Business Education - Listening and Paying Attention

Can anyone dispute how important listening and paying attention are to so many aspects of our lives?

Read through these points below to refresh your memory and find some methods that can help ensure that you are listening and paying attention when you should be.

• Communication is 80% listening and 20% speaking

• Many people never actually listen. Instead, they wait for the other person to
  stop talking so they can talk. Even worse, instead of listening, they are
  usually thinking about what they are going to say when the other person is
  talking.
• There is no way to quantify how important being a good listener is and it impacts every aspect of one’s life.

• In groups, there is a nonverbal level where you can pick up or sense the energy by observing participants behavior, posture, tone and animation of voices and attentiveness.

• It is important to pay attention to this so that you know how attuned and focused the group is.

• Being in a group is about speaking and listening, but especially listening.

• There is a big difference between listening and waiting to talk. It usually becomes evident later in the meeting because the people who were waiting to talk usually bring up something that has already been discussed or decided upon.

• The basic rules of dialogue for the Greeks were “don’t argue,” “don’t interrupt,” and “listen carefully.”

• Everyone would be happier if they applied these rules to their lives

• Psychologists talk about how reward and punishment are at the root of learning, but in fact we often learn by observing how others are rewarded and punished for their behavior.

• For example, if you are new to a group, and someone in the group does a behavior that triggers a negative nonverbal reaction in the other members of the group, you learn immediately, and often unconsciously, not to do that behavior.
• It is important to pay attention to catch these things

• Be aware of the energy level of the group

• During a monthly utilization management meeting, we often have a hard time getting committee members to attend the meeting. The problem is the facilitator is not aware of the energy level of the group and does not make sure that all participants are engaged. This has caused many of the committee members to feel like they do not need to attend the meeting because they do not offer value. I am trying to tactfully get the facilitator to recognize this and change the way she runs the meeting.

• Listen to each person you come in contact with as though he or she is the most important person in the world.

• The irony is that the conversation you are having is indeed the most important one at that moment. Listen as though your life depends on it.

• Be a better listener. You owe it to yourself and anyone who spends time communicating with you. It is the one lesson you can take from this guidebook that will benefit you the most in every aspect of your life.