I’ve written frequently about listening. As a leader, working closely with other people means being responsive to the preferences of others, how they work, and what motivates them. Consistently, the best way to learn these things is to listen effectively – being guided to better understanding by letting people tell you directly.
This sounds simple, but the biggest barrier to listening is that we often do the wrong kind of listening. Too many of us think that good listening simply means not talking, so we skip the learning and understanding meant to come from the best kind of listening. We foolishly use listening as a way to think of what we’re going to say, distracting ourselves away from the ability to connect with what the other person is offering. So instead of listening being a pathway of allowing someone to be heard, it often comes across as fake or ineffective.
In order to be a better listener, it’s important to understand how easy it is to fall into less effective forms of listening and what each form of listening sounds like. Through better understanding, we give ourselves the best chance to use listening effectively.
Listening to fix
The plague of the beleaguered sitcom husband, listening to fix is the easiest to identify. This type of listening surfaces when the speaker expresses a problem or tough situation and are met with the often reflexive response from the listener of: “I know the answer here!” This form of listening is common for habitual rescuers. Since we have a sincere desire to help and offer advice, simply “listening” doesn’t feel like enough for us, we have a bias towards acting, towards doing something about the problem.
Unfortunately for us, not every problem is one that needs to be fixed. Like a good friend who shows up at your doorstep unannounced, if you’ve invited yourself to solve a situation when you haven’t been asked, you’re not likely to be welcome.
Things we say when we’re listening to fix:
- “Have you tried…”
- “If I was in your shoes I would…”
- “My advice would be…”
Listening to fix makes sense when someone explicitly asks for your help. “Hey, I’m having a hard time with something, I’d love your help/advice”. If you’re unsure, you can float a simple “I appreciate you sharing that with me, let me know if you get to a point where you want my input or advice.” Be sure you’ve been invited in before you treat the other person’s contributions as a problem to be fixed.
Listening to win
Anytime you challenge the perspective of the speaker (intentionally or unintentionally) you’re listening to win. Anyone who’s ever met a one-upper or someone who likes to debate facts and details has experienced this. It’s incredibly frustrating when someone skips over the substance of what you’re saying to instead focus on minute details.
Listening to win is the listening of arguments. We hear what’s being said and before the other person can finish talking, we’re already thinking of counterpoints and holes to poke in their logic. Listening to win is the listening of debaters, lawyers, and marital discord.
But, like listening to fix, this type of listening can also come from a place of good intentions. Overcoming this type of listening can be especially challenging for optimists. Optimists often find themselves telling loved ones to “look on the bright side” or trying to help them find the silver-lining. Unfortunately, even this well-intended contribution fails to meet the speaker where they are. Did they want you to try to cheer them up? Did they ask you to help them find the silver-lining?
Things we say when we’re listening to win:
- “Look on the bright side…”
- “It’s not as bad as you think…”
- “Think about it this way…”
Listening to win makes sense when someone is explicitly trying to exchange ideas with you. If the other person says that they’d like to have an open discussion or debate some ideas, then you’ll know that they’re asking for you to express your opinion/perspective. Similar to listening to fix, you need to be sure that you have the other person’s permission before contributing your perspective.
Listening to understand
When we listen to understand, we turn off the part of our brain that seeks to respond and jump to conclusions. We allow the other person to share openly and ensure we’re hearing them correctly. Active listening is a more intense form of listening to understand.
This kind of listening allows us to connect with the other person on a deeper level and to share their perspective. When you hear a loved one say “I don’t need you to fix, I just need you to listen” they’re asking you to listen to understand.
This type of listening gives emotional support instead of technical support. You’re connecting with the other person by sharing their perspective in a non-judgmental and non-evaluative way. This allows the other person to let down their defenses and to openly vent, worry, complain, share anxieties, or whatever they’re needing to get off their chest. They can only do this openly and fully if they feel like you’re really trying to connect with them.
Things we say when we’re listening to understand:
- “I see what you mean.”
- “It sounds like you’re saying…”
- “Tell me more about that…”
- “Thank you for sharing this with me.”
Whenever you’re trying to deepen a connection with another person or ensure you have done a good job of understanding someone else’s reasoning or motivation it makes sense to listen to understand. Listening to someone on a first date, hearing a friend share a sad personal story, or confronting an employee about poor performance – all of these are appropriate venues for listening to understand.
If you take one thing away from this article, let it be that no type of listening is “better” or “worse” than any other type. They all have their purposes and benefits if they’re used intentionally. Our problem is that we often aren’t being conscious and thoughtful about what kind of listening makes the most sense for the situation we’re in. The reason listening to understand is so valuable is because it’s used so rarely. It’s the form of listening that takes the most practice.
When you find yourself struggling to connect with an employee, coworker, or boss, challenge yourself on whether you’ve done a good enough job of trying to listen to understand. Open the door for the other person to share their perspective. You could make a lot of headway with a simple statement like: “I feel like I haven’t been a good enough listener lately. I’d really like to better understand your feelings on [topic].” For bonus points, you could even add: “I often struggle with listening to try to fix a problem or listening to offer a silver-lining. Let me know if it seems like I’m doing that. I really want to just understand and hear your perspective before reacting.”
Remember, practice makes perfect. Try to find the simplest and easiest opportunities to use your listening skills and be patient with yourself if it doesn’t go smoothly at first.
Good luck out there.
Patrick