LISTENING SKILLS

 LISTENING SKILLS

1. What’s listening?

Listening is giving attention to a sound. When listening, a person receives what others are saying and tries to understand what it means. It is a Cognitive process includes attending to, understanding, receiving, and interpreting content and relational messages; and behavioral processes include responding to others with verbal and nonverbal feedback. Listening is a skill for resolving problems. But, a Poor listening can lead to misinterpretations, thus causing conflict or dispute.

Listening is a crucial skill for any administrative manager, as it helps you communicate effectively, build rapport, solve problems, and avoid misunderstandings. However, listening can also be challenging, especially in a busy and noisy workplace. In this article, you will learn about some common barriers to effective listening in the workplace and how you can overcome them.

2. DIFFERENCE BETWEEN HEARING AND LISTENING

                 Listening Hearing

Listening is the act of receiving a sound and understanding what you receive. Hearing is the act of perceiving sound and receiving sound waves or vibrations through your ear.

Listening Requires concentration so that your brain processes meaning from words and sentences. Hearing is one of the five senses and it just happens all the time – whether you like it or not – unless you have a hearing problem

Listening leads to learning Hearing simply happens

Listening is a skill that lets the sound you hear go through your brain to process the meaning of it. Hearing is an involuntary act where you simply receive vibrations through your ears.

Psychological Physiological

Concentration is required Concentration is not required

3. TYPES OF LISTENING

A. Active listening – It is a type of Listening wherein the listener is attentive towards what the speaker is saying. It helps in understanding the emotions, which the words are expressing. This helps in commuting your thoughts towards that person in a better way. Active listening is more than just listening to what is being said, it is also listening to what is unspoken.

B. Appreciative Listening – It is a type of Listening where one accepts and appreciates the other person through what they say. It seeks to praise. Alternatively, listening to something for pleasure, such as music is also a type of Appreciative Listening.

C. Comprehension Listening – In this type of listening to the listener’s primary concern is to understand the message which is being conveyed by the speaker. It enables to sort out important words from less important words from a long speech. Comprehension listening is also known as Content Listening, Informative Listening.

D. Critical Listening – Critical listening is listening performed to evaluate, judge, form opinion about what is being said. The judgment includes assessing strengths and weaknesses, agreement and approval. Critical listening requires critical thinking skills as well. A detailed logical analysis goes with critical listening. It is used to distinguish between real compliments and flattery. It is also known as Evaluative Listening.

E. Empathetic Listening – It is a type of listening where the listener understands the speaker’s concern or loss with a rational approach. This rational approach is about being empathetic towards the listener. It is about paying close attention to the nuances of emotional signals and be rational. This kind of listening is often used by those involved in customer service where the objective is to earn profits for the organization and acknowledge the customer’s emotions as well.

F. Sympathetic Listening – Sympathetic listening is a listening used to show care for the speaker and acknowledging his sorrows in a sympathetic way. Sympathetic listening invariably encourages sympathetic conversations.

G. Biased listening- Biased listening happens when the person hears only what they want to hear, typically misinterpreting what the other person says based on the other biases that they have. They may misinterpret what the speaker says based on their bias.

H. False listening- In false listening, you pretend to listen to the other person but do not really listen or comprehend the message. These listeners may be pretending to listen with the help of appropriate gestures like smiling and nodding. This type of listening will undoubtedly impact your ability to be effective in your jobs.

4. BARRIERS TO LISTENING

A. Physical distractions

Physical distractions are anything that interferes with your ability to focus on the speaker and the message. They can include background noise, interruptions, phone calls, emails, multitasking, or poor lighting. To overcome physical distractions, you need to create a conducive environment for listening. You can do this by reducing or eliminating the sources of noise, closing the door or window, turning off or silencing your devices, paying attention to your posture and eye contact, and avoiding distractions such as checking your watch.

B. Psychological distractions are anything that affects your mental or emotional state and prevents you from listening attentively. They can include stress, boredom, anxiety, anger, prejudice, or personal biases. To overcome psychological distractions, you need to manage your emotions and attitudes. You can do this by being aware of your feelings and thoughts, taking breaks or deep breaths, being open-minded and respectful, and acknowledging or addressing any issues that may affect your listening.

C. LINGUISTIC BARRIERS- Linguistic barriers are anything that causes confusion or misunderstanding due to the use of language or symbols. They can include, technical terms, slang, acronyms, ambiguous words, or different interpretations. To overcome linguistic barriers, you need to clarify and confirm the meaning and intention of the message. You can do this by asking questions, paraphrasing, summarizing, giving feedback, using simple and clear language, and avoiding assumptions.

D. Physiological barriers- may result from individuals’ personal discomfort, caused by ill-health, poor eye sight, or hearing difficulties.

5. EFFECTIVE LISTENING

The Effective listening requires concentration and a conscious effort to achieve. The purpose of effective listening is to listen to understand, not just hear what was said. Effective listening is a skill. This means it requires practice to become better and more efficient at doing it.

It requires us to ‘switch on’ to engage with the person we are listening to – not only to hear the words but truly understand the intent behind the message

Move your attention toward the person that is communicating with you – for example, if you are currently working on something, leave this and concentrate on the person communicating with you

Engage your brain – remind yourself that you need to listen

Make eye contact and observe body language – by looking at the person, you engage with them. This means they will keep communicating. We also add to our understanding by observing the body language used to communicate the message. If this is being done over the telephone, listen to the voice as well as the words

Remove or reduce barriers to communication – give yourself the best chance of listening by removing anything that will distract you. These are called barriers to effective communication.

Here are some things that you can do to demonstrate effective listening:

Eye contact – making eye contact with the others, and looking aface when they are communicating with you

Non-verbal language – nodding your head in agreement, tilting your head slightly and smiling

Verbal nods – making noises such as Hmm

Mirroring body language – copying some of the body language the other person is using

Paraphrasing – repeating back what you hear in your own word to check your understanding

Asking questions – show interest by asking questions about what you are hearing

Active listening – the listener should pay attention on the speaker’s speech. A conscious listening only make listening effective.

Open-minded- The listener should be transparent and welcomes the speaker’s information without having or showing any biases. A prejudiced mind cannot helps the listener to evaluate the speaker properly.

Composed- The listener should be calm, quiet in the listening process. It means, the listener should listening the speaker pleasantly without hurry.

Proficient- Listening is a skill. All listeners may not be proficient, but some are proficient. A Listener should become a proficient, then only receives the information accurately, which is being sent by the speaker.

Knowledgeable- In the listening process, the speaker shares some information with the listeners. But, if the listener doesn’t have any idea about the topic on which the speaker is being shared the ideas or opinions. That listening cannot become effective. Because, the listeners lack of knowledge never allows them to be effective in the listening process.

Patience- The patience level of the listeners will decide the listening process. If the listener has a good level of patience, automatically he/she pay attention on the speaker’s words. If the listener doesn’t have the patience, the whole process will go in different way.