talk less,listen more. Describe it in 10 lines.
Answers
Answer:
n the rush to solve problems and get things done, there’s a natural tendency for all of us to simply tell. And, we’re quite good at it. Think of the great communication classes you may have had over the years. While called “communication,” they were all about how to deliver or present a message. I challenge you to find one that was about how to effectively listen.
Making quick decisions and judgement calls will often lead to misdiagnosed solutions, faulty assumptions, narrow perspectives, and misunderstood facts. As a result, we deprive others of the opportunity to solve problems on their own.
Think about a time when you felt misunderstood by someone. How did it make you feel? Maybe you got defensive and vented your anger and frustration? Or maybe you felt intimidated or shut down, perhaps committing never to open up to that person again? Regardless of the response, each time we feel misunderstood (not truly heard) by someone important to us, we can feel disrespected and hurt. We may even experience an unintentional breach of trust−as if an essential part of the relationship bond was chipped away.
One of the most profound gifts you can give to another human being is your sincere understanding. To do so requires clearing away your mental clutter, suspending (at least temporarily) your agenda, and stopping long enough to focus and hear what someone is really saying. When it comes to creating effective relationships, with people fast is slow and slow is fast. An attentive, unbiased, listening ear gives people the rare opportunity to feel understood−a gift some psychologists argue we need as much as the air we breathe. Being truly present provides a safe environment in which people can learn to listen to themselves, to assess their own behavior, diagnose their own problems, and come up with their own solutions.
Explanation:
There is an old quote that says “we have 2 ears and one mouth, so we should listen more than we say.” The challenge is that the more senior we become in organisations, we tend to speak more and listen less.
Bottom line, it is not possible to be a great leader without being a great listener. Even our Chairman, Adi Godrej, acknowledges, “Till a few years ago, I didn’t really listen to what others had to say. I have tried to change that. Now, I make an effort to listen carefully when a suggestion is made, or when someone is making a point”.
My message this week focuses on how we can become better listeners. Why is listening such an important skill? Why don’t most of us listen well? And what can we do to improve this?
Why is listening an important skill?
Is it that we are just that much busier now? That there is that much more to choose from? That on some level we just don’t enjoy the connect? That we know much more? What is it? Given just how intricately connected and highly mobile the world around us is becoming, if anything, we should be listening much more and much more carefully. After all, we are having conversations with and reaching out to people and in ways that we haven’t before.
As a company, we are growing and becoming much more diverse. Our team members are located across Asia, Africa, Latin America, Europe and the Middle East. Not just that, we are also consciously building a variety of backgrounds, skill sets and approaches into our teams. This means that the people who we are working with now, are very different in many ways. Add to that, the fact that we are grappling with the macroeconomic uncertainty in the geographies we operate in, requires us to become much more agile. To be able to do this, we need to be much closer to our consumers, to understand their needs and then find ways to delight them. That requires listening. We need the right people on board and we need them more engaged with and excited by our ambitious aspirations. That requires listening.
We want to leverage the diversity of our people to innovate and create better products. That requires listening.
On a personal front, as parents, partners, children and friends, our relationships have probably never been both more deeply connected and disconnected, given technology and distance and just how busy we seem to be all the time. How much time are you really investing in conversations? Real conversations, not quick messages and status updates. And how much of that are you investing in listening closely enough to be able to make your relationships stronger?
“Did you even hear what I said?” has probably been the famous opening line of many disagreements.
How to become a better listener
I am quite sure that many of you have probably experienced what it is like to be at the receiving end of a conversation where you feel you weren’t heard out well. Use some of that memory to introspect on how often you are probably doing the very same thing. This isn’t a change that can be made without you acknowledging the extent of or the need for it. Here are some suggestions on what you could do to start being a