{"id":686,"date":"2013-11-18T10:00:17","date_gmt":"2013-11-18T10:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/?p=686"},"modified":"2013-11-18T10:00:17","modified_gmt":"2013-11-18T10:00:17","slug":"effective-listening","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/effective-listening\/","title":{"rendered":"Effective Listening"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I often talk about communication on this blog, and how incredibly important it is to being a smarter worker.\u00a0 Communication isn\u2019t just how you speak though, it is how you listen.\u00a0 The skill of listening can make or break the career of a worker, and a good listener is the difference between a low level employee and an employee on the management track.\u00a0 From the interview process, to customer interaction, and even meetings with your co-workers, listening is the most important skill you will ever use in the workplace.\u00a0 No degree, certification, or title is more important.<\/p>\n<p>A good listener in the workplace is an incredibly valuable asset.\u00a0 First let\u2019s look at what can happen when you have an employee who doesn\u2019t listen well.<\/p>\n<p><b>Problems that occur when an employee has poor listening skills:<\/b><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><b>Poor customer relations<\/b><\/li>\n<li><b>Time lost spent repeating things<\/b><\/li>\n<li><b>Directions followed incorrectly<\/b><\/li>\n<li><b>Slower responses due to poor communication<\/b><\/li>\n<li><b>Frustrated co-workers<\/b><\/li>\n<li><b>Morale suffers<\/b><\/li>\n<li><b>Delayed Projects<\/b><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>These are just some of the possible outcomes of a bad listener.\u00a0 I can tell you confidently that employees like this don\u2019t go very far in a company, simply because they cause more work than they complete.\u00a0 If you want to improve your listening try to follow these steps.<\/p>\n<p><b>To Improve your Listening:<\/b><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><b>Make eye contact with the speaker \u2013 <\/b>Keeping eye contact helps you focus on what the speaker is saying, and will help you stay attentive.<b><\/b><\/li>\n<li><b>Ignore your phone\/tablet \u2013 <\/b>Turn off your phone and leave your tablet in your office when in a meeting.\u00a0 It will only distract you from the information you are trying to absorb.\u00a0 Even if you don\u2019t answer or view it, a vibrate from a text will leave you wondering who it was or what they wanted.<b><\/b><\/li>\n<li><b>Don\u2019t have too much caffeine right before a meeting \u2013 <\/b>Too much caffeine will leave you jittery and your mind racing.\u00a0 I personally find it hard to keep my mind from trailing if I shotgun an energy drink right before a meeting. <b><\/b><\/li>\n<li><b>Visualize what the speaker is saying \u2013 <\/b>Try to picture what the speaker is saying, so that you can associate it to something in your mind.\u00a0 This will help you recall the information later.<b><\/b><\/li>\n<li><b>Share the emotions of the speaker \u2013 <\/b>If the speaker is happy, smile, if they are sad, frown. Simply mocking their emotions will help you share in their story, and retain the information better.<b><\/b><\/li>\n<li><b>Only ask questions during a pause \u2013 <\/b>Let the speaker finish what they are saying before you ask a question.\u00a0 They may answer your question, and you will listen closer if you are hoping for an answer.\u00a0 This is also good manners.<b><\/b><\/li>\n<li><b>Don\u2019t interrupt \u2013 <\/b>Interrupting will knock the speaker off track, and make it hard for both of you to remember what they are talking about.<b><\/b><\/li>\n<li><b>Summarize \u2013<\/b> At the end of a meeting, summarize what was said and what needs further review.\u00a0 This gives a chance to make sure you understood everything correctly, and for the speaker to add anything they left out.<b>\u00a0\u00a0<\/b><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I often talk about communication on this blog, and how [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[508],"tags":[1099,392],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/686"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=686"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/686\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=686"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=686"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=686"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}