The Silent Skill: How Active Listening Unlocks Leadership Success

Think you're good at listening because you can repeat the last thing someone said think again Most executives only capture a fraction of what's actually being communicated and that's costing them big On today's executive connect podcast. We're welcoming Oscar Trumboli best-selling author and host of the award-winning deep listening podcast He's worked with over 1500 organizations to teach leaders how to go beyond words and uncover insights and drive powerful decisions

Ready to upgrade your listening skills and transform your leadership impact. Let's dive in Welcome Oscar

Good. I'm Alyssa looking forward to listening to your questions today. I Love it now you've been building an impressive career helping leaders go beyond just hearing words to truly listening with meaning What interests you and this passion for deep listening and how did you learn and Lead on your mission of creating a hundred thousand deep listeners Well, you have to zoom into a ordering meeting in April

2008 I'm in a three-way video conference between Sydney Seattle and Singapore and we're setting the annual budget for Microsoft and You can imagine there are lots of people in this very long boardroom and 20 minutes in my supervisor My vice president looks me straight in the eye across the room and she says Oscar We need to talk immediately after this meeting now. I know about you Melissa when you get the honey. We need to talk conversation It's not gonna be good so

To be quite honest. I didn't listen to anything that happened in the rest of that budget meeting which cost me on my budget line a little bit later on and all I was trying to do was figure out how many weeks of salary I had left and Who the five people I'm gonna call together job Meeting finished a little early and as everybody walked out Tracy said to me Oscar police closed the door because what I have to say to you is very important and as I kind of step back after closing the door

She says to me Oscar you have no idea what you do at the 20-minute mark and I thought great I'm getting fired and I don't even know why I sat down and Tracy said if you could code how you listen you could change the world

What I heard was whoo. I haven't been fired and The difference between hearing and listening is the action you take and Ever since then I haven't tried to code how I listen but I've tried to code how the best listeners in the world listen with within a few hundred of them from Hostage negotiators to dolphin trainers and Journalists and judges and

Deaf people and blind people to to understand what great listening is so that's where it started and since then we've coded it into software into books into Cheek saw puzzle games and into the consulting methodologies for use Deep listen deep listening isn't just a skill. It's a discipline that one must practice

So can you break down some of those core elements of deep listening and explain how executives can apply them in their day to day?

Well one of the first fallacies of listening is that focusing on the speaker is where listening starts Kind of that's handy, but it's not actually productive the step but most people skip when it comes to listening is listening to themselves They have so many browser tabs open in their own mind and this is multiplied for executives where I have Balanced meeting the next meeting the upcoming resolution of customer issue quality issue production issue

They've got so many things going on in their mind and they don't have available memory to help everyone out So There's three things I would say that everybody needs to know about listening and the first one is don't focus on the speaker Start by focusing on you The second one is it's great to listen to what people say. It's even more powerful to notice what they haven't said and If you know the numbers of listening it becomes really simple and

Don't focus on yourself. Know what the speaker is going through The speaker can speak at 125 to 150 words a minute if they're selling property They might speak at 200 words per minute. They might go a little faster. You can still understand Here's the challenge for the speaker although they can get a

150 125 words out per minute in their head. I have 900 words per minute. They're trying to get out So the very first thing that somebody says is 14% of what they think So if you're only focused on what they said the first time you're missing 86% of what they think and what they mean And if you want employees and customers to be seen heard and valued By noticing what they haven't said you'll make a big impact So when it comes to listening that the three things we talk about continuously is one

Get yourself right to Make sure that you can hear not just what they say the first time But create some space so they can say what they think and what they mean and then finally if you can hear what they mean Rather than what they said you'll have an impact beyond words and often say to people if I said to you Melissa 3 is half of 8

What will go through your head you'd properly say Oscar's wrong?

You misspoke and yet 3 is half of 8 and Zero is half of 8 and so is 4 See while you're listening to me speaking you're thinking mathematically and you go 4 Oscar 4 is the only answer But if you drew the figure 8 on a piece of paper and cut it in half and Thought about it geometrically you've got two three's when you cut an 8 in half and you've got two zeros when you cut the 8 in half in the middle Every day we're having conversations with people

Where they're saying 3 is half of 8 and then your head you're going no no no you're wrong you're wrong you're wrong In fact, they're just looking at the world in a completely different way So that's how to think about listening beyond the words And I feel like I 14% is such a crazy number to me that's not very good if you're in sales or dealing with people on a regular basis so You know most of us focus on like you said what's being said, but really What's not being said so when people are

Talking to someone how can they is it really just asking the right question so 14%

Listened leaving silence and asking more questions for clarification. Oh, yes, if it was only that simple Yes, that's a great stopping point and But I want to allow you a very simple technique By the way if you work in a complex collaborative or competitive environment The average person thinks that 900 words per minute, but if you're in those complex environments You're thinking up to 1600 words per minute, which means what you say the first time is 5% of what you think

So here's the tip the words silent And the word listen share the identical letters If you want to notice what somebody hasn't said If you just pause if you just use silence It's like a magnet to pull out what they mean For many of us particularly in the West particularly in Western workplaces We feel an urge to fill the silence We have our negative relationship with silence We call it the awkward silence the pregnant pause the deafening silence In high context cultures China career Japan

The in-your-of-north America the Polynesian cultures the Australian Aboriginal cultures Silence is a sign of wisdom respect and authority So if you're looking for one simple thing To draw out what I mean Quite often silence is the most difficult thing you're ever going to play with Treat silence like a word Listen to the beginning of the middle and the end of silence which will give you enough time to go Oh, they haven't finished what they think

They're just moving on to explaining it in a different way Most people have a jumbled mess of spaghetti inside their head And it's unlikely they can say what they mean the very very first time If you're looking for two simple other phrases These phrases take the Conversation in very different directions Tell me more keeps the conversation going in the same direction So if you want to listen for what similar If you want to bring the group together

If it's a group conversation it's always tell me more So that keeps the conversation going in the same direction But if you're listening trying to listen for difference And most people are uneven conscious that they listen for similarities exclusively because they're just trying to pattern match with past experience The other one is and what else?

now questions with eight words or less neutral or unbiased and in the early part of a conversation in the early part of a relationship in the early part of a project you want to watch neutral questions In the middle towards the end of the conversation or a project you do want to ask close questions So a lot of people say you should always ask open-ended questions

That's true if you're a psychiatrist But if you're in a workplace and you got finite resources you have to allocate Bice questions have a place as well And the pause I always think of like I've been in some of those meetings that you're talking about where everybody is talking Posing is almost like it's so uncomfortable that it makes people you could tell who's paying attention to right when you pause

I feel like the pause a lot of times you I could always tell oh they know they're not paying attention and it also is like like you said a seeker lepon to Really getting more information but also paying attention to see who's paying attention And I think now do you think it's because The westerners are just uncomfortable with the pause or do you think it's just a lack of discipline?

I think comes to what's role modeled in the culture by the leader If you've got leaders who are comfortable with the unknown To explore to experiment to not think they have the answer to every question Now you'll see pauses and silence and Always present If you if you're like use weight W Hey IT Why am I talking as a way to think about silence? So if you can't remember silent and listening have the same letters just remember weight why am I talking?

because often particularly in group settings the lead as role is not to get everybody to listen to the active speaker The leaders role in groups is to get everybody to listen to each other and creating That space whether through silence or an offer for somebody else to provide input is a great way to get a different And possibly better solution to the same problem So leaders set the tone and If leaders are comfortable flexing that muscle

Then the group becomes more comfortable as well particularly if people are jumping in in turn taking and The leader might say I noticed that Mary hadn't quite finished Oscar Hold that thought we're gonna come back to you This is particularly plays out with the classic introvert extrovert dynamic in a meeting as well I want to go back to that example You set at the beginning with the budget meeting and everybody's in the room now How like playing off that example?

How how do you teach leaders in those situations where? You know, there's multiple executives in the room You know everybody has to give their you know their pitch to get their dollars. How do you teach them? These skills that you're talking about is there a certain method that you use or how do you teach them that so they can make better decisions? in their careers Well the first thing to think about is listening and communication happens before during and after those set-piece meetings

A lot of the success of those meetings happen well before the meeting It's a piece of theater to be honest whether that's a set-piece meeting that's presidential negotiation all the works done by others before hand The during pieces really critical if you're the leader who's hosting that meeting process is as important as content how you Set time up how you ask questions How you allocate time to various parts of it

Most leaders I work with have agendas and think that's the answer and in most cases It's the answer to the output It's not the answer to the process or the imports that are coming into the conversation So during the meeting No matter how many participants there are if you don't ask this question Most people will zone out during team meetings If you don't ask this question you won't get the most from everybody if you don't ask this question

You won't get discretionary effort if you don't ask this question You won't get the left field breakthrough ideas and the question is simply this What would make this a great meeting Not what would make this a great meeting for you which I hear a lot of executives ask But we're actually not interested in what will make it a great meeting for the participant We're asking for the collective so we want everybody to go around the room and say well

We'll make it a great meeting because when somebody zones out I invite them to go listen for what the other person said and That will give you a different perspective in terms of listening So before the meeting make sure you have Everybody who are the right people in the room with the right inputs during the meeting make sure you have the right process set up By asking this question what will make it a good meeting conversation project Acquisition procurement process

You can interrupt people that tell the same story just different ways a lot of people say oh I can't listen to these people They just go on and on and it's like When you ask that question at the beginning you have a permission slip to interrupt them Melissa at the beginning of the meeting you mentioned this would make it a great meeting Given where you're out with the story how are we tracking?

They will self correct in most cases and if they don't and lack the self awareness Then you can just say look given the time available Could you wrap it up? Could you say it in a sentence?

Whatever the case may be that also make a point to check in with them a lot of times the reason people say things over and over and over again They feel like they haven't been heard Finally after the meeting this is where the biggest impact happens The difference between hearing and listening is action if you don't take the actions and the actions of a Regret in the meeting nobody will ever think you're listening in group meetings So again you need a process for tracking actions and

Checking in on actions before the next meeting so listening happens before during and after a meeting I love it made me when you when you were saying I'm one of those people that have all these file folders open So let me go for meeting to meeting to meeting we're still digesting the last meeting and the meeting before the other meeting You know to figure out what we got to get done and then we're showing up to a meeting that we're

You know responsible for bringing something so how does one navigate and juggle that right? I think even for myself I do like you said have all those file folders open and when I Get on a call I'm still trying to like who saw and like bring it down

To to really lean in and focus on the current meeting. So is there any You know tips for those leaders and executives that are going for meeting to meeting really attacking the day and problem-solving all the time that you can share Yeah, I'm gonna give you two

both very practical number one Well, listen if you had to speculate what percentage of meetings do you create like is it 50% 80% 20% Great for those 50% of meetings is your most common meeting a one-hour meeting or a 30 minute meeting I've been trying to do the 25 meeting mark and the 50 meeting mark so there's kind of minutes in between the other meetings I heard the trying I Didn't hear what you said after that. So are you doing it or are you trying it?

Well in my in my industry everything happens at the last end of the meeting right everything happens at the end So we kind of waste the beginning Parts of the meeting then we get into the meeting and then everything happens at the end because like you were saying at the beginning Not everybody was paying attention

So we're really going back and addressing all of those things. So I would say I Give myself a C I could be doing that Most executives would and if you've got an assistant just handover and delegate it to them But the further one hour meeting is definitely the five minutes either side When your book a meeting with me it's ten minutes after the hour and Everybody says to me at the beginning did you make a mistake?

We meant to meet it ten after the hour. I said no No, that that was by design and they go oh, that's great because I had a restroom break Had a chance to collect my thoughts and I also Take off ten minutes at the end So they can process the meeting so for the 50% you're in charge of you can time box it So that you and the participants have got time either side of it because if you started the top of the hour

And it's a group meeting people still gonna arrive five minutes after the hour. It's like Sorry, so I was running late I had a listen that ran over because the big breakthrough idea only came at the last minute in the last meeting and and they're not there They're physically present but they're mentally not present So listening as humans as we evolved we learned to listen

After we learned to see so our eyesight is more evolved than our listening our listening happens in the more modern part of the brain The prefrontal cortex so shutting down those browser tabs is really difficult because we're using working memory The brain 5% of body mass but it consumes 25% of blood sugars

That this is where the work happens. So the second tip is this Drink water drink a glass of water before the meeting starts and it sends a signal to the parasympathetic nervous system That's all the nervous system around your chest and lungs to go relax everything's okay Now if you just time box it and drink the water You're gonna be miles ahead listening is a skill It's a strategy and it's a discipline It's not something that

Oscar clicks his magic fingers come on the course and off you go it's done You're the world's best listener now Listening takes discipline it takes practice takes consistency The listening is a contact sport the only way you can practice it is by being in dialogue with another human So greatly you're trying the time boxing With your teams If you're a leader Hopefully that will cascade into the meetings they create as well

So the time boxing happens and explain to people why you're time boxing as often as possible Because time is the only finite resource we have in an organization money people That much more flexible than our time

Yeah, I love that that's a great the great tips now We talked a little bit at the beginning you mentioned Japan and some other

Cultures that have you know they they have been trained to do it. It's embedded into their culture Now how can we take what's being used in other parts of the world and really embed it and bad deep listening into our corporate culture is there a way That one could kind of blend that into a culprit culture if a culture is not as you said into deep listening And everybody is kind of just fighting their way through the meeting is there a way to embed that

See there's what I did I read I re ask the question Beautiful beautiful example of 125 words per minute Melissa. Thank you Completely out of a rest and well done, but that's a perfect example of that and if you go back and he molasses First-day question and the host second question that actually had very different emphasis in meaning in them So as a as a leader in a corporate system one of the things you want to pay attention to for the meetings you run is this How many

Statements are made versus how many questions are made during a conversation you can keep a tally of this just Put your little one two three four five and then stroke with a gate so you can keep tallys in five And then just notice the ratio of statements to questions For underperforming teams the statement ratio is very much higher in underperforming teams to the questions Now depending there's no magic formula and 50 50 is probably not a good start start for 25% questions

And 75% statements that's a good starting point Here's the most important thing you've got to pay attention to When you look at the questions how many of those questions are clarifying questions most people are answering the question that wasn't asked Why because they didn't allow enough space for Melissa to say it the second time Or confirm with Melissa when you said x did you mean X or did you mean Y or did you mean Z or did you mean something else

Clarifying questions should be at least 10% of the total Conversation and should represent at least a third of all questions asked When you increase the clarifying question ratio in team meetings

Your meetings will actually be shorter Those examples that Melissa talked about earlier where everything kind of comes at the end of the meeting That's because we're just not listening Effectively and we get the chance to pull up fall wood By asking some simple clarifying questions Because remember again most of us are going for four four is half of eight you're wrong you're wrong you're wrong Well, I'm thinking geometrically you're thinking in mathematics

So maybe we just need to agree on the language So for leaders just keep a count You can do this in your one-on-ones as well Just keep a running count of how many times you're asking questions versus statements the opposite is true too Too many questions Doesn't feel like listening it just feels like you're loading up more ammunition in a gun to put somebody in a court So be careful with how many questions you ask as well Which one of those is helpful for you

I call that interrogation the too many questions Yeah, I know Go ahead sorry sorry No, no, I just noticed your head tilted very differently when I talked about clarifying questions compared to statement to question right Shows and I think you heard it a little differently Yeah, and I think For me sometimes I know I'm guilty

Jumping to conclusions, right? I'm coming hot out of a meeting and I know what's a meeting is going to be about And so I instantly think I know what's gonna so I'm instantly jumping to conclusions I guilty of it guilty of that and so how can we teach people to not be that Jumping to conclusions you know talking over people interrupting people finishing people senses is there Is it simple is just muting your your computer so you just don't do it or is there another So there's

For for for primary barriers to listening we're very such 35,000 white place listeners across the world in English speaking Workplaces and there's four things that get in their way number one the one you said I've been there. I've done that I it's not my first rodeo I can patent match I can solve hurry up Finish a sentence because I know the answer right so we call that the shiroud listening villain That are awesome. They give great listening. They give you lots of mm-hmm, uh-huh

In their head they're not paying attention at all the side hurry ups. I can tell you the answer And what the speaker says in our research is all they're trying to do is fix me they're not actually listening So notice they say fix me not the problem So for those shrewd listening villains out there your disproportionately represented in finance in accounting in human resources in General and executive leadership any service function IT and

Sales shrewd is disproportionately represented there interrupting is someone who's very conscious of time And but they're the jeopardy quiz contestant who presses the buzzer before the host and they answer the wrong question and get it wrong And what the speaker says is you know one more bother talking, you know So you're creating friction in the relationship The final two is lost. I don't know my purpose in this meeting

I don't know why I've been invited. I don't even know my place in the meeting So you come across as vague and disinterested in the meeting ask that question if the host doesn't ask you What what will make this a good meeting? So you can understand would you like me to listen from the customers perspective? Would you like me to listen from the competitors perspective? What perspective would you like me to bring in this meeting? And then the final one the dramatic listener

They love listening to your story. Oh, I'm struggling with my manager. This is the worst merger I've ever gone through Oh, let me tell you about my manager I've got I've got an even worse manager than you all of a sudden the spot white goes on to them So if you want to find out which one of the four listening villains gets in your way You can go to listeningquiz.com you can take the seven minute 20 question assessment You'll get a five page report

It'll tell you not only what your primary and secondary villain is but it also give you Three pages of tips about what to do about that combination of villains in yours I'm not going to ask you to out yourself Melissa because you already have you're the shrewd listening villain Yeah, we listen differently at home

Then we listen our work at work. I'm a shrewd listening villain at home I'm lost my brother-in-law's bang on about religion all the time when they come over dinner is like And they religion is the religion of canon versus Nikon it's photography and like my my camera is my phone It's like occasionally I pretend I'm interested in the conversation but most of the time I'm not so I'm completely zoned out. I don't know my purpose in that conversation

So your skills of listening dumb well at work you can bring them into home as well at least you need to be aware of what gets in your way Now you're making me question my listening I'm thinking through how I'm doing listening I find for me I have to put myself on a way and everything down Otherwise, I'm distracted with listening with the beings and the the calls and the this and the this so like you were We listen different in our work in our home

I know in my home if I don't put the phone away for I'm half listening which we know if I'm half listening I can't possibly be really listening So for me the the simple thing of putting the phone down in a way and sitting And not thinking about what I need to be doing next and not what I need to be accomplishing later Is the only way I've really been grounded in listening personally with my children and my family So I have to practice this more

Maybe I'll try the phone putting the phone away at work and see how that works Focus in better You're you're my me an executive of flew from the US to Australia effectively a 24 hour flight I was hosting a room of 30 CEOs on his behalf, Peter's behalf

He sat down the meeting was about to commence. I introduced everybody and then he got up And went to his bag and put his cell phone in his bag and he sat down and he said look I've traveled 24 hours to be here I apologize I need to bring my full and undivided attention to this conversation 19 of the 30 executives did exactly the same straight away As a leader why you raw model to your teams will get you located Now I know after the fact that this is a piece of theatre

That Peter created to make sure the executives paid attention to him and nothing to do with that And more importantly as he said to me laid Oscar I don't care if they pay attention to me. I wanted them to pay attention to each other And that's the difference between a good host and a great host a good host gets everybody listen to them A great host gets everybody to listen to each other So what are you role modeling when it comes to devices

Are you role modeling frantic? Are you role modeling sneaky? Are you role modeling or Can you simply say Look My dad's under medical care He's got an appointment today my phone will be on The only reason I'll answer it is his from his doctor So if that phone does ring people don't get oh yeah

Tells all of us to do it right but he doesn't do it himself. So there are situations where you can't Switch the phone or you might have a child at sick or a daycare center that needs to contact you There are many reasons why the phone should be on And signal that to the team But it should be the exception rather than all And that's a really great example too because you're being so authentic and honest And I think that builds trust with people and you know

You're not becoming a hypocrite like you were mentioning to Tell them they can't be on their phone but you're on your phone So I love that example that's so such a really important example Now do you think any of it has to do With the technology itself like the Constant need I kind of feel sometimes the phones kind of like an addiction and I feel like We're constantly feeling like we have to be busy and Important in doing things and answering texts and

Social media is is that planning and to any of it you think or is it just flat learning how to be a better listener So I want to apologize I'm from the industry that created all those distractions

I sold Email systems and instant messengers systems and video conference systems And what I taught then and what I teach now is actually not different By default you should switch all those notifications off Right that that you have a new mail whether that's on your phone or on your tablet or on your desktop really Doesn't really matter that much Or is it more important to role model being present to the person or people who are in front of you Use the technology don't let the technology use you

You have one button in every operating system That if turned on will switch off all notifications based on what's in your calendar So if your calendar is empty you'll get the notifications and if your calendar's got a meeting in it I won't notify you Before you did was just switch that setting in your operating system to on No notifications during meetings That would help many many many many people

For a lot of people switching notifications off is like telling a drug addict they need to go call turkey They will never do it Maybe switch your phone to grayscale When you're in those meetings So those little red dots that go from one to two to three to four to five aren't as prominent for you Learn how to use the vibrate feature rather than use the ring feature Use the technology don't let the technology use you all those red dots and notifications and vibrations and sounds

All come from the exact same piece of research in 1973 that taught the software industry Based on the slot machine industry in Las Vegas how to keep people pressing a button mindlessly to put coins in it So if you want to be a mindless gambler Keep your notifications on It didn't occur to me until you said that oscar that I have had my phone on off the entire time I've owned my iPhone I don't even think my phone is ever

Raying unless it was an emergency and it didn't occur to me until just now that I have them all I do not just turn or silent So maybe that's why I'm more peaceful. I don't know that could be it. I didn't occur to me so just now I want to get any I want to ask you any final thoughts or anything that we didn't touch on that you want to leave with our listeners today Now simply a reminder that the first thing somebody said is unlikely to be what they think and what they mean

And if you truly want to have an impact beyond words Listen to what they have to say But notice what they haven't said is The 86% sits in what they haven't said and when you hear What they haven't said your meetings will be shorter. They'll be more productive and more impactful That's great. Thank you for sharing that oscar now tell our listeners Where they can connect with you and what's the best way?

Please don't connect with me please connect with your listening visit listening quiz.com and learn about your listening And if you do want to connect with me once you take the quiz you'll get all the fancy pants coordinates in there where you can stay in touch with me if you want to But it's more important you discover or get in the way of your listening than spending time talking to me

Thank you so much for being here oscar and sharing your time with our listeners. That's the executive connect podcast

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