I’d been working with my coach for a few months. One session, I had a few creative thoughts and wanted her to work with me on them. After what turned out to be 22 minutes, when I’d shared my problem, considered some options and decided what to do, I asked my coach,
“Why am I paying you?”
“Because I’m listening.”
Fast forward back to my workplace, where I led a team of 7 managers with 200 staff beneath them and a penny dropped.
If I listened more, how would they react?
So, I began doing just that. When my people brought me problems, I kept the plates spinning by being curious and asking for more information. More insights. More ideas of solutions they had in their head. And I listened. And listened. And listened some more.
And you know what. They liked it. Not that they told me as such. But they began to thrive. Be more pro-active. Problem-solve for themselves.
Why is Listening so Valuable?
When a leader provides the space for others to talk, they begin to develop themselves. Of course, there is always room for direct coaching; for offering feedback; development reviews and more. But there is one easy activity that a leader can provide to those they lead, and that is for them to shut up and listen more.
As a leader, when you leave space for others to speak, you are. . .
- Building your relationship with them because you are interested in what they say
- Helping them evolve their own solutions to their own problems
- Facilitating a cascade of thinking in their processing, through opportunities, ideas, pitfalls and ways to still succeed.
- Building their confidence by helping them grow without holding their hand
- Showing you trust them
- Being less of a boss and more of a collaborator
- Finding out more about the problem
- Appreciating their wisdom
- Taking the weight for problem-solving off your back and giving it to them
- Facilitating fewer demands on your time, because they start to fix more themselves
- Motivating, by valuing them, by listening to them
- Respecting them: treating them as a partner, not a subordinate
Why Not Listen?
So, why do so few leaders truly listen to the people in their care?
Some of it is about being too rushed to appreciate the benefits of using what Stephen Covey would call Quadrant 2 time and living in Quadrant 1 or 3. The quadrants I call ‘fire-fighting’ and ‘someone else’s stuff’. To give yourself the space to listen more, you have to notice what you are doing that you don’t need to do and give yourself a break. You need to find the time in Quadrant 2 to spend time with your people. And then you – and they – will grow.
Listening fully – and with intent – takes a bit of self-awareness and practice. When you have too much on, you knee-jerk back into solving others problems quickly, which gives you have more to do. Listening and helping others fix their own problems is an investment, for which you need to make the time to start with. Doing too many of the things you need not be doing is a vicious circle you must break.
And other leaders take on an arrogance that comes from the success they have achieved: that they got to where they are by being better – superior even – than those they lead. And this appears in a know-it-all attitude to others, rather than the humbler approach of learning from – and sharing with – each other, whatever the so-called status.
What You Can Do – Today
Here are ten key tactics to be a better leader: –
- Get rid of distractions
- Keep as quiet as you can and focus on the person fully
- Use facial expressions and body language to show you are listening
- Do NOT problem-solve with your ideas (this is a heinous crime)
- Seek to fully understand, by asking open questions
- Make those questions short
- Ask second questions about what you hear
- Use more open questions to encourage
- Let them confirm their next step
- Appreciate others for the value they can bring to you: how you can learn from everyone.
Listening well takes practice. It is easier to stick with what you’ve always done and fix people’s problems. It is the bigger – more effective – leader who sets aside the ego of hearing their own voice and has the self-confidence to trust their people to realise their potential, when someone else listens as they do.
And if you doubt about whether you can develop this shift in your style, well, try it in small steps – one experience at a time.
Because the answer is yes, you can.
