Listening For Hard Listeners

Now and then, someone will compliment me for “being a good listener.” If they only knew!

I find it ironic that I ended up in a profession that requires good listening skills, when this behavior does not come naturally to me. Listening is something I have struggled with all my life, and continue to work on to this day. 

My wife Bianca would probably agree!    

A senior leader from one of my client firms recently chose “listening” as a leadership skill he wants to enhance as part of our executive coaching work, so I’m writing this article to capture the lessons I have learned combating my weakness in this area in preparation for our next 1-on-1 discussion.   

First, some background. Listening to someone talk for long periods feels like having energy drained from my body. My eyes glaze over, and I zone out.

It’s been this way for as long as I can remember. I loathed the classroom back when I was a student. I often fell asleep at the back of the class listening to lectures. More than once, I was jolted awake by a whiteboard duster hurled in my direction by a frustrated teacher. (BTW, teachers were very different back then. We used to get dragged out to the hallway and have our backsides caned as well. I always aced the exams, but I did this by studying the textbooks on my own time, not listening to a boring teacher droning on.)  

Fast forward to the present day. I don’t like going to lectures or conferences. I avoid watching webinars live. I’ll wait for the recording and watch it at 2x speed, or even better, just read the written transcript. I watch YouTube at 2x speed with subtitles enabled. If I’m listening to podcasts and audiobooks, it’s at 2x speed (minimum) as an accompaniment to some other activity I’m engaged in, like driving a car or doing some cardio exercise.   

I attended a 1-week residential Company Directors’ training course with the NZ Institute of Directors to earn a certification in boardroom governance skills. Sitting through 5 days of governance presentations was a hideous torture (especially since I already studied the 300-page “4 Pillars of Governance Best Practice” course textbook before attending). No amount of caffeine seemed to help. Many times, I fantasized about having a magic remote control so I could listen to people at 2x speed to get it over with.   

In summary. Listening to people talk is a tough slog for me. To compensate, I tend to avoid it altogether, or use technology to accelerate the pace of incoming information. 

So, how did I end up building a business where listening is a core skill requirement? 

I fell into business coaching by accident, but soon realized a mindset shift was required if I wanted to succeed in this profession. I needed to learn how to be a better listener. The secret I found lies in one word. “Curiosity.”  

Adopting a curious mindset helps me approach conversations (or group facilitations) as a problem to be solved, or a puzzle to be unlocked. Curiosity helps me to engage more of my senses, to be more present, and pay closer attention to what is being said (and often more importantly, what is not being said). 

Curiosity forces me to ask better questions vs. simply give my opinions. Even if I have a solution that might bring the conversation to a rapid conclusion, I do my best to resist that temptation. I try to swallow “the advice monster” coming out of my mouth (succeeding most of the time) and lean on my trusty friend, the GROW coaching framework. Wherever possible, I use the GROW sequence of questions to encourage the other person (or group) to exercise their critical thinking skills and generate their own options, before sharing my ideas.  

My client told me that he tends to dominate team meetings by sharing his opinions upfront and persuading people to his point of view. Unfortunately, this approach has led to his direct reports becoming passive and conformist. Dominant leaders who speak first and share their opinions upfront can shut the conversation down and stifle the growth and creativity of their team.

The client wants to change his approach and encourage his team to contribute more strongly so that he does not become a bottleneck to velocity and growth.  Like me, he wants to be a better listener.

My recommendation is that it’s usually better to set the scene (provide context), ask good questions, listen to what people have to say, and coach people to make well-reasoned decisions (or recommendations) vs. trying to be the chief problem solver.     

On occasions where I’m asked to table my opinion first, I like to open my idea up for criticism, and make it safe for others to disagree with me, and engage their critical thinking skills. 

I might frame it like this: “Well, I could be wrong, but here’s one option to consider. What are the tradeoffs you see with this approach? What other options can you think of?  

The goal is to get all options on the table, encourage critical thinking and robust debate, and coach others to make well-reasoned decisions (or recommendations).  That’s how you unlock the creativity of your team, grow their decision-making muscles, and gain leverage as a leader.

I like the mindset espoused by the CEO of Microsoft, Satya Nadella. He wants the Microsoft culture to be a “learn-it-all” mindset, instead of a “know-it-all” mindset.

Achieving this requires leaders to be “curious listeners.”

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Until next time…
Stephen