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We spend 45 percent of our communication time listening, yet few of us think of listening as an active process. Listening is an active and complex process that requires skills beyond our inherent tendencies. Properly developed listening skills are an essential component of any successful career, corporation, or business. Strong character development, self-awareness, and participation in the organization’s goals lead to better understanding of information. Proper listening will result in more accurate communication, and consequently, more successful personal and professional relationships.

To improve the overall success of your organization, start with perfecting employee communication. Listening is a major and often ignored part of the communication process. Focus on evaluating that aspect first, and then move into other areas, such as verbal communication and product knowledge.

Organizations spend enormous amounts of time and money trying to improve employees’ communication skills. Unfortunately, verbal communication gets the fanfare while listening skills go virtually unnoticed. The importance of good verbal communication falls onto deaf ears since many of us are well-skilled in the art of “fake listening.”

In our formative years, most of us developed the art of fake listening. We learned to appear engrossed, in the classroom and at home, when in reality we were daydreaming about other more interesting things. We got away with being average students. But, in business, being average is not good enough. If we want to excel, get promoted, or earn a higher salary, we have to improve on this particular problem area. Since poor listening skills could be the silent partner that stops us from clinching important assignments or a reasonable pay increase, we must break our adolescent habit of fake listening and learn how to listen actively.

The Active Listening Process: We must train our minds to be perceptive. Active listening is based on the ability to accept information for discussion. If we are narrow-minded or sluggish, then we cannot listen actively. Understanding the active listening process allows us to master our own listening skills and to target our own problem areas. Think of the process as an outline: write it down and follow it step by step. When you deviate from the source, backtrack and re-focus on the process.

1. The receiver listens for the total meaning of the sender’s message. Often there is more to the message than is verbalized; by analyzing body language and eye contact, in addition to verbalization, one can form deeper conclusions about the information presented.
   
   
2. The listener forms an initial opinion about the information. If the information was well-received and fits into the receiver’s frame of reference, listening will continue. If the receiver is not comfortable with the information, listening may stop and active involvement may cease. Unless, of course, the receiver is a practiced listener.
   
   
3. The receiver reflects the message back to the sender. This clarifies the meaning of the message while engaging each party in an intense and clear reiteration of the subject. If the reflected message does not satisfy the speaker, it will be explained again in more simplistic terms. The process will continue until the sender is satisfied with the receiver’s understanding of the topic. The ideal listener will not walk away from a conversation until the message is clear.
   
   
4. The sender and receiver both understand the topic and engage in a concluding discussion in which both points of view are addressed and mutually understood. If one party is unfamiliar with active listening techniques, certain attitudes and biases could potentially impede communication

Active listening techniques lead to enhanced relations and greater comfort in self expression. Supervisors obtain greater insight into the opinions and problems of employees, which increases morale, productivity and professionalism. Being aware of the active listening process helps employees recognize attitudes and perceptions that may create communication barriers.

Communication Barriers: Causes and Effects: Sometimes, the most obvious communication barriers can be overlooked. For example, if employees consistently complain or joke about an individual’s inability to comprehend information, that individual could be unfamiliar with the job specifications, have bias based upon past experience or perceptions, or simply not know how to focus on a topic for discussion, all of which impede listening.

Communication is extremely important in terms of team dynamics. If two colleagues have a communication block which inhibits their ability to complete assignments on time and to perfection, one party may be less interested in the job than the other, possibly daydreaming about lunch rather than focusing on problem solving.

Time constraints can also take a toll on effective communication. If one individual is over-laden with work, they may not allow the necessary time for listening to the needs and comments of others.

Isolated communication issues can create further and more widespread repercussions. For example, if someone is difficult to communicate with, others may avoid speaking with him or her since more questions may be raised than answered.

In any case, with a careful assessment, employees’ communication techniques can be analyzed to understand how to conquer communication barriers.

Evaluating Employees’ Listening Skills: Recognizing the signs of poor listening is the first step to overcoming communication barriers. There are several reasons why an individual may have difficulty listening, and there are a handful of small flaws that become major problems if left uncorrected. Management with communication deficiencies can filter down into other areas of an organization, resulting in miscommunication throughout departments. It is also important that, as a manager, you ensure that your employees are developing their communication skills as well. Efficient communication from both sides will yield increased productivity and success. Employees who know how to listen properly are able to ascertain the information regardless of the presence of obstacles.

Answer the questions below to target communication problems in your organization:

• Do employees appear focused on what the sender is saying? If employees are restless or dazed, then they may have lost control of their attention.
  
  
• Do employees ask pertinent questions to clear confusion and to stimulate discussion? Pertinent questions are a good clue to proper listening.
  
  
• Do employees respond at appropriate intervals or do they interrupt the speaker before a thought is finished? Interruption causes a breakdown in thought by stopping the momentum of the mind, and in effect, losing the potential of the idea.
  
  
• Do employees sidetrack the speaker by changing the subject? Do they ask inappropriate questions, indicating they have not been listening?
  
  
• Are employees receptive to new ideas? If employees refuse to break old habits, or allow negative attitudes to invade the work place, then improvement will be impossible.
  

If your answers do not resonate with our rationale, do not be discouraged; you are not alone. Many organizations have major communication problems due to the poor listening habits of employees. Poor listening is not always a noticeable problem and many organizations do not stress the importance of good listening skills.

There are many reasons why we do not listen well enough to communicate properly and egocentrism is the most debilitating, especially within an organization. Often two heads will clash, and instead of brainstorming for a solution, a sparring match will ignite, eventually dwindling down with no solutions or progress made. Studies show that when listening, most people think about their own concerns rather than the speaker’s message. For example, we automatically tune out communication that does not personally appeal to us. Our minds wander to more comfortable and amusing or troubling thoughts, instead of focusing on vital facts. Thus, we become preoccupied, wasting company time and money. By utilizing poor listening skills, we not only miss out on important information, but also damage our credentials by showing unfound bias. Employees must learn to leave their personal biases at home and view each co-worker as an equal and important contributor to the organization.

Make Discussion Part Of Your Meetings: If employees know they are expected to comment, they will prepare for meetings, becoming actively involved with the material prior to the commitment. In addition to working short term, this process works long term as well. Persisting that employees prepare for meetings may disgruntle a few hard-nosed individuals at first, but the benefits will become obvious to all involved. The outcome will be a consistently more informed employee, superior internal communications, and improved production.

Focus is a Necessary Component of Active Listening: Distraction is inevitable if employees are not in tune with personal and company goals and expectations. Although an individual may prefer performing tiny feats of self-stimulation, such as reverse rotation thumb twiddling or cubicle spit-balling, while listening, colleagues will perceive this restlessness as indifference, as well they should. While we are capable of performing simultaneous tasks, we never do more than one thing at once to perfection, especially when listening is involved. Being an active listener means listening 100%. Employees need to refrain from engaging in activities which could distract themselves, others, or the speaker, such as organizing their desks, answering the telephone, staring out the window, or tapping their fingers. Distraction is caused not only by visual cues but by emotional ones as well.

Examine the following subtle distracters to help formulate solutions for employees’ listening problems:

• Stress; an individual’s participation will flounder if he/she is absorbed in other pressing matters.
  
  
• Anxiety; thoughts of one’s rebuttal often take precedence over what is actually being said, since the fear of forgetting looms within us.
  
  
• Environment; we tend to be more interested in the setting and those around us than what is being said.
  
  
• Assumptions; we jump to conclusions prior to receiving all the information.
  
  
• Bias; we may discount statements based on preconceived notions about their source.
  
  
• Egocentrism; we utilize our “selective hearing,” listening only to the information we want to hear and conveniently discounting those words which are less pleasing or convenient.
  
  
• Passivity; many of us are not actively involved in our surroundings.

Andrew E. Schwartz, CEO, A.E. Schwartz & Associates of Boston, MA a comprehensive management training and professional development organization offering over 40 skills specific programs and practical solutions to today's business challenges.

Copyright, AE Schwartz & Associates. All rights reserved.
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