Active Listening - The Key to Enhancing Employee Motivation
How many people do you know who really know how to listen
? I mean they know how to shut up and let the other person talk. But, is that the same thing as really listening?
Are you ever in conversations when you are busting to speak?When you have this really important point that you want to make, so much so that you stop hearing what the other person is saying, you are so anxious to 'say your piece'.
Most people believe that listening is merely the result of being silent while the other party takes their turn to speak. When you listen to these kinds of conversations, it is like listening to the verbal equivalent of a tennis match. Each person stands on opposite sides of the conversational court and lobs the ball or their topic, across the net to the other person - who, in turn lobs their topic right back. There is no developmental thread in these kinds of exchanges. People merely wait their turn to speak.
From this, it is easy to understand that hearing and listening are not the same thing. Hearing is the act of perceiving sound. It is involuntary and simply refers to the reception of aural stimuli. Listening, however, is a selective activity which involves the reception and the interpretation of aural stimuli. Most significantly, it involves decoding the sound into meaning.
As a leader, for example, you may be wondering what essential leadership skills you need to have or acquire or demonstrate to improve your effectiveness and to build morale amongst your employees. Listening is a key skill. When you are seen to be a 'good' listener you build trust and convey openness to employees concerns and new ideas. Hence, listening is one of the most important practices for effective leadership.
Organisations are increasingly aware that managers with good listening skills can have a significant impact on the organisation's success and offer in-house as well as external training to bring their managerial cadre up to an acceptable standard.
Most of us can tell when people are really listening to us and it makes us feel very good. We feel special. We feel enclosed in a safe space. We begin to relax and we feel that the person who is really listening to us is special too and (this may surprise you) studies show, we feel that they must be intelligent!
Passive and Active Listening
Listening is divided into two main categories: passive and active. Passive listening is little more that hearing. It occurs when the receiver of the message has little motivation to listen carefully, such as when listening to music, story telling, television, or when being polite.
People normally speak at 100 to 175 words per minute (WPM), but they can listen intelligently at 600 to 800 WPM. Since only a part of our mind is paying attention, it is easy to go into mind drift - thinking about other things while listening to someone.
The cure for this, is active listening - which involves listening with a purpose. The purpose may be to gain information, obtain directions, understand others, solve problems, share interest, see how another person feels, show support, etc.
It requires that the listener attends to the words and the feelings of the sender for understanding. It takes the same amount or even greater amounts of energy than speaking - you have to concentrate, not on your own concerns, but totally on the other person.
Prof Nigel Nicholson of the London Business School, calls this focus on the other - 'decentering'. You step out of your own space and empathise with the other person's needs, feelings and situation.
This is easier to say than to do. It requires courage. And it requires you to acknowledge the other person at a deep level. Once you have truly 'heard' the other person, you are then able to offer feedback - which is probably less likely to offend, as the person is conscious that you are on their side and your motivation is to help them to grow and not to diminish them.
The following are a few traits of active listeners. They:
Spend more time listening than talking
Do not finish the sentences of others
Do not answer questions with questions
Are aware of their own biases.
Never daydreams or become preoccupied with their own thoughts when others talk
Let the other speakers talk. Do not dominate conversations
Plan responses after the others have finished speaking, NOT while they are speaking
Provide feedback, but do not interrupt incessantly
Analyse by looking at all the relevant factors and asking open-ended questions
Summarise what they think they have heard
Keep conversations on what others say, NOT on what interests them
Take brief notes. This forces concentration on what is being said.
There are at least three levels of listening and we engage in all of them at different times. It is important, however, to practice the ability to engage at the third level, if we are committed to signalling to our followers that we value them as individuals and value their issues and concerns as being important.
The 'Listening Levels' are:
Level One
This basic level includes:
- Listening on and off ie you maybe preoccupied with other personal concerns
- Tuning in and tuning out - you may get bored or easily distracted
- Being aware of the presence of others - but mainly paying attention to yourself.-, and again, your own concerns and preoccupations
- Half listening. Following the discussion only long enough to get a chance to talk.
- Quiet, passive listening
- Listening, but not responding. Little effort is made to listen; actually, hearing is going on but very little real listening is going on.
Often, a person at this level is making believe that he is paying more attention while really, he or she is thinking of other things. They are generally more interested in talking, than listening.
Level Two
At the second level, the individual hears sounds and words, but does not really listen deeply. At this level, people stay at the surface of communication and do not listen to the deeper meaning of what is being said.
They are trying to hear what the speaker is saying, but they are not making the effort to understand what the speaker means. They tend to be more concerned with content rather than feelings. They do not really participate in the conversation.
This level of listening can be dangerous because misunderstandings may occur since the listener is only slightly concentrating on what is said.
Level Three
This level includes active listening. At this level, people try to put themselves in the speakers place - they try to see things from the other person's point of view. Another term for this type of listening is 'empathic' listening.
Active listening requires that you listen not only for the content of what is being spoken but, more importantly, for what the meaning and feelings of the speaker are. You do this by showing that you are really listening both verbally and nonverbally.
Active Listening - The Key to Enhancing Employee Motivation
By: Geraldine Kilbride
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