Apply listening in business

Your skill as a listener can make or break your success in leadership, teams, customer relationships, and negotiation. This topic, taking a fresh look at how you can become more effective as a listener, was written by businessLISTENING.com editor Bruce Wilson, a business coach for executives, professionals, and entrepreneurs.

Part I, Strategies for Business Listeners sets out a simple model explaining how an effective listening style changes ordinary conversations. The central premise is that you will get more out of conversations by first knowing your conversation goals, then narrowing your focus to 3 choices: talk or listen; focus or clarify; andlisten attentively or not.

Part II, How to Listen (Attentive Listening Skills) provides the nuts-and-bolts tactical complement to the listening strategy proposed in Part I. Subjects include: "Get Over Yourself, Give Them A Solo", which speaks to the power of not interrupting in any one of a multitude of ways; "Stop Multi-tasking", about the importance of focus; and finally, "Recap Regularly", "Use Supportive Words", and "Use Body Language" which show how to establish a tangible connection between yourself and the person you are talking to. 

Part III, How Effective Listeners Ask Questions / Listening Self-Study covers the art of asking non-leading questions which contribute to, rather than morph, what a speaker is saying. Part Three also provides exercises and resources you can use to sharpen your listening skills.

Part IV, Emotion Savvy Communication is not for the armchair listener or the faint at heart. Emotions (also called "feelings") are increasingly understood as a complex interaction of human brain and body systems. Because they are integrally linked to decisionmaking, emotions are a key component of communication. But because the role of emotions is poorly understood, and "purely rational thought" has long been an ideal within science and economics, emotions are often ignored, avoided or mishandled even while they are playing a pivotal role in business decisions. The simple solution: develop the vocabulary and skill to accurately identify the emotions being conveyed in conversations, both by the people you listen to and by yourself as a speaker. It's easy enough for most of us to attempt this -- with very few exceptions, we have all the equipment we need -- but like anything worth doing it takes practice and some amount of trial and error to become skilled.