How to Be a Better Listener

Basic listening skills are a powerful tool for facilitating better conversations and relationships built on trust and respect. Adopting just a few simple types of body language and communication can pay huge dividends in ensuring clear and open communication between you and your team members. Here are three easy things to adopt to make your team members feel that what they say is understood, important, and valued.

1. Reflecting

The art of reflecting someone’s emotions or motivations back to them communicates that you are paying attention to the point of what they’re trying to get across. Often we will use lots of words to try to communicate a general idea, such as “I’m upset.” If someone comes to you agitated, frustrated, excited, or joyful about something, reflect that back to them: “It sounds like you’re really frustrated/excited about this.” This will give the speaker the confidence they’re being understood, or it may give them the chance to express more clearly what they mean—either way, it’s paving the way for better future communication.

2. Summarizing

Summarizing is similar to reflecting, but it has more to do with the content of what someone’s saying to you. Every now and then, check in with the speaker by summarizing the main points of what they’ve told you: “So you’re saying that we need another week to get this project to the place we really want it?” When you give the speaker this feedback, it affirms that they’re effectively communicating the thing they want to communicate. This builds the speaker’s confidence and helps to build trust between you.

3. Asking Clarifying Questions

This may be counter to many people’s instincts. We tend to think it’s rude to interrupt another person, but politely interjecting to ask questions to clarify meaning are actually a way of expressing that you are listening carefully and that you care to know exactly what the other person is getting across. It communicates that their words are valuable. 

If you’re not doing these things already, try them out and see how your team responds. These small changes can be powerful tools for facilitating better communication and increasing trust among your team.