by John J. Walters<\/p>\n
I was wracking my brain trying to think of something to write about that was at least partially meeting related while listening to music (as I usually do while I work) when it hit me — what is it you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re asked to do for the majority of nearly every meeting?\u00c2\u00a0 Listen!<\/p>\n
I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve always admired the people I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve met that possess the skill of listening more than they speak.\u00c2\u00a0 It is certainly not something that I do very often, although I really wish it was.\u00c2\u00a0 When I speak I give my opinion, my advice, or my reaction to something.\u00c2\u00a0 I am rarely surprised at what comes out of my mouth, and I rarely ever learn anything.\u00c2\u00a0 When I listen, however, I never know what I am going to hear.\u00c2\u00a0 So long as I am \u00e2\u20ac\u0153tuned to the right station,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d anything is possible.<\/p>\n
A quick Google search for \u00e2\u20ac\u0153listening\u00e2\u20ac\u009d will pull up a ton of articles on the subject.\u00c2\u00a0 I grabbed three from the first page at random and read through them quickly to see what they had to offer, which I will summarize briefly here.<\/p>\n
The first article<\/a> was written by Larry Alan Nading, PhD.\u00c2\u00a0 Its value is in its simplicity, and in the broad number of topics that it covers.\u00c2\u00a0 The most important lesson to learn from it is about the three basic listening modes.\u00c2\u00a0 There\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s competitive (where we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re only waiting for our turn to speak), passive (where we listen but do not participate) and active (where we listen and then seek to understand completely through verification).\u00c2\u00a0 Simply being aware of what type of listening you are employing in a given situation will often make you a better listener.\u00c2\u00a0 The article is a good introduction to the art of listening, if you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve never really given it any thought.<\/p>\n The second<\/a> and third<\/a> articles focus primarily on active listening skills, which is helpful as long as you truly understand what active listening is.\u00c2\u00a0 Active listening is more than just carrying on a conversation.\u00c2\u00a0 One article summarizes it quite nicely as \u00e2\u20ac\u0153being able to repeat back in your own words what they [the speaker] have said to their satisfaction<\/em>.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\u00c2\u00a0 The words are theirs but the emphasis is mine.\u00c2\u00a0 When someone talks they are (hopefully) talking for a reason.\u00c2\u00a0 If you can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t summarize that reason back to them immediately after listening, then you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re not listening effectively.<\/p>\n Both articles contain some very helpful hints and tips to improve your listening skills.\u00c2\u00a0 I highly recommend reading them, especially the one on MindTools.com as it is the most career oriented. \u00c2\u00a0But improving your listening skills doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have to be all about being a more effective meeting participant.\u00c2\u00a0 I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m sure your friends and your spouse or significant other would appreciate a little more active listening from you as well.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" by John J. Walters I was wracking my brain trying to think of something to write about that was at least partially meeting related while listening to music (as I usually do while I work) when it hit me — what is it you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re asked to do for the majority of nearly every meeting?\u00c2\u00a0 Listen! […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[7],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.meetingcaptain.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.meetingcaptain.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.meetingcaptain.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.meetingcaptain.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.meetingcaptain.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/blog.meetingcaptain.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.meetingcaptain.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.meetingcaptain.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.meetingcaptain.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}