Being an exceptional listener is one of the most effective and reliable ways to build or deepen any relationship.
It also makes you different from most other people.
In her book, ‘Time to Think’ Nancy Kline observes that most people think they listen well and yet they rarely do.
Certainly not at the level which you can have a profound impact on people and take the impact of your work to whole new level.
This article shares five practical steps you can take to immediately become a better listener.
But before we look at the steps we want to know WHY? Why would you want to improve your listening in the first place?
Here are some things that came to mind:
1. Your quality of listening immediately conveys how important you think the other person and what they have to say is. If you do not listen well, it diminishes someone, but when you truly listen it communicates that you are genuinely curious, interested, and care.
2. You want your client to do their best thinking in your meetings. The way you listen to someone affects the quality of their thinking. In her book Nancy Kline points out, “When you are listening to someone, much of the quality of what you are hearing is your effect on them.”
3. When you listen deeply you will hear things and notice nuances that you would not otherwise. This profoundly changes the power of your responses.
4. The quality of your attention correlates to the level of impact you have. If you want to positively influence someone then listening is often far more powerful than talking.
5. You cannot avoid revealing your agenda through the way you listen. What is your intention behind the way you listen? For example, are you listening to reply or listening to understand?
A new and fresh way to becoming a better listener
The conventional and often recommended approach to better listening is to practice ‘active listening’.
This can help. Yet I found the problem with this approach is anything that results in you doing more thinking is going to reduce the quality of your listening.
Often, we are not aware of just how much thinking we have droning away in the background. Just a few examples of thought habits are, listening to respond, evaluating, judging, comparing, opinions, impatience, making assumptions, or formulating advice.
Becoming aware of our thought habits and dropping them
I discovered that it is far more powerful to become a passive listener, rather than an active listener.
This means learning to listen with nothing on your mind. You relinquish all your habitual mental activity and are completely open, with all your senses.
Initially, it may seem counter-intuitive to listen in this way. But once you experience the deep connection it creates and quality of thinking it brings out in the speaker and yourself, it will no longer make sense to listen with an active mind.
Five practical steps financial planners can take to becoming a better listener
1. Connect with your reason WHY?
Your level of ‘want to’ is the most significant factor in making change happen. When you are clear about the value to others and yourself of becoming an exceptional listener, you are on the path.
2. Practice listening and not responding
This means that whilst you are listening you are not engaged in your own thinking too, such as formulating your response. Instead, you keep your mind free, allowing the communication in, and seeing what occurs to you after the person has stopped talking.
3. Listen for the feeling
Instead of focusing on the content of what you are hearing be curious about the feeling behind the communication. It can be very powerful to report the feeling back to the person because it demonstrates you are connecting at a deeper level.
4. Listen for understanding
With an open mind you are allowing yourself to become aware of what’s missing or what doesn’t make sense to you. Is the person seeing things in a limiting way? Does what they are saying add up? What possibilities or opportunities are they not yet seeing?
5. Asking permission
Once you have fully heard someone, you ask if you can share your thoughts. If you have heard something that doesn’t make sense, for example, then gaining permission to respond will have someone be open and willing to listen to you.
We live in a world that does not stop talking
Because so many things compete for our attention, the value we place on listening can easily get pushed down our list of priorities.
Yet listening is one of the most under-rated financial planning skills (and life skills) of all. It just requires that we practice deep listening at the next opportunity.
PS. Read about one of the things that can get in the way of you being a better listener. Click here!
