Listening to be Heard
by Dick Dyer, APR

My website refers to an Early American Almanac anonymous quote: “God gave us two ears and one mouth. If we keep that proportion in mind, we will do just fine.”

We’ve known for a long time that listening is a good thing. But if you observe what I observe, listening to conversations around you, people aren’t listening, truly listening. Oh, they may think that they are, but pay attention and hear what’s really going on.

Without getting too technical, the listening that goes on is typically the closed system, asymmetrical, self-serving type. People listen to hear what they want to hear in one-way communications modeling.

What did he just say? Let me put all of this another way.

Listening is a research tool—a valuable way to learn what people know, what they think, and what they are likely to do. If you stop to truly listen and prompt them to speak, you will learn those things. You have read in my columns before: You need to know where people are before you can move them to where you want them to be. You need to listen to know where they are.

Listening is not an easy task. Why? Because people are afraid of what they might hear.

Two-way symmetrical communications requires listening on both sides of the communications channel. You send a message and then listen for the other person to respond. If the process is pure, people are totally honest—polite, but totally honest.

Effective Public Relations tells the story of Abraham Lincoln. “Twice a week, Lincoln set aside a time for conversations with ordinary folk—the housewives, farmers merchants, and pension seekers. He listened patiently to what they had to say, no matter how humble their circumstance or how trivial their business. A military aide once protested to the President that he was wasting valuable time on these unimportant people. Lincoln rebuked him, saying, “I tell you, Major… that I call these receptions my public opinion bath… the effect, as a whole is renovating and invigorating.”

Abe was not afraid to hear what people had to say and most people would judge him to be a very good President who took some incredible risks.

True listening skills are a deliberate process—an open process or system. You actively engage people and probe their thinking to totally understand what and why they think the way they do. The opposite is a closed system. Closed systems lead to problems defining themselves in the form of crisis.

In crisis communications, I have learned to always let a complaining customer or audience talk and express themselves for however long they wanted. In the end, they have almost always become apologetic for their behavior, but (and most important) we work to some level of solution or at least a more complete definition of the problem. Remember, a problem well defined is a problem half solved.

Here are some tips for better listening (Some of these tips came from Personal Excellence and appeared in Communications Briefings newsletter.

Eye Contact - Always connect with the person you are listening to. Make eye contact. Use your body to engage the person. Be careful to observe their comfort zones on this by watching for their looks away or squirms for additional space.

Engage with Questions - Ask for more information. Please explain what you mean? Can you give me an example of what you’re talking about? What can I do about that? Probing questions keep the conversation alive and give you valuable insight into what can be done strategically.

Pace Yourself - Listen at the same rate as others talk. If you catch yourself daydreaming or planning what to say next, stop and return to the here and now.

Welcome “wrong” information - Listen for contradictory data or surprising facts that oppose what you believe. Don’t filter out what you dislike or don’t agree with—listening to contradictory information leads to possible solutions if you listen it out.

Accept Ambiguity - Some people won’t provide satisfying answers to your questions, but they will help divine the problem. Always encourage the speaker to elaborate.

Like learning to speak, listening is an art form which is not taught in most schools or colleges. That’s another soap box. I would love to hear from readers on other techniques they use to truly listen.

One final factoid—I recently read that 60-80% of all that we communicate is done by listening. “Shut-up and listen” has a whole different meaning than what I think my Dad meant, but maybe not.

Dick Dyer operates his own public relations firm in Winthrop, Maine. He enjoys hearing from readers on column ideas and/or questions they would like pursued within this column. You can reach him by email dyerapr@fairpoint.net or by phone at (207) 512-2217.