How good are you at listening?

I regard this short story as a bit embarrassing, but I’ll share it anyway.

 

I’m 19 years old, back from college during winter break, and reuniting with a close high school friend. We’re in the car, and I’m talking nonstop about first semester when my friend turns to me and says, “You talk too much.”

 

To this day, I remember the moment, and from that day forward, I resolved to shed the label.

 

Here’s my personal reveal: In virtually every conversation since, I privately monitor what percent of time I’m talking relative to the other person. True story.

 

The world’s most important skill?

Listening might not be the world’s most important skill, but it’s hard to argue otherwise. Dana Brownlee, in her piece for Forbes, calls listening “a stealth skill.” And author Arlin Cuncic, who wrote “The Anxiety Workbook,” quotes psychologist Sabrina Romanoff, who refers to it as a power skill. And no one questions the obvious: listening is the key to building, and maintaining, strong relationships.

 

Which leads to this curious question: Why is it never taught in school?

 

Report cards highlight reading, writing, and speaking, but not listening. Curious.

 

“While listening is a skill universally lauded,” note authors Robin Abrahams and Boris Groysberg in their article for the Harvard Business Review, “it’s rarely, if ever, explicitly taught as such, outside of training for therapists.”

 

20,000-30,000 words a day

It might rarely be taught, but listening has been studied extensively.

 

Abrahams and Groysberg cite a 2015 study that found “while 78% of accredited undergraduate business schools list “presenting’ as a learning goal, only 11% identified ‘listening.’”

 

Leadership expert Charley Swords cites a range of revealing statistics, “The average person hears between 20,000 and 30,000 words during the course of a 24-hour period,” and “most people usually only remember about 17%-25% of the things they listen to.” Other notable stats: The average person speaks roughly 110-150 words a minute, yet we can hear about 450 words a minute, leaving plenty of time, it seems, to focus on our response rather than what the listener has to say.

 

Seven types of listening

My initial research unveiled seven types of listening: active, critical, empathetic, reflective, nondirective, purposeful, and malicious. (Malicious listening, according to Russell Bishop in an article for the Huffington Post, is when a person listens with the intent to prove you wrong.)

 

If you’re in the market to improve your listening skills, active listening is the standard, with impactfactory.com drawing this notable distinction: “Unlike critical listening, active listening seeks to understand rather than reply.

 

The three A’s of active listening are attention, attitude, and adjustment…. Most importantly, don’t fall for the common misconception that active listening is only about making the other person feel listened to. Equally important is actually understanding what they are saying.”

 

Like a trampoline

What typifies a good listener? Brownlee shares this wonderful quote from leadership consultants Jack Zenger and Joseph Folkman: “…good listeners are like trampolines. (They) are someone you can bounce ideas off of — and rather than absorbing your ideas and energy, they amplify, energize, and clarify your thinking. They make you feel better not merely passively absorbing but by actively supporting.”