximum utility and minimum cost. Listening was the lynchpin that caused the shift. Utility soared when everyone paid attention to everyone else—the ping-pong negotiation match was replaced with open listening. Instead assuming their singular point-of-view was well reasoned and right, there was much more and better information on the table to inform their group decision.
The moral of this little case can be seen millions of times a day: listening is cost effective. Also, it takes less effort to listen the first time than it does to re-do mistakes.
When you are in a situation that might have some real ramifications, ask yourself,
How do I get maximum utility with minimum cost?
And to our bargain hunters you might ask yourself what you really want, the object, power, verbal sparring, or conveying respect.
To learn more about your listening style click here to take our short assessment.