Your lips are moving but I can’t hear what you are saying, or maybe I am not listening. After a couple of sloppy customer service incidents this week it made me ask the question, when people speak are we just hearing them or actually listening to them? Hearing, but not truly listening happens in our business life, as a boss, as an employee, as a co-worker and even as the client. But it also happens as a spouse, father, brother, son, as well as any other relationship that engages in conversation.
You might ask, “What is the difference?” In general, hearing is the acknowledgment of sound without regards to understanding, whereas listening is making an effort to process and understand what is being said.
I would imagine that we are guilty of not being a great listener at some time or another, myself included, but why? Are we so eager to speak that we can’t even finish listening to the other person before we are already forming our thoughts and ideas, that we miss the rest of what the other person is saying? Maybe even overlooking very important details? Are we so eager to show them what we know that we hear what we want to hear, not what they actually said or asked for? Sometimes even if we listen closely, we can even think we know what’s best for the other person despite what they might want or really need.
The implications of not proactively listening can range from hurt feelings to a missed sale to missed diagnosis. It can also result in repeating tasks over again because we did not listen to instructions, losing a customer because we did not give them what they truly asked for, putting ourselves in harm’s way, and many other undesirable situations depending upon the roles of the communicators. The cost associated with not listening is very hard to quantify but they are extremely high.
Listening is a learned skill and takes active participation. Here are some keys to really listening:
- Being a good listener is a deliberate action. It takes patience and practice. If we are already poor listeners, we may have some bad habits to break. But we can develop into good listeners.
- Look directly at the speaker to avoid environmental distraction.
- Look for non-verbal clues, body language, facial expressions, tone/pitch of voice
- Avoid “preparing” your rebuttal or response in your mind WHILE the speaker is still speaking.
- Do not interrupt the speaker! We can’t listen while talking and we can’t have an appropriate response if we don’t have the speaker’s full thoughts. That is why God gave us two ears and only one mouth, we should be listening twice as much as we talk!
So the next time you’re in a conversation, no matter who it’s with, make sure you take the time to really listen to what they have to say. It might change the entire outcome of the conversation.
MDS prides itself on listening to our clients’ wants and needs so we can serve them accurately and efficiently. Are you really listening to YOUR clients, your residents? MDS can help you set up a survey to see if you are really hearing your residents/prospective resident’s needs with a satisfaction survey and/or a lost prospect survey.