What I Hear You Saying Is….

If you missed last week’s blog, here’s what you need to know—you’re a terrible listener. Despite the fact that most of us spend more time listening than talking, it turns out that the human brain is not good at listening.

There are several theories as to why. It might have to do with the fact that our brain thinks much faster than people speak (an average of 400 words per minute, versus 150 words per minute). Another model posits that the brain’s primary strategy is to be efficient so, much like we covered in our exploration of how we see the world, the brain takes information and then generates guesses about what people are trying to say, instead of prioritizing hearing what people actually do say.

A third theory is that our main concern in conversation is not physical survival, so much as social standing. Thousands of years ago we may have been listening to gain information about where the man-eating tiger was last seen, but now we just want to know that our psychological and social well-being are intact. We’re not listening to learn—we just want to hear that we’re right.

No matter the why, the fact is that most of us miss 60 to 80 percent of what others say. And studies on listening show just how problematic that can be. While researching, I uncovered a compilation of listening research findings that stretched back to work done in 1930. The findings tell us, over and over again, that listening matters. In schools, in hospitals, in sports, and in sales—listening skills impact everything from physical well-being to professional success.

My favorite finding is that, and I quote, “When listening to a dying person, the dying person should be the center of the listener’s attention.” Um, I don’t know who funded that study, but I don’t think we needed research to tell us that one. I really hope there wasn’t a control group.

IS LISTENING WORTH IT?

Even for the undying among us, there are all kinds of benefits associated with people feeling like they are being heard. In the workplace, high-quality listening results in less burnout. People who feel listened to within an organization are more committed to that organization. Research published in the Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior found that high-quality listening increases well-being, trust, job knowledge, work performance, and job satisfaction. Those benefits make it worthwhile for any organizational leader to improve their listening skills.

Such skills are especially important in sales. Research published in the International Journal of Listening (yes, it’s a thing) found that when a customer believes that an employee has been an effective listener, they are more likely to continue as future customers. Whether it’s a business development rep speaking with a prospect, an account executive handling service renewal, or a customer success representative solving a problem, high-quality listening is a critical skill.

Since listening leads to harder-working employees and a greater likelihood of returning customers, it should come as no surprise that a team’s ability to listen can have a significant impact on their company’s bottom line. That’s according to research at Loyola University in 2017. So, yes, listening is worth it.

ARE YOU LISTENING?

There are clear benefits to high-quality listening. But most of us (96 percent) already think we’re good listeners. Science says otherwise, so we’re clearly going to need more instruction than simply, “Listen more.”

In order to improve our listening, we need to make it more active, intentional, and effortful. If it sounds like it’s going to be hard, that’s because it is. Many of the ways we can improve listening go against what our human brain wants to do. Like anything else worth doing, it takes practice and commitment.

Here are several things you can do to listen better:

• Be curious. If you go into a conversation not thinking you’ll learn anything—you won’t. You’ll only be listening for the things you already knew (“I told you I wouldn’t learn anything.”) or you’ll get distracted. Listen to learn. Listen for the things you didn’t know.
• Stop with the personal anecdotes. It’s so hard. When someone tells you a story about their issue at work, you want to talk about your issue at work, but that’s not listening.
• Stop making assumptions. Our brains have evolved to fill in the gaps to work faster and more efficiently, but even if you think you know what someone is going to say or where the conversation is headed, stop yourself from jumping ahead. When you finish someone’s sentence for them, they don’t see it as you understanding them—they see it as an interruption.
• Ask questions. Make sure your questions are about what the speaker is talking about, not what you went in thinking you would ask.
• Get comfortable with silence. Allow silence to let the other person keep talking. Allow silence to give yourself a chance to gather your thoughts.
• Take notes. Taking notes not only helps you remember information, it also shows your prospect that you value what they’re saying enough to write it down.
• Remove distractions. This one is tough because we all have a lot of distractions. You might think you’re really good at glancing down at your phone without anyone noticing, but you also thought you were a good listener (and we all know how that turned out).

BUT DO THEY KNOW YOU’RE LISTENING?

What’s funny about listening is that, even if you become an excellent listener, it doesn’t matter if other people don’t see you that way. Many of the benefits of effective listening have to do with how the speaker feels from being listened to. You can’t just listen—you have to show you’re listening.

There are three different kinds of cues you can give people so that they perceive that you’re listening. The first are non-verbal cues. Are you nodding your head? Are you leaning forward and making eye contact? In other words, do you look like you’re listening? You should be mirroring the body language of the person with whom you’re speaking. If they look concerned, you should also look concerned. If they are smiling, you should be smiling, too. (Smiling! It’s not just for women anymore.)

The next category of ways to show you’re listening falls under paralinguistics. These are things that are voice-related, but not actual words. As someone speaks, are you saying “uh-huh” occasionally? Does your tone match their tone when you ask questions? Do you give an exasperated sigh when they share something that annoys them? These are all examples of paralinguistics, and they all signal to someone that they are being heard.

Body language and paralinguistic cues are important, but they can also be faked. We’ve all been on the phone with someone who drones on while we say “uh-huh” periodically, even though we aren’t really paying attention. What can’t be faked is the last category of proof that you’re listening—verbal behavior.

Paraphrasing what someone has said back to them is solid proof you’ve been listening. Asking follow-up questions that are specific to the conversation is further proof. As Harvard Business School researcher Hanne Collins put it, “The best listening is, counterintuitively, ‘spoken.’”

I’ll leave you with Carl Rogers’ and Richard Farson’s explanation of active listening from 1957, which is when they coined the term. They say the method “requires that we get inside the speaker, that we grasp, from his point of view, just what it is he is communicating with you. More than that, we must convey to the speaker that we are seeing things from his point of view.”

The speaker feeling heard is just as important as the speaker being heard. Even when nobody is on their deathbed.

Tell us what kind of coaching and training you’re looking for at mastery@maestrogroup.co. We’re listening!