This is The Coaching Inn, a podcast from 3D Coaching. Hello, it's Claire Pedrick here and this is this week's book group. If you're following us on social media, it's on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram, hashtag 3D Book Group. And we're reading Simplifying Coaching. And this week we've been reading chapter two, which is called Simple Listening. and it's all about headlines, underbelly, all sorts of stuff in terms of listening.
But I think the most significant thing about listening that really hits me as I think again at this point in my journey is that we are listening so that somebody else understands, which is such an enormous shift from listening so that we understand. Because actually at the end of the conversation, what matters more than anything else is that they've got new insights into their own stuff, not that I have. So we need to listen in a slightly different way.
And if you want my kind of top tip is whatever your job is and however you do what you normally do. If you know that listening differently really matters as part of your development in coaching or in conversations, then start listening like this when you're sitting in a different chair or when you're standing up or when you're in a different room.
If you've been doing listening in the chair that you're probably sitting in right now for a long time, then you're going to find it really difficult to make the shift. listening differently. And the thing that I've learned since the book went to print is that actually when we offer back what we hear we always need to offer it as an author or a question and not a statement.
Because if we use a statement tone when we offer back what we hear then people will start correcting us and they think they're passing information to us. Whereas what we're actually doing when we're listening is we are facilitating them to listen to themselves. So it's like an improv, make an offer, they don't have to take it and they might take it and they might not. And actually that responds, I think, to your question, Mark, you said, in what way does naming emotions risk being diagnostic?
And I think I think it does hugely risk us being diagnostic if for example they're sad and we say you're sad. Can you hear that that's a statement tone? You're sad. Whereas if you go sad, they can go, well, not sad, I'm this. So it allows us to enable them to really pick up and think differently. One of the other questions that we were asked is what's the role of us sharing our own feelings in response to listening, in response to what we hear?
And I guess my response to that is it depends what it's in service of and it also depends on whether it's going to give insight to them or whether they're going to make the conversation about us now. rather than about them. So it's a bit of an inexact science, I think, about whether we share our own feelings. And I think you've got to do that with discretion and wisdom and in a way that it doesn't take very long and that you can withdraw it if it's not very useful.
And I think the other question that you're asking, Mark, what's the role of us sharing information on the kind of climate, what's happening in the here and now? Absolutely, what's happening in the here and now, what's happening between us is very much a significant part of listening.
So we're listening to them, we're listening to what they're saying, we're listening to them in their context, we're noticing what we notice and noticing what's happening between us is super useful because it often reflects something that's going on somewhere else. That Daniel Goleman quote that's on page 21, that the range of what we think and do is limited by what we fail to notice.
And because we fail to notice that we fail to notice, there is little we can do to change until we notice how failing to notice shapes our thoughts and deeds. And that's from Vitalized Simple Truths by Daniel Goleman. So there's something about noticing absolutely as we're listening and there's something about offering short and light and not making it the heavy theme of the conversation because they'll know what we need to pick up.
So some other things that have come up really in terms of insights. Mark Chappell, we listen for the thinker, it's not a way to gather information. We're listening so they can explore and notice for themselves. Reflect back what we notice, sight, sound and movement and potential double messages. It's interesting, isn't it? Because sometimes you're listening to somebody and they say something three or four or five times.
And actually the most useful thing to offer in the listening is I notice you've said that three or four times in this conversation so far. So offering.
What we notice and listening deeply is really at the heart of what then forms really great simple questions because simple questions are going to come from what we see or hear or sense and we'll pick that up when we get to the simple questions chapter but for now I think that listening deeply so that they understand is a really useful and important task in the role of coaching. Someone else said that there's a visual insight.
Notice how much the coaching container is filling up with information, which makes it difficult to see the headlines or feel the underbelly. The more information that we bring into the room that we ask for them, the more it feels like interrogation. but also the more they think we're going to do something with what they say.
And actually, if this is about them having the insights and feeling heard, they need to feel heard, but they don't necessarily need to overload us with information because we will miss then the other stuff, the insights and observations of what we're listening. Listening is the best gift of all. And I just encourage you to really continue on your journey to actively listen simply.
I just had a chat this afternoon with Susan who's doing our social media for this and she said that isn't interesting that there's such a difference between simple listening and simply listening. There's one to ponder. So next week, we're to be looking at simple beginnings.
and how to really get that conversation off to a brilliant start so that we're both clear what we're doing, how we're going to do it and how we're going to know we've done it and we kind of get the focus of the conversation into the right place early on because that's what sets the climate for transformation. So enjoy your read this week and see you next time. Thanks, bye. If you've enjoyed what you've heard today please share the podcast with a friend. who might also be interested.
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