Navigating Advice and Strategic Listening

Recently I had a conversation with someone who has been very helpful to me in the past, who in this case was calling me for some advice. We talked for a while, caught up, and had a great conversation. I think in the end we both offered each other some helpful advice.

?Any of us who are trying to accomplish a worthwhile objective are usually inundated with advice from all sides. The people who believe in us want us to succeed and they will often share what they think is the best way for us to go forward. While this is well intentioned, they don’t always have all the information or depth of knowledge that we have about our goal.

?What I came away after reflecting a while is that there is a difference between “listening to” advice and “taking” advice. Unless we’re in the middle of a crisis, it is almost always worth listening to someone who wants to help. If nothing else, we can get out of our own head and gain a different perspective. Where we need to step up as leaders is deciding how much of that advice to take after we have listened. It’s our responsibility to examine our goals and the rest of our strategy and then decide if it’s in our best interest to act on that advice.

?Ultimately, we choose the actions we take, but it never hurts to listen to advice even if we make a conscious decision not to follow it.

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