Active Listening

Let's talk about active listening. First off, what is it? It's a way of describing how one can/should participate in a conversation. If you were merely listening, you're just passively consuming information. Actively listening, however, emphasizes that it is not passive; you've got to do stuff.

Quickly googling for tips yields some solid results. Joseph Topornycky and Shaya Golparian, in their paper, describe five key techniques of active listening (with some examples):

1. Paying attention (maintain eye contact)
2. Showing that you are listening (nodding) 
3. Providing feedback (paraphrasing and providing reflections)
4. Deferring judgment (letting the speaker finish before you respond)
5. Responding appropriately (respond in a way that the speaker would want to be treated)

Let's look at this with coaching in mind. 

The coach should have the ability to focus on both what the client says and what they don't say; it's listening to the whole person. The coach should check to see if they are noticing what the client is saying and the context of what the client is saying. This is really important to creating a strong coaching presence (see the other post for more info on that) because if you aren't hearing what they are saying, how are you supposed to constructively communicate?

Mirroring is something that the coach should be able to do effectively. It's not parroting, mind you. For example, if the client says, with a heavy sigh, "Yeah, so I've got a big project assigned to me." Parroting would be the coach saying, "So...you've got a big project assigned to you." The coach doesn't need to say that, the client knows what they just said. The time could be better spent by pointing out the heavy sigh or throwing out a possible interpretation of the sigh or even just letting out an equally big sigh. It's simple but it could draw the client's attention to their previous action.

One difference, well, maybe not a difference but there's a nuance that we should note around the idea of showing that you are listening. The article suggested "...encouraging the speaker with small verbal comments such as 'yes', 'uh huh'..." With coaching, that's really not needed (and I might propose that that isn't really needed in general). If the coach is effectively mirroring and asking effective questions, it'll be clear that they are listening. Yes' and uh-huh's tend to be more for the coach's benefit.

Audio transcripts are a useful tool for coaches. It allows for a more thorough review of a coaching session. You miss out on the tonal queues and the body language but it's still useful. In those transcripts, when the coach says, "uh-huh" there is a line break in what the client is saying. Kinda like this:

Client: So I came into the office

Coach: Uh huh

Client: and I was still a little frustrated with how the previous meeting went

Coach: Hmm

Client: and I really want to figure out this and that.

Did the uh huh's provide support for the client? Nah. Compare that to a transcript sans comments. 

Client: So I came into the office and I was still a little frustrated with how the previous meeting went and I really want to figure out this and that.

Reading that second version makes me think of two things. First, it feels more like a continuous thought. Second, the run-on sentence nature of it can provide some indication as to what the client was feeling. Granted, this is a made-up example, but the principle is the same. So even though the intent was to show that the coach is listening it's ultimately interrupting the client's flow. What do you think, reader? I might try removing those sorts of verbal queues in my day-to-day speech to see how it feels.  

Many parts of coaching come back to the relationship between the coach and client. The coach must act with the client's best interest, goals, and learning in mind and active listening is a key component.

Do you have any tricks or tips for active listening? Let me know in the comments! Thanks for reading!