The Sound of Silence: Mastering the Art of Conversation #56

After all, all art is experience.

Hello and welcome to The Company Doctor, where today Gary and I are talking about the importance of good quality listening. Gary has some incredible tips on how you can become a more engaged and engaging conversationalist, salesperson, and networker, simply by applying some simple practices. You'll find lots more tips and advice on a huge range of topics over at thecompanydoctor.com, where you can also join our mailing list. But in the meantime, get Get ready to get curious, to talk like a tortoise and think like a hare, and to harness the power of your emotional intelligence as we explore the sound of silence, mastering the art of listening.

Please don't think me presumptuous if I give you—

Gary, ahoy!

Ahoy! That's a nautical theme today, but isn't this about listening?

It is. I couldn't think of a listening-themed hello, so I just went nautical.

Ahoy is definitely not one of them. No. But good. Ahoy to you. Ahoy to everyone listening.

Yes, ahoy everyone. And we're talking listening today, and it's a big one.

Gary sort of prepped me before this and said this is this is a big one. This is so big. Yeah. I hope you're listening, George.

I am. I am now.

Good.

And you've given me some of your notes, and I've got to say, even some of your notes is probably the biggest sort of list of notes that you've ever sent me, most comprehensive set of notes I've ever received.

Yeah, you should see my notes. You only got half of it, but yeah, it's going to be great. And one of the reasons I am looking forward to this episode is that I've got to try and navigate contradicting everything else we've told people before. That's always tricky because listening is a completely misunderstood topic. I think most people think it's about listening more. Yeah. And we're going to uncover the fact that it might not be.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And it is a tricky one. I think it's fundamental, obviously, in business, which is what we did while we're talking about it today. But I think even as just a human skill, it's something which everyone could stand to be a bit better at, myself included.

We could all do that. All do that. But anyway, we're going to get into it. We're going to listen and maybe even talk a bit. Try and listen more than we talk, who knows? I know, but I'm looking forward to all the difficult questions you're going to be asking me.

Oh, absolutely.

I vaguely got 3 areas of topics. Great. Actually, just to complicate things, to test people that they're listening, my 3 topics for today are IQ, EQ, and XQ, which are not obvious. No.

I had to look some of these things up and I still don't know.

Did you? Yeah. I mean, I wrote them and I don't even know what they are. But I thought, you know, I think there's an expectation in listening that we're going to talk about, you've got two ears and one mouth and all that kind of stuff, which is lovely, but it's not the reality of life. But we'll come back to that. Yeah. So, are you ready?

I'm ready. Let's dive in.

Are you listening?

I'm really listening.

So, you know, I think just as an introduction to the topic. I just want to kind of introduce a bit of a kind of Venn diagram, which is not an obvious thing for listening, but if the principle of listening is to first seek to understand and develop a mutual understanding. So definition of like communication is when both parties understand hopefully the same thing in the same way. So listening is a bit more complex than, what did you say? Sorry, what did you say?

Hello?

With that in mind, if you think about it, if you agree with that, then the understanding of what someone is saying dramatically increases in proportion to our ability to ask questions and then listen to the answer. Hmm.

Would you mind just repeating that?

Because I think I get it. Yes, if you weren't listening.

It's quite a tricky one. Yeah, my mind had wandered.

So basically, if listening is about first seeking to understand and developing this kind of mutual understanding, That understanding is increased in proportion to our ability to ask good questions, right? To have something to listen to.

No, I like it. And I guess this links to our How to Ask Bloody Good Questions.

It does, but I'm going to give— that's why I'm worried, because I'm going to give a slightly different take on— I'm not going to talk about how to ask good questions. I want to give a slightly different take from a listening perspective.

No, that's great.

Yeah. So here's the test, because you've done all this research, right? So what is IQ?

Intelligence quotidian, or quotidian, or something.

Did you do Latin at school?

I did actually, yeah. Oh right, well maybe you could try harder. Yeah, not very well.

Yeah, it means that. It's either intelligence or intellectual ability, but we'll come back to that. Yeah, what about EQ?

Yeah, this is where I sort of struggled because I know EQ is like a sound thing, like an equalizer.

Oh yeah, turn up the equalizer because you're a music man.

Because I'm a music man.

Yeah, well it does mean that, but not today. But yeah, it does mean that. What does it mean in this context, you think? We talk a lot about it on the podcast, all the time, banging on about it.

Something about questions?

No, it's emotional intelligence, really.

Oh, I see.

Right, okay, yeah. Yeah, so EQ is the quotient. Is that a French word, or are we just embarrassing myself? Anyway, the Q is the quotient, but it's really emotional intelligence. And the new kid in town, because everyone knows about IQ, EQ, or they've heard of it, they know what it means. Is XQ, X factor. What do you think the X? Experience. It could be experience, but normally is experience, but it isn't in this case, it's execution.

Right, okay.

And this is where the Venn diagram comes in, right? So the 1980s view of listening is, you know, you just listen a bit harder, pay attention, you know, and then you're off to the races. But in the reality of it, life isn't that simple. It's kind of three-dimensional. So think about an overlapping Venn diagram, whatever that means. Of IQ. So the being, you know, we're going to talk about these in detail in a minute, but the intellectual part of listening. Yeah. The EQ, which is the emotional part, the emotional connection to listening. And the XQ is the execution, because what's the point of listening if you're not really connecting, joining the dots?

Okay, so that's sort of the action as a result of the listening.

Yeah, it's a bit like, have you ever put Mentos in a bottle of Coke?

Yeah, I have.

What happened?

It explodes.

Yeah, there's a chemical reaction, right? So the XQ is the chemical reaction. So here's my visual. There's lots of t-shirt moments today, George, by the way.

Just like— great, that's my favorite.

Yeah, so here's my t-shirt moment. If someone was saying something to me and I'm— if I'm listening, it's a bit like they're tossing the ball at me. And not listening is like I've got my arms pinned to my side, right? You throw the ball at me, the ball hits me, bounces off me, Lands on the floor. I had this actually before, just as an aside. I went to a conference once and I gave someone my business card, which I know is a bit old-fashioned, but they kept— they didn't, you know, when you reach out to give someone something, yeah, they didn't, they didn't reach out to take it and just kindly say that and throw it behind their back. They just said, I don't do business cards, I don't do paper, I don't do paper. And it was embarrassing because I had my hand out and they had their hands by their side. That's what this listening thing is about.

But I'm refusing a handshake.

Yeah. Exactly. And a lot of people go through listening like that. They've got their hands pinned to the side. Yeah, no, I like that. And it's awkward. Do you like that?

Well, I like the analogy. I don't like it when people do it.

No, no. Okay, so, you know, that's, that, yeah, that's where we're starting at. So therefore it's all about effective questioning, because good questions unite the I, the intelligence, the E, the emotional part, and the execution bits together. It's the good questions of the glue. We've done an episode on Bloody Good Questions, so I'm not gonna do it again, but I want to give you another take on questions because I think you need to get something good to listen to. Yeah, yeah, you with me?

Yeah, yeah, no, I am.

So with that in mind, I think the biggest word I want to throw into the mix before I get into part 1 is the word empathy. What does it— what does empathy mean? When I say empathy, what do you think?

It's sort of relating to a situation, and it's not quite sympathy, but it's, it's about emotional intelligence, isn't it? It's about emotional connections.

And yeah, a lot of people say is understanding. Understand where someone's coming from. But, but that's what empathy means. It comes from a French word, empathie, which I've got a terrible accent, but it only means to understand. And the point of listening is to understand where someone's coming from. You don't have to agree with them, by the way. And I think this is part of the issue. So people like— we're going to talk about a bit later, but people go off in a trance when someone says something because they don't agree with it, and then they go on a journey with how bad it is and how terrible it is and what it means. And before they know it, they're like they dreamed. Yeah, I do that when I'm driving sometimes. You've done this where you're driving? Oh, you're not driving that much. Well, when you do— um, throw that in— when, uh, when you're driving, sometimes you didn't remember any of the journey, you just like ended up somewhere and you don't remember how you got there.

Yeah, I do it when I walk, and I also do it when I cycle.

Yes, dangerous, which is very dangerous. Yeah, so anyway, I think a lot of people go through life in that way, so they kind of go off in a trance while people are talking. So, uh, like you're doing right now as I'm speaking to you. So let's get into the topic. Yeah, and I'll probably finish now. I've spoken a lot, but anyway, let's get into it. So part 1 is the IQ. So I want to talk about the truth about listening intellectually. Now, uh, with COVID with remote working— and I'm not dissing remote working, I'm not even going to go there because there's a place for it and it's fantastic— but we've kind of lost some of the non-verbal cues. Absolutely. You agree?

I definitely—

sometimes I go on calls. You ever been on calls where people don't go on the video. Yeah, cultures don't do it right.

I had an interview once where the person that was interviewing me was off, had the camera off. It was bananas.

Yeah, and it's weird, isn't it? And, and the other thing, so that's kind of, that heightened the problem for me a bit because I've kind of found that, you know, those, the nonverbals are harder to, to work out. And the other thing I was thinking about when I went into a trance was listening is rarely taught. In fact, most university students are really well taught how to present. Do you agree? Presentation skills, and no one teaches listening skills. You've ever been on a course, they go, you know what, I'm going to teach you how to listen. You think they're mad, right?

That's a really good point. And as we said, it's like, it's a really fundamental skill. So it is something that's just as important, if not more so, than presenting and appearing confident when you're speaking.

Definitely. And in fact, being a good presenter means you're a good listener as well, right?

Yeah. And another thing I would say is that having having been on so many video calls and the sort of the, as you say, the visual cues that you can't see when you're on camera, I now see it sort of double when I'm in a real-life meeting, which is strange.

You've got double vision?

Yeah, I had a few whiskies before. No, it's, I'm just sort of noticing them a lot more now because they're heightened. Yeah, because you don't see it on the camera. So when you do have an IRL meeting, I've just, I notice them a lot more than perhaps I would have done. Anyway, that doesn't matter.

No, it does matter, and it's a very good point. So that— and this is kind of actually leading to what I want to talk about, because, you know, I think questions are fundamental. You know, listening equals questions to me. And, and part of the reason that people are bad listeners is they're trying to impress people, like I'm trying to do with you right now. But here's, here's my thoughts, right? I think good questions demonstrate your knowledge, expertise, and credibility better than saying how smart you are. Yeah. So a lot of people will show off how, you know, like introductions, uh, I used to be the intergalactic manager of blah blah blah. I mean, well done, but it doesn't matter because being a better listener is part of the key. And if the objective of a conversation has got two goals, I would say first goal is to understand what the other person's communicating, hopefully the same thing we said at the beginning. And the second one, and see if you agree with this, is to convey interest and engagement and caring. Because if you're talking to someone and they're like looking out the window, yeah, or they're looking at their, what, you know, bloody iWatch. Yeah, I'm guilty of this. It keeps beeping at me and that makes me look. It doesn't show that interest in what you're saying when I'm speaking to someone.

And phones as well, people constantly talk while I'm talking to them, looking at their phones.

Exactly. So, so this is, you know, for people listening, I want you to think of this in a different way. Just Focus. If you're going to go to the trouble of listening to someone, then just, you know, actually zone in to that person and, you know, really, really focus. Because if you can convey interest— I've had conversations before where I said absolutely nothing, but I listened genuinely to someone and they told me what a great conversation it was. I didn't say a word. Yeah, bless them, thank you very much, but I never said anything. And I want to transpose this to people in business. So if you're in sales, if you're in customer service, if you're a consultant, this is a really important skill because consultants— I'll use consultants as an example because I am one— consultants frequently don't hear what clients are saying because they're not listening. They're missing an opportunity to hear what someone's actually saying because they're so busy thinking. Yeah, they're off in a trance. And then the other thing is they use their own language and their own words. Therefore they don't speak the client's language and therefore they don't communicate. They miss out on any report because they're talking like ships in the night. You may think, what's this got to do with listening? I think it's got a lot, you know, it's got a lot to do with listening.

Well, I think picking up on the language point, you know, that's a huge thing, isn't it? Using the same language as someone that's talking to you. A lot of people do it instinctively anyway, but I think it's definitely something to take on. And, you know, we do it at work and it definitely helps. I mean, not to a point of forcing it, but I think it definitely is a sort of, it's almost a subconscious thing that you can take on.

Yeah. And so that's important. So if you're really focused on what someone's saying and you're asking questions, but you're using their language, but more importantly, you're trying to understand genuinely where they're coming from, what they're really saying. We're going to talk a little bit about nuances in a minute, but otherwise you're missing out because actually you're talking at opposite ends. You're so busy talking about you and what you're trying to do or what your company is trying to do, and they're saying something completely different and you're misunderstanding them. Yeah. So the meaning of words, they kind of deal with the tip of communication. You're almost like you're misfiring and completely misunderstand someone by not listening properly.

Yeah.

This is what the lazy people in the world say. They'll say something like, if you want to be good at listening, here's an obvious one, uh, listen more, speak less. Yeah, no shit. Um, yeah, you've got two ears and one mouth. Yeah, I agree with that. So I told him, right, if you want a diet, here's an idea, exercise more, eat less. There we go.

Yeah, you've solved it.

The world is solved, you know. So my second point is, and hopefully you're getting this, is that distractions will deafen you. Distractions definitely, especially if you're a bloke. If you're a man, distractions will deafen you. Have you ever— I was walking yesterday, I was up in Newcastle actually, just showing off about my cosmopolitan—

Travelling ways.

Yeah, you bet. And someone was on their phone and they bumped into a lamppost. It wasn't so sad, it was really funny.

Yeah, no, I've seen, I've seen this.

She was really shocked, and then when she got up, she tripped over me. Which was all over the place. But avoiding distractions is so important. So I talked about the watch and the phones, and I'm guilty. I'm not saying I'm perfect, right? But, you know, for the— a good example is for this podcast, we put our notifications on, we turn our phones off because it messes up the recording. So we've got a reason to do it. And in the olden days, if you went to a garage, then analog phones could set fire to the petrol pump. So you didn't have your phones on. But here's a bigger reason: distractions deafen you.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And I think the main one for me, I don't know if you find this as well, but it's other conversations. So if I'm talking to someone and I can hear another conversation going on, it's almost like I can't not tune into what's going on there.

Like, it's—

yeah, and it's not being nosy, it's just attracted.

I think you are a little bit nosy, George. Yeah, you're attracted to it.

Yeah, I just can't filter it out. Yeah, so that's a difficult one.

Yeah, no, it's true. In fact, sometimes it's even more interesting, isn't it? Yeah, that's the worst. Some of the conversations we have, it's actually more interesting to listen to someone else. And the second part of distraction is Dolly Daydream. Because when you speak to someone, I mean, they might be boring, no offense to people, right? So it could be boring. It could send you into a trance. But normally someone triggers something in your mind and it makes you go off and daydream. The car example is a classic, but I'm not saying go completely, but either you'll focus on the next question to ask Or someone says something that spurs you off to think about something else and you forgot to put the dinner on or something. Before you know it, you're absolutely not listening to them.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So here's my tip. You don't need to act like you're paying attention if you're paying attention.

How about that? Nice.

Is that a t-shirt moment?

I think it might be.

Go on, give it to me, George.

It's definitely— I think we've got the things that aren't t-shirts are the things like you have two ears and one mouth. They're not t-shirts, but this I think we have t-shirts.

We have 1980s, but this is 21st century stuff.

That's it. This is t-shirt territory.

Good answer, George. Thank you so much. Okay, we're going to move to part 2 because that's the intellectual side of listening, which, you know, if you're listening, you're thinking, well, that's great, it doesn't help me. So I want to help you. Part 2 is about emotional intelligence, EQ. I've got a quick story to tell you. It's not always the case that you should listen. Here's my example. Have you ever been to a wedding where the canopies are coming out and you're talking to someone that you don't know? You're at the wedding, you're talking to someone you don't know, and you can see the canopies and you want the mini burger. And you end up looking at the person thinking, I'd rather have the mini burger than talk to that person. Excuse me a minute, and you run off. But there are times where, and that's emotional intelligence as well, because you're hungry and that person was boring. So that happens, right?

Yes, that happened to me not too long ago, actually.

Did it? Don't say who it was. They might be listening.

Possibly.

They need to be more interesting. But that aside, because that's really unfair. That aside, the key to emotional intelligence on listening is to be more interested than interesting. Okay. Thoughts? Be more interested than interesting.

I think that's— it would require quite a big shift in mindset, wouldn't it? Because most people are so hardwired to want to be interesting when they're talking. They're sort of like, right, I need to get my point across, or I need to tell my funny story. Or, you know, there are sort of memes about people just waiting for the other person to finish so you can tell your story that's even funnier. So yes, I think it's definitely—

Enough about you, let me talk about me.

Shut up a minute. Yeah, I think it's absolutely something which resonates. It's just I can see it being a really tricky one to do.

It is not easy. It's not easy at all. And the secret to it is to be curious. And asking questions is the key to curiosity. And the other thing at the same time, because none of this is easy, right? Is you've got to fight against your own prejudices. Yeah, because you could be speaking to someone that you don't relate to, or you might not like what they did, or, or you might have a very firm view about something. But I'm not— I said at the beginning, you don't have to agree with someone, you just need to give them the right to be listened to. Yeah, but curiosity is the key to it. And unfortunately, when we're kids, it gets kind of knocked out of us. So I've told this story before, but I remember when my kids were younger and they, they— when they reached 3, they wake up in the morning and they start asking why. Because they become curious. Why, Dad? Why is it? Yeah, why is it? Once one of my kids said, why is a dog not a horse? What do you mean, why is a dog not a horse? Sounds like a riddle. Ridiculous question. Ask your mother. And then we kind of slap them around. No, we don't do that. But you kind of, you get cross with them, and then they don't ask. And by the time you become an adult, you don't want to be too curious because it hurts.

Yeah.

But I think to be a good listener, you need to be you need to be more curious.

I totally agree with that.

So curiosity for the non-curious, here we go. This is for you. Yeah, you got to be a little bit nosy. So you've got to be a little, you know, George was saying he's a bit nosy, but you know, you don't want to be like, it's not interrogation. And you may be sitting there thinking, well, it's all right for you to say, Gary, I mean, you're talking to George, he's an amazing guy. And he is, and everyone tells me, George the podcast, I mean, thank God for George. But here's what I'm going to say to you. You might come across people that are boring, right? Do you agree?

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

Absolutely. Here's my thought: everyone is interesting if you ask the right questions. Everyone's got an interesting story, you just need to get to it. Yeah. So focus. If someone— if you decide that you want to listen, and try it because you'll be amazed by it, can I just say— and this is where I'm being controversial because we've got an amazing podcast on how to ask bloody good questions, and you know what, it was a masterclass in asking bloody good questions— but for this moment For this listening moment, I want you to be immersed in what people are saying without thinking about the next question. I'm going to give you a tip. You want to know what it is? Yes, please. You're welcome. The tip is this: forget— don't— I mean, this is weird because I've got loads of questions I've written down. So don't write any questions down for— take the next conversation you have with someone, do a bit of research about them or their company, but don't write any questions down and only ask them questions based on what they tell you. What does that mean to you? And how does that work? That's really interesting. How did you find that? And just ask them questions. Only ask them questions about what they've told you. Why would that be a benefit?

Well, I suppose it's the relatability thing, but then you just reeled off a few sort of examples there of like almost sort of crutch questions, which I think it would also be quite useful to have. I don't know if you agree with that, but sort of, you know, things like, and why was that important to you? And you know, that sort of stuff you could use in any situation.

Oh, okay. I didn't realize I did that. Yeah, no, no, it was good.

I mean, it was great. And I think that sometimes you do need that, you know, if someone's not giving you the full story or if you're not getting what you want from them, those sorts of little probing questions.

Yeah, maybe. So, but, so then base it on, but, but base all your questions on what they've told you. So if someone said to you, for example, I, I recently changed jobs, I pivoted during COVID and I changed jobs, then ask some questions about that. How did that work? And what made you do it? And are you pleased you did it? And just ask questions about that. I've got no other questions written down. I just want to know Not to the point where they go, just leave me alone. Yeah, I told you, man, get off me. But not that much. But yeah, you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, just enough. And then, you know, don't be shallow. And I don't mean it that way. Be deep. Go deep. Don't go be shallow. So shallow is— here's the shallow one. Meet someone for the first time, you say, oh, hi, how are you? Where'd you live? Where'd you come from? How long you worked here? These are the shallow questions. Nothing wrong with them. Go deep. Ask them about some of their interests, maybe past, present, future, but just, but just ask some questions about themselves and on the things that they're saying. Yeah. And then try to actively not listen to the voice inside your head because the voice inside your head is taking you somewhere else.

Yeah.

I'm giving you my full attention, George. Anything you say is really interesting. I'm genuinely interested and I'm genuinely gonna ask you questions to show my interest in what you're saying because I do generally care.

And it's so tough not to, when someone is talking, sort of make a mental note, be like, oh, I'll ask about that in a minute. Do you know what I mean? Like, it's such an ongoing internal monologue that it's very difficult to switch that off. But when you do, and I occasionally am able to do this, it feels great. You know, when you are fully immersed in the conversation and you are asking genuine questions because you are genuinely interested, then it feels fantastic.

It's great for everyone, right? And they say, what a great conversation. We're going to come back to the how-tos in a second, but immerse yourself in what they're saying. And only ask questions related to that. So this is what happens in partnerships, right? In partnerships, have you ever heard this say— I'm not in your relationship, obviously— you're not listening, you're not, you never listen to me, let me finish, that's not what I said, that's not what I said. Have you heard that?

I've heard it on TV.

Not in your relationships, obviously. People say that, right? Yeah. Here's the interesting fact: after I love you, these are the most common words in any relationship. After I love you, they're the most common words in any relationship. And the reason is that people lose curiosity for each other. That's pretty sad, isn't it?

Yeah, very sad.

Curiosity. If you want, I've been married for 35 years, generally to the same woman, and it's because, you know, we are generally interested in each other and we, we're curious. We don't lose that curiosity. We're interested in what we did and how it works. And so it makes sense. So that's the, that's the, that's the EQ, that's the emotional intelligence. You might be thinking, well, I shouldn't have to do that. You don't, but then you're just going to have a boring conversation.

Yeah, it's on you. It's on you to—

It's on you, sunshine. Part 3, the XQ. This is new stuff. XQ's new.

Is this yours? Have you coined this?

No, no. I wish I could. I'm not that smart, George. But I am smart enough to use the things that are smart. Yeah. Right? So here's a t-shirt moment.

You ready?

Yes. Here's my summary of XQ. Talk like a tortoise, think like a hare. Sting like a bee. That's better than that.

That's first in the '80s.

Yeah, 21st century. Talk like a tortoise, think like a hare.

I love it.

What do you think?

Yeah, t-shirt.

It's a t-shirt straight away. Instead of going on these mental side trips, use your bandwidth, your thinking power, and concentrate and understand what someone is actually saying. That you're not listening. No, you're, you're not listening. People don't listen. Why, why does it matter? What about the people? Yeah, why does it matter?

Yeah, because there's just no, uh, there's a lack of interest, you know.

Yeah, it can be perceived as lack of interest. Yeah. Or, or it's just generally, you know, it's all me, me, me, enough about you, let me talk about me. Anyway, you're going away on holiday? I've been there, it's rubbish anyway.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's self-centered. And it's not— it is natural, I think people are naturally this way.

For some. I mean, most people are good listeners, to be honest. But the way to think about it, it's like a jigsaw puzzle, and the good questions help complete the puzzle. You'll probably never finish the puzzle, but, you know, the 1,000-piece puzzle with no picture on it, you're trying to work it out. So here's my summary, and I've got some tips, and then we're going to get off, right? The biggest constraint in arriving at mutual understanding is our ability to accurately listen. That's what I genuinely believe. So if you can't ask good questions, you may not have anything to listen to. And if you can't listen, you can't ask good questions, and then you won't deeply understand this. It's a loop. So you've got to ask questions to get something to listen to. You've got to listen to ask questions. And we just demonstrated that by thinking of someone on your next listening exercise to do that. You know, good listening is a challenge, and good listeners are rare, and that's the challenge. But the good news is all you need is conversational sensitivity, and that makes you really good. Do you know what that is?

Uh, no, why don't you tell me?

Oh, thank you very much. It's command of the conversation. So basically, conversational sensitivity is that I'm tuned in and I've got command of that conversation so that I get something good to listen to, and therefore I've got the ability to pick up nuances in the meanings. Because sometimes there's nonverbals. Now, if you're not physically with someone, sometimes it's visual, or it's the people's, uh, the way they sound. Are they happy? Sad? Are they, are they quick? Are they worried? No, you can— you have to read into it.

Yeah.

If you're with them, you're picking up the nonverbals and also the things that they're not quite saying. And it's something you, you learn over time. Sometimes people don't ever learn it, to be honest. I think you have to have higher emotional intelligence to be good at doing that. And I think the, the last thing to say, and I'm going to give you the tips for this, is It's to have a high tolerance for silence.

No, I can't do it. I have a very low tolerance.

I thought, I wonder who'd give in first. I just thought I'd give that a go. Silence is an amazing tool. Honestly, good salespeople know this because you ask the customer a question and then you pause and you, you know, it's an amazing thing. But anyway, so I want to give you 9 quick tips for better listening. Before you do that, I've got my— Yes.

Why is silence such a good thing? Because I know that it is, and I know that people do it because it makes people on the other end sort of talk and talk themselves into a situation or whatever it may be. But what's the good thing and how can you use silence to your advantage?

Well, it's a good question because the whole topic of this podcast episode is The Sound of Silence: Mastering the Art of Conversation. And I think the most important part is to be able to— if you're going to listen, you shut up. And if you're silent, it means I'm waiting for you to tell me something. I'm letting you tell me something rather than me showing off and telling you how smart I am, which I'm doing right now. And that's why I think silence is powerful, because it gives you a clue that I'm waiting for you to tell me something.

Yeah, that makes sense.

You like it? Is that true? It's true. Sure, there's other reasons. That's my reason and I'm sticking to it. Okay, 9 very quick rapid tips. Repeat people's last words back to them. So what you mean is, if you remember nothing else, remember this: don't put it in your own words unless you really have to put it in theirs. Their language makes a massive difference to listening. Number 3: offer non-verbal clues that you're listening. So, tell me that again. 'You spoke quite fast, so I didn't quite get what you said.' But only if it's natural. You don't want it to be like all the time because you'll be irritating. Pay attention to non-verbal. So you're looking for what they didn't say or their body language, I guess. Keep asking questions. Ask more than you need to because you'll never ask too many questions. Don't make interrogation. Yeah. Minimize distractions as much as possible. Just make a conscious decision. If I'm going to be listening, I'm really going to be listening. No distractions. Acknowledge shortcomings. If you've had a hard night on the tiles and you're a bit knackered and you're not in good listening mode, or you're worried about something, or you're waiting for a doctor to call you, then tell people that, and then they know and they understand that you're not being rude. Number 8, don't rehearse your response while other people are talking. You're so focused on the next question, you're not listening to what they're saying, because now we've given you a method which is just answer questions about what they're talking about. And finally, monitor your emotions. Don't roll your eyes. Fold your arms, do the opposite of what you're trying to do. You know, you're, you know, I'm listening because I'm leaning forward. Yeah. But monitor your emotions because they make a big difference.

Fantastic. Okay. Number 8 is my favorite, if I may. Is it?

Yeah. Why is number 8 your favorite?

Just because I think it relates to me the most, but I think it's also more widely the most important and the one that people probably struggle most with is not trying to think of a question or not rehearsing what they're going to say next. Whilst the person is talking.

Yeah, I think it's a big one. I think that comes up the most. And I think, you know, that answer of asking questions about what they're asking is probably helps. It's not always the way to do it, by the way.

Sure.

If you're a podcast interviewer like you are, you want to ask questions and keep things moving. Okay. I've got 3 takeaways, George, on listening. Are you ready to listen to them? I'm ready. Brilliant. Okay. Number 1, listen to understand. Do the work to really understand what someone is sharing with you. Hint: you don't have to agree. I don't have to agree with you. I just need to understand where you're coming from and think through your lens. Listen to understand, number 1. Number 2, ask questions to get something good to listen to. I think that's a good one. Listening isn't about, you know, two ears and one mouth and paying attention. It is partly, but it's actually about getting something good to listen to. So be more interested than interesting. And the number 3 is you need conversational sensitivity to pick up the nuances. So When you listen to people say, you know, as I said at the beginning, and even if I don't say anything, they say, what a great conversation it is because I've got conversational sensitivity and that's listening in the bag. Love it.

George. Fantastic. Well, I have thoroughly enjoyed listening to you today. I've got some great conversation starters and some good tips there. So thank you very much, Gary, as ever. Thanks to you all for listening. Hopefully you have been listening and your minds haven't wandered and we shall see I'll see you all next time.

See you soon.

We hope you enjoyed this episode of The Company Doctor. Gary and I certainly did. If you'd like to hear more of me and Gary having a great time and discussing important, useful topics, head on over to thecompanydoctor.com where you'll find all of our previous episodes plus blog posts and show notes. Thanks for listening. You should all be experts at it by now. And we'll see you next time.