Conversations of Discovery

Most leaders listen first to answer questions and solve problems. Improve your active listening skills to create:

• Positive culture
• Better communication and trust
• Improved performance through better transparency and coaching

Today's newsletter uses the Chinese character for 'listen' to show how to get these results.

The Chinese character Ting beautifully illustrates the skills needed for active listening. The character combines symbols suggesting listening is with ears, eyes, and heart as if the speaker were a king:

1. Ear: Hear the topic and words and hear the voice pitch and emotion being shared.
2. Ten Eyes: Pay attention to the speaker's body language and other non-verbal clues to understand their message more fully. The character shows Ten Eyes to symbolize maximum focus and how words are only part of the message.
3. One Heart: Active listening is often called empathetic listening. Empathy ensures understanding the from the speakers point of view. The character shows the outcome of a meaningful conversation is to have “One Heart” by the end.
4. King: If you imagine the speaker is royalty, you will give them you full attention, show respect and support, not make judgements, and take what they are saying seriously.

I am a little surprised the character no longer has two mouths in it as depicted in early predecessor cave drawings. Because, active listening requires you to ensure understanding by:

• Reflecting in you own words to help the speaker hear how the message sounds.
• Reflecting emotions to verify impact.
• Summarizing the main points of what you heard.
• Asking questions to deepen understanding.

Use open ended clarifying questions to show the speaker you have not made judgement and want to learn more. Questions should probe for deeper understanding and clarification. They should not be answerable with a "yes" or "no." I especially like:

• Say more?
• How is this impacting you - at work? - personally?
• What does it look like in 5-10 years if nothing changes?
• What is the belief underlying all of this; I must ___ to be a success?
• What would you do if you could not fail?

Perhaps the mouth omission indicates that the speaker should find solutions on their their own, not from the listener. Good empathetic listening should help the speaker find better solutions to issues themselves.

• Ensure understanding as described above before considering any advice
• Ask the speaker how they might approach a solution.
• Be reluctant to give your own advice, ask permission before doing so, and let choice to accept advice be the speakers.
• Sometimes active listening is enough.

Approaching conversations with all the active listening components of Ting makes them more useful to all. Think about adding Ting before moving to a solution as a leader.

How can active listening enhance your leadership and the results you see?

Adventure humbly.