VOICES ACTIVE LISTENING
THE SUBTLE ART OF ACTIVE LISTENING Lyn Campbell-Anderson discusses the differences between listening and active listening and how truly hearing another person can be an engagement game-changer during times of people change and transformation.
A
ctive listening: ‘‘The practice of engaging closely with what a speaker is saying and indicating understanding, typically by asking relevant questions, using gestures, and summarising’’ – Oxford Languages 2023. In our fast-paced, hectic world we are daily, hourly, minute-driven consumers of information. Often five to 10 paces ahead of ourselves, our busy minds constantly ruminating over the past or thinking about the future, trying to control the numerous factors outside of our control. Is it any wonder then, when engaging in conversations with other humans, that we may overlook or misunderstand the obvious intel being shared? Engaging with a system is comparatively easy (if your single sign-on works the first time!) and we have become very used to doing so. However, engaging with humans with all our uniqueness and complexities is completely different. These complexities are amplified during periods of change. Although we all have our own bespoke requirements and perspectives, we are programmed to fear the unknown and to crave comfort. When you are therefore faced with a whole group of people, unsure
98
ANZSAP ISSUE 01
Lyn Campbell-Anderson
believes that the key to engagement is very simple – to practise the art of active listening. He reiterated this one piece of advice several times (in case I didn’t hear it!) and urged me to listen with both ears, my eyes, and my mind. Simple, I thought – but is this advice really as simplistic as it sounds?
or angry about changes that are happening within a business, you must find a way to manage that fear. Unmanaged collective fear can quickly spiral, turning into a nightmare scenario with the phrase 'running with a herd of stampeding elephants’ coming to mind. Constantly looking for effective ways to manage this type of situation myself and engage both sponsors and stakeholders in times of change, I interviewed a fabulously focused and detailoriented sponsor. This person was also recognised as a great leader within the business and his industry, and I wanted to understand his secret. My sponsor vehemently
In 1957, American Phycologists Carl Rogers and Richard Farson, released their Active Listening paper, outlining “the practice of preparing to listen, observing what verbal and non-verbal messages are being sent." They believed that truly active listening invoked a powerful feeling of connection and was the key to forming successful human relationships. This trail-blazing human-focused technique has since manifested throughout many iterations by numerous experts and has become a key element within any successful change communication strategy. I now personally see every interaction as an opportunity to practise active listening, however it’s not an easy as it sounds. Think about your last conversation: be honest, did you:
• Focus on drafting your own response(s) in your head?
