Why Deep Listening Is the Most Persuasive Thing You Can Do

What if you're accidentally pushing away the people that you care about the most and you don't even realize you're doing it? We've all been there. The heated argument that spiraled out of control. The workplace conflict where nobody felt heard. The family dinner that turned into a battlefield. Here's the truth. Most of us think we're listening, but we're actually just waiting for our turn to talk. And it's destroying our most important relationships. Meet Emily Kasriel. She's an award winning BBC journalist, executive coach, and one of the world's leading experts on transformative communication. After two decades reporting from five continents and leading global initiatives like BBC's Crossing Divides, Emily developed her groundbreaking eight step deep listening framework that has now trained over 1,000 leaders across 119 countries, from IBM executives to British army officers. Her new book, Deep Transform youm Relationships with Family, Friends and Foes, is set to publish with HarperCollins. And today, she's breaking down exactly how curiosity, empathy and respect can turn your toughest conversations into breakthrough moments. In this episode, you'll discover how to stay grounded when someone's attacking your values. The neuroscience behind why we shut down during conflict, and the specific questions that can disarm even the most defensive person. And again, we have had over 1600 episodes. And the way she approaches deep listening is truly unique. So whether you're navigating workplace tensions, family drama, or trying to bridge divides in your community, this conversation gives you the tools to listen so people feel truly understood even when the stakes are highest. Are you ready to transform conflict into connection? Let's dive in. Let's get into this by exploring your unique background. Because when it comes to listening skills, one of the things that I love to do is figure out what led somebody to be so fascinated with the topic of listening. And I think your journey is particularly interesting here.

Well, I've worked in radio for many, many years where you're walking around with your microphone focus not just the sounds of people's voices, but also the sounds that really are able convey a story. When I was traveling around different countries in Africa or India or Japan, so there's that part of sound. I Also, more than 10 years ago started training to be an executive coach. And then I became accredited and then became a mediator on the side of my BBC work that's really focusing about listening to individuals. And then as part of my BBC work, I led a very big project across the whole corporation, including 40 languages, radio, TV, audio, digital, called Crossing Divides, about engaging across difference and realized I wanted to know more. How can we help people engage even when they disagree?

Oh, this is so good. Okay, now let's dig into this because for the uninitiated, uninitiated I should say, it might seem like a silly concept to dig deeply into because listening is a biological reality that happens without much effort for many people. But there's so much to this. And when you talk to people and you, you have these conversations, do these trainings, what do you think is the thing that people misunderstand about listening, that holds them back from listening effectively?

I think that many of us, and I certainly used to be like this, think that we are fantastic listeners. I mean, after all, as you say, it's natural we were listening while we were still in the womb. But what we're doing kind of standard listening is we're performing listening. We are preloading our verbal gun with ammunition, ready to fire. Because we, after all, know what the person is going to say. We assume that we know their story already. We interrupt them because we're helping, we're helping them complete their sentences. We're saving time after all. Or we try and cheer someone up. That's why they're sharing their story with us, or, or even we are providing a solution for them. Actually, men, more than women do this because we feel that's how we can add value. We listen long enough to get so we understand their problem and then come up with something which helps them get rid of it. And in doing so, we leave the person feeling dismissed, feeling used, feeling unheard.

Yes. And as you were describing this, I'm sure everybody was feeling that from other people that in those interactions. Because you're going to have those flashbacks as you're listing each of those mistakes. Yep, somebody jumped in and gave me a solution when I didn't want it. I, that did make me feel bad, or somebody did interrupt me because they assumed they knew where it was going, that did make me feel bad. But again, what's so funny is that, and I've noticed this too, when I'm training on listening, people will identify those problems in other people. They'll say, yeah, most other people are bad listeners. And so how do we start to develop the self awareness that helps us to understand where we are lacking as listeners?

I think self awareness, as you have identified is absolutely critical. And the very fact that we identify these listening flaws, these listening traps in other people allows us the invitation then to consider, what, what am I doing? And how can I enable somebody to feel heard, truly heard? Because that is Amazing. That is full of possibility. When you feel truly heard, you feel so grateful and you feel so connected. And what's really exciting actually is when I ran this big project, this big global project with a thousand people in 100 countries, we wanted to get some academics involved so we could actually evaluate if it worked. And the findings were published in your bedtime reading, not Journal of Applied Social Psychology. But it demonstrated that when people practice deep listening, not only did they feel more connected, they also felt that they could be, they felt safer to express themselves and more understood. And then this is the truly exciting bit, when people feel truly heard, they became more able to re examine their own attitudes. So I think that's a real incentive for all of us. If you can deeply listen to someone, even when you disagree, they're likely to lower their defenses and be more open to listening to you.

Yes. And that's the reciprocal nature of listening that so many people overlook. Because one of the keys to being heard is to actually take the time to listen to others. If you want people to listen better, then you have to be that example. And it is very counterintuitive be in it when it as it relates to the argumentative or persuasive element of this as well. Because in the moment our limbic system, the part of our body or our brain that registers these emotions, we will see the perspectives of others almost as a threat. I cannot allow this to exist. I must interrupt them in order to make sure that this pernicious idea does not take root any deeper and the opposite is true. Let's go deeper into this because it shows how listening is critical component of persuasion.

Yeah, you're quite right. Although I would argue that in order to truly deep listen, as I outline in my book, you need at least temporarily to put aside your desire to convince or persuade and be genuinely and authentically curious about the other person's opinion, the other person's story, as an outcome that they'll be more likely to listen to you. But it's important that when you listen, it's authentically, it's not performatively. You want to understand their perspective. And as you say, it is so hard to do, because when we feel righteous that we are right, it's as if listening to somebody whose views we disagree with will challenge our morals, our very core. And in fact, when we did research with the NGO More in Common and YouGov across 2000 people in the US we found that a lot of people thought that if you listened, it signals agreement. And even more so far More so amongst young people.

And what do you think about that pattern? What does that tell us?

I mean, I find that when I work with communities, in boardrooms, in conflict zones, that many people fear that listening signals agreement. And indeed, I used to do that, too. I used to try and avoid people whose views I found abhorrent because I thought that was moral. It was as if I heard them, I would be somehow contaminated by them. And as you said, it would be as if I was giving their ideas free rein into the air and allowing their ideas to become more powerful, ideas which I felt were really, really abhorrent. And yet, if we can understand that listening does not signal agreement, but that just allows us to understand, we may well find points of connection. Because after all, it's about recognizing the humanity of the other person. Respecting them, but not necessarily respecting their ideas or agreeing with them. That is not the objective of deep listening.

Oh, see, that's a distinction that I believe people fail to understand because we tried. We think about respect holistically. I respect you, I respect your beliefs, I respect your position and everything like that. No, we can respect the person and have no respect for their perspective. Right. And I think I consider this tribal listening, which really is not listening. Right. So if somebody agrees with me, I can be the most incredibly compassionate and empathetic listener imaginable. But once somebody has a belief that falls outside of my tribe, then I see it as a threat to not just me, but also the people that I represent and the people who are within my tribe to even entertain this or treated with some respect. And I. My hypothesis, and I'd love to hear your thoughts on this as an expert in the field, is that it is becoming harder for younger generations because poor communication skills are modeled in social media all the time. You don't see viral clips of people respectfully having a conversation and listening empathetically. You see the horrible approach. Right. And again, too, there's a performative aspect we understand in interpersonal conversations. We're not. Like you said, we are not actively listening. We are acting like we're listening. But even more so, I think the performative aspect is dialed up in this online world because you would imagine if you could see somebody listening empathetically to ideas that you find abhorrent, you would not only think less of the person who is saying the things, but you might also inappropriately extrapolate that the other person listening empathetically is endorsing those beliefs. So I think all of those ideas are running through young people's head heads, which makes it even harder for them to listen.

Yeah, absolutely. And we know that the algorithms on most social media highlight and make ideas which are very extreme go viral because they have more engagement. So there may well be videos of people engaging well across divides, but you don't see them because they don't go viral. And we did indeed find that people who spent almost all of their time online were much more likely to say that they felt unheard. It seems to me such an opportunity for us to ensure that everybody has heard that we can take the opportunity once you learn how to deep listen, to deeply listen, you know, to people within our families, within our faith communities, with our colleagues, with our friends, in a very different way, which can allow us to feel connected despite our differences. And I also think that, you know, in order to tackle some of the really big challenges in our society, climate change, all sorts of things that are super important for us to be able to do effectively as a society, we need to deeply listen, even when people think differently to us.

Hello, my friends. Before we get back to today's episode, I want to ask you a question. Have you ever wondered how to elevate your team's negotiation game and how you can help the folks on your team have better, difficult conversations? At the American Negotiation Institute, we offer transformative keynotes and workshops tailored to empower professionals with top tier negotiation and conflict resolution skills. Whether it's a keynote for your next event or hands on training for your team, we've got you covered. Don't just negotiate. Master the art with the American Negotiation Institute. Click the link in the description to find out more. Elevate, negotiate and succeed. So this gives us an opportunity to go deeper into setting aside our desire to persuade as one of the most persuasive things we could do. In these conversations, I want to go deeper into this because that is profoundly scary for a lot of people because they might be feeling, well, hold on, I'm not here to be somebody's therapist and just listen to them. I've got an agenda that I'm trying to push in this conversation. So it seems almost inappropriate because it feels, it could feel like we're not driving toward the objective. And then also too, I think when people are speaking, the persuasive person, the person who's there to argue and change people's minds, we see all of these vulnerabilities in what they're saying. And you're saying, I need to attack that, I need to attack that, I need to attack that. It's not time to empathetically listen. It is time to break them down. So let's go into this and help the person listening to this podcast understand how setting our setting aside our desire to persuade can actually make us more persuasive.

Actually, the reason that a lot of us feel so really strongly about the need to prove the other person wrong isn't actually about what's going on with the other person's ideas. It's about ourselves. So I've got a whole chapter in the book about listening to ourselves first. And in fact, I've even painted a picture for those who are watching of all the shadows that are going crazy in ourself when we're trying to listen to the other person, because that's what's going on. I know myself when I have felt the most strongly, when I feel 150% in the right and the other person all wrong, when I feel like there's an existential threat if I engage with the other person. That's my stuff. Yeah. And taking the time to have those alerts when I feel so strongly. And for example, let me give you an example. I was talking to a former colleague of mine who now chairs an English regional energy company. And he's chair of the company. And he was really struggling in his relationship with somebody on his board, underneath him in the hierarchy, who is the accountant and deals with finances. He knew he needed to get on with this guy. And yet he felt whenever he was trying to listen to the guy or to challenge him or to indeed go get his ideas, it wasn't working. He just felt angry and upset. And as he was talking through this with me, he went silent. His eyes went to the top right in the room, and he suddenly had this revelation. He realized that this guy reminded him of his bullying older brother. Because this guy had an older sibling who'd left home, parents who weren't interested. The older brother was meant to entertain him, look after him and hang out with him and kind of parent him. But his older brother was not interested. He just wanted to play with all his equipment and Bunsen burners in the kitchen, did not want to engage. And once this friend realized what was going on and that this accountant had another Persona beyond the older brother that he was projecting on him, suddenly a whole different type of relationship became possible. And it wasn't that they became best friends, but they were able to work together effectively. And I think often when we feel we need to persuade, when somebody has certain characteristics, maybe they're mean, maybe they're Selfish, maybe they're impatient. Often it's the stuff in our self that we are denying. It's our shadows which we repress. And what do we do? We see a little glimpse of that in the other person and we hate them for that. We feel we need to be aggressive and all those emotions come out and therefore taking that time to understand what's going on can be so, so crit. You asked also about wanting to persuade another person. When we want to persuade another person, we want to change them. We are actively wanting them to be someone they are not. And by doing so it means that we're not open to understand them. And I'm trying to make the case here that sometimes we do need to persuade someone, but if we can take the time to really understand them first, they will feel heard and we may change our opinion because we've heard them and come up with a third idea. Let's say you're having an argument with your partner about where to go on holiday. Yeah. It is so important that you go to a beach holiday because you need to chill after your oppressive work over the last few months. You need that your partner wants to go on a hike and see loads of museums because they have felt a bit trapped and bored and they want to, you know, go and get some cultural stuff and go on beautiful walks. Yeah. If you don't take time to listen to them first and you just give them a full scale sales pitch about the fantasticness of beach holidays, you're not really even talking to them, you're not really engaging with them. You're just giving them a pre prepared speech about all your good arguments and you feel that with all these arguments they're going to be won over. But if you can really understand their needs and what's important for them and they say they need some variety, some newness, maybe you go on a cruise holiday and you come with a third solution which meets both your needs and their needs. But because you, if you haven't listened to them first and really truly listen with curiosity, you forego that opportunity. They just feel annoyed, you feel annoyed and you both go on separate holidays.

This is so good, Emily, for many reasons. First of all, as you were listening, as you were talking about the description, I am that tired person who wants beach holidays. We're going to Jamaica in two days.

So.

And as you started talking about the hikes, I was like, oh my gosh, no. But I would have been that person selling hard and not listening. It's such a great example. But it also Just encapsulates the struggle, the internal struggle that we have and how that internal struggle manifests itself externally in our conversations with other people. And what's fascinating about this is that when the person who's listening to this podcast actually thinks about how to incorporate this into their lives, they'll say, yes, I understand that I have the mental capacity to do what Emily is suggesting that I do, and yet I find it so difficult to do in the moment. So let's put your executive coaching hat on. How can we get somebody to start to develop the discipline and restraint that is required to actually utilize deep listening in these tough conversations?

I completely agree. And ask my family. I'm one of those people who write book about deep listening. I talk about deep listening. Mum, you're supposed to be good at listening. You know, it is super, super hard when we disagree. And I think being kind and generous to ourselves is first of all so important. But as I outline in the book, there are eight steps to deep listening, and it does take practice. So don't start with one of those really difficult conversations. Start with an easier conversation. Maybe your kid comes home school and says, you know, mum, I had a really difficult, you know, difficult time at school. Teacher just picked on me all the time. And normally you might want to cheer them up and you might say, and I know this from my experience, I'm sure it wasn't so bad. I'm sure it just felt like they picked on you. Maybe they also picked on other kids as well. You know, I'm sure so many of us have done that, but instead we can say, okay, let me really try and understand what's going on in my kid's mind rather than just dismiss them them and dismiss their feelings and then we can reply. So I'm hearing you say that you had quite a tough, tough time at school, and it felt as if your teacher was really picking on you. Notice by the way that I use the word it felt. So I'm not affirming that the teacher actually picked on the kid, but I'm talking about the way that the child experienced that. So you felt that the teacher really picked on you, and your child was saying, yeah, it was really, really horrible. And all the other kids were looking at me like I was really stupid. You know, there the child is going deeper and expressing more of their thoughts, and you can respond, you know, that sounds like it was really tough, that sense that everybody is watching you because of what the teacher has said. And your child might respond, yeah, but actually there was also this great bit because I played with my friend Harry later in the classroom, because they have felt heard, emotionally heard, as well as with the words. They are by themselves, and it depends on their age, far more likely to be ready and see the bigger picture, because that's one thing which is so fantastic. But I think we should do a little deep listening demonstration so I can give you a sense of it, and then we can perhaps talk through the eight steps. Would that be a good idea, Kwame?

Yes, I think this is the perfect time for us to do that exercise, and I think it'll give us a better understanding of what it really means to listen deeply.

Okay, so let me ask you a question, Kwame. Let me ask you, what food reminds you of home?

Oh, curried chicken. That's it. My family's from the Caribbean, and my mom's from Guyana. They do curry exceptionally well. So, yeah, curry and roti. And, like, putting the potatoes in with the chicken, too just is home to me.

So I'm hearing for you, and I sense a lot of joy in your voice, a lot of energy. It's curry chicken and roti and the potatoes. And it's your. Not just your own home, but also your heritage of Caribbean and including Guyana. And it's something that you're proud of.

Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. That's a great. That is a great way to describe it. That's exactly it.

And tell me more.

Yes. So I think for me, it is. It's not just the food. It's the whole experiment, the whole experience. Rather, it's the. The coming home from school and smelling the curry throughout the house. So the curry announces itself itself first. And so it's. It is the anticipation of it, and it's. You can almost. You feel the dopamine building up and just anticipation of. Of the delicious food. And I remember as mom was cooking, she was always timing it so that it would be, like, hot and ready. It was never, okay, it's been done. We're warming it up. That type of thing is like, no, we're timing this perfectly for dinner. And so there was the. A part of that process was me getting. Being too eager, wanting a snack. Mom, no, you'll ruin the dinner. And I'm like, but I want my dinner now. And then she would give me a little bit, you know, just a taste. Okay, how does this taste? I'm like, it tastes perfect. It tastes like, we should eat this right now. Right? So there was. It's almost like this unintentional performative aspect of it. The mom never planned for that. But I think that's one of the things that made it so warm for me because there was so much intentionality that went into it. So it wasn't just. Just the food, it was the love that. That surrounded it too.

So I'm hearing you say that the love that your mother gave and put into the cooking and your memories, which were, you know, full sensory, that it was the anticipation, the dopamine as you returned home from school, and knowing that your mother was there, waiting, preparing, putting time, effort, and your impatience as a child, and your mother wanting you to wait, but giving you a bit, Having that love, being able to break the rules and yet being able to eat then together and waiting for that moment and that feeling of being loved in that way has really carried you. And you still feel that today.

Oh, yeah, that's exactly it. That's exactly it. And what's funny is that even for a while, because Whitney and I, we got married on graduation day and then we started living together and everything like that. My. Obviously it was my favorite food. I can cook it well, but I have to. I. I limit the amount of times I cook it because I'm thinking, this can't just be a random Wednesday, you know, this isn't a throwaway meal. This is a stop everything and. And we. We experience this together type of meal. So I cook it really infrequently, even though it's my favorite thing to consume, because I'm. I'm thinking it's almost sacrilege to. To not to have it cooked at home, but not cooked by mom. So whenever. So when mom comes over and she'll sometimes mix it in, I'm like, there it is. I can smell it. This is. This is the way it should be. But yeah, it's. It was so close to me that I didn't even. It didn't even feel appropriate it. To eat it with frequency because it was so sacred.

Wow. So I'm hearing you say that the sacredness of eating it at home with your mom and her cooking, it. It's very identified with the mother and your love and her love for you and you love for her. And you've been married since graduation and you do, and you have learned to do it at home, but you don't want to make it into the secular, into the everyday. You want to continue the sense of it being sacred and special in order to allow those to be few moments which heighten your whole experience when you do have it with your own family. And yet Also, when your mum comes back, that is the real thing. And there's nothing that can. Because you can't really have your chicken curry without your mother. You can. You can do it. And it's still special. And it's important, the sort of continuity you have between your family growing up and your family now. And yet there's also that, you know, nothing can beat that mother love that mother curry chicken.

Yeah. So even those times when I do make it, a lot of times when I make it for other people, I'll take a lot of care and make it as. As good as I possibly can. But I personally wouldn't even eat it. I'd eat something else. Because for me, the sacred nature of this requires a specific type of setup. So I'll share the love, but I will not consume myself, because I want to create that same environment for other people. But again, for me, it has to be under the right conditions.

That is fantastic, Kwame. What a beautiful story. So, getting out of our story roleplay for a moment. How many questions, roughly, did I ask you there?

You know, that was an interesting element because you asked me the first question and none, no others.

Yeah, well spotted. I did ask you. Tell me more. More.

Ah, yeah.

And the reason now, as a journalist, super hard not to ask people questions, but the reason that we don't ask people questions is that when we do. I wanted to know, where did you grow up? Was it in the us? Did you grow up in Guyana or elsewhere in the Caribbean? You know, I had a lot of questions. I wanted to know, you know, is this a recipe passed down through generations? You know, what's in the curry? Is it curry leaves? What's going on? I had a lot of questions, but I. If I had asked. Asked those questions, I wouldn't have unpacked so much. Now I feel so much more connected with you. I know so much more about you. Just in the space of four minutes, because I handed over the steering wheel of the conversation to you and let you be in the driving seat. You determined where we went. And this is very atypical, particularly in a work context. We think we know where we need to go. We need to take control of the conversation. When we deeply listen, we temporarily surrender control and we hand it over to the speaker, which is why they will then go deeper. But the deeper is defined by them and not by us. So it's not interrogative. It's not. It doesn't make you feel uncomfortable because you choose where you go.

This is so good. And this is I will say this with confidence because we've had a lot of people who came on for listening specific episodes and everybody who talks about negotiation and communication, of course we're going to talk about listening at some point. This is truly novel, and I think it comes from the journalistic background too, because you are willing to let go of control when it comes to the conversation. Now, what's very fascinating to me is that even though the. That exercise that we did was less than. Than five minutes, it felt much longer. And I think that is positive and negative. It is positive for the person being heard to say, wow, Emily cares so much about me that she's willing to just take the time, no agenda. She's not pushing me in any way. She's so for the folks who are listening on audio, like, looking at your. Your body language and everything is like, I felt incredibly cared for. You truly do care about understanding me without any agenda, and it allowed me to go deeper. You helped me to understand things about myself that I've never articulated before. And when you listen really well, you can help the other person get a clearer understanding. Now, to the. To the dark side of it, feeling like it took longer. I think that's what makes it one of the many things that makes it so hard for people to listen. Because when you're listening that deeply, it. It almost. There's like a time dilation that happens, so it feels like you're. Like you're running out of time in the convers when it doesn't. When it actually, in real time, hasn't taken that much time. So it's great for the person being heard, but tough for the listener.

I don't quite agree, actually, Kwame, because you were telling me such interesting things and because you were speaking authentically, now you do so much speaking. You're so articulate. You speak so much. Probably on the surface of yourself, you speak. You know, you're used to coming up with your pat phrases. You say how great your podcast is on negotiation, on communication, but you rarely actually think now when you're listening to somebody as they think, it is far more compelling. I'm much more interested in you because you are telling an authentic story. So the time went pretty quick for me, too.

Wait a second. So this, this is groundbreaking because essentially what. Tell me, tell me if I'm getting this right. Because becoming a better listener helps the other person to feel hurt, right? This is great. But also becoming a better listener leads to you getting more information that is compelling and unique and novel, which makes you want to listen deeper. Because the quality of information is better.

Exactly. I mean, even if I were selling you something, if I was trying to sell you a new bit of chicken or a new curry, I would understand more about you. So if I was selling you the curry, and I'm a bit hesitant about saying this because I know your thing is about negotiate anything, but if I was to do that, then knowing what's important to you, knowing and understanding your reference points, allows me to then have a very different type of conversation and a much more collaborative one, because I can land ideas with you in ways that makes more sense for you, and therefore you're more likely to be wanting to understand my ideas.

Wow. You know, it goes back to, what is it, Dale Carnegie, where in the book how to Win Friends and Influence People, he talks about, you're going to get much further by being interested by. Than by trying to be interesting. And what's interesting about this is that maybe we can kind of play around with this, because the more you find other people interesting, the more interested you would be. And that is largely going to be a function of how well and how deeply you are willing to listen. Because people will become more interesting the deeper you listen to them.

Absolutely. And as the research shows, we'll feel so much more connected, which is also really exciting as a listener, that, as you said, you articulated thoughts that you'd never articulated before. I mean, that's a real privilege as a listener. I mean, even when research has been conducted with listeners in prison, they feel empowered when they listen in that context. And when people listen at work, if your manager, your boss listens to you, you. You'll be more productive. You'll want to work harder. You'll have a much more commitment to the organization and the bottom line, the company is going to become more productive because you set the tone. Of course, also as a leader, when you listen, it allows people to surface concerned thoughts. I mean, imagine if I'm having a conversation with you, and I say to you as your boss, so is it okay, Kwame, if you get this job done? I think it's got to be done tomorrow. You've got to do A, B, C. You go, yeah, sure, no problem. I'll do that. Your mouth is smiling, but not your eyes. And if I say to you, okay, great. That's fantastic. I look forward to seeing for it. You know, look forward to seeing it done, how are you going to feel? You're going to think, bloody hell, how am I going to get that done? I've got five other Things to do. But instead if I say to you, hey, Kwame, I'm getting the sense that you want to please me and want to do it, and at the same time there's other senses stuff that's getting in the way. Perhaps you're a bit overloaded. Suddenly we have a real conversation, we go off script, you tell me what's going on, we can then fix and reprioritize what you need to do. And you feel left so much more, you know, knowing that I care about you and what's going on for you and heard, and I'm much more likely to get the job done well. So we both win.

Yes. And this is, this is an expert level move because right now this is, this is a great example of not just listening, listening to the words people are saying, but also listening to what is not said and also listening to body language as well.

Yeah, absolutely. Let me take you through the eight steps and we can talk all about the different aspects. And please feel free to interrupt me, even though we know interrupt is not a brilliant deep listening skill. But feel free to interrupt me at any moment if you want to come in and probe more deeply or whatever. So step one is about creating the space. Because most important is a space where your speaker will feel safe. So for example, if you're in an open plan office and want to find out why a colleague is having difficulties with their timekeeping, not so good. Even if there's a glass door, because the person who's having that conversation with you is going to be aware of their colleagues watching them. So go out, go to a private meeting room. Walking is fantastic. Nature, even better. A bit of nature research evidences that it reduces people's blood pressure and their heart rate and enables people to be able to speak more authentically and open. But it's even the physical environment. So if you're in a noisy cafe with a friend and perhaps they're a little older and they don't hear so brilliantly, doesn't work so well. All that glass and metal. Far better. Somewhere with a bit of wood, a bit of material to absorb some of that sound. Overhead, blue, white lighting, like in a hospital. Not so good. Much far better. Is a place with side lighting a bit more yellow to make you feel relaxed and even more so. And this is why in the book I talked about going to a Japanese, Japanese tea ceremony practitioner, I went to Japan to research the book because they really know how to make someone feel cherished. So for example, if I'm giving you a mug of Tea. Prior to hearing you speak, I will rotate the mug so the most beautiful image is facing you and put a fresh bamboo leaf from the garden or from the balcony. And actually they have 72 seasons. I think it is 72. Get you a treat from that specific season. I mean, it might just be be putting on the favor. Your partner's favorite Adele track while you're about to have a difficult conversation or go into your kids, you know, room surrounded by all their toys so they feel free to speak openly. I talked to one parent, actually. She had a kid, came from school, wouldn't get out from under the bed, said she's refusing ever to go to school again. The woman eventually went under the bed with her child because that was her child's safe space. So step two is listening to yourself first. And we spoke a little bit earlier about how if we don't listen to ourselves first, all those shadows, all that other stuff that we project from our own weaknesses, perhaps unacknowledged, or from previous relationships, we've had your old boss, your old colleague, just get projected onto someone who reminds us, even unconsciously. Now, this can be tough work. Yeah. So if you've experienced trauma, for example, you might need to get the help, help of somebody who a professional with expertise. Before you start the deep listening to yourself first, there may be shadows which are buried inside yourself for good reason. It also might mean if you haven't experienced trauma can be hard too. So you talked earlier about how to manage when those difficult shadows erupt in the middle of a conversation. You might choose to find an anchor, something that makes you feel safe, that you can think about. It could be a pet or a favorite place or, you know, someone, you know, who really loves you. And when you're, you know, you're kind of losing yourself and arguing, returning back to that moment of centeredness and that place of safety can enable you then to get back and listening again. But it is hard, this stuff. Yeah. Which is why, for example, as an executive coach, I try and take a bit of time before I'm having a coaching conversation, so. So I can center myself. And indeed, that is step three. It is about being present. Because so often when we listen to people, when we negotiate anything, we are not present. We are either thinking about through all our shadows. We're thinking, am I going to get home in time to watch the big game? You know, am I going to, you know, oh, God, you know, this person reminds me of something. You know, we know we're doing that. We're preempting. We're thinking about all the reasons that they're wrong. We're not really present and we need to deal with the internal distractions. But first of all, we need to become aware of those distractions and note them in order to become present. But also the external distractions. Our phone, even if off and on a black shiny screen, still has the power to distract us. So put it out of sight. If you want a reminder and you know that you've got to have a hard out, put a little alarm five minutes before the end so you have time to wrap, wrap up elegantly. I mean, you might also want to. I mean, I've been on silent retreats and meditations and things in order to help cultivate my ability to stay present. I was somebody who, as I said, used to be a serial interrupter and always full of enthusiasm and passion and wanting to argue and thinking that was the right thing to do. And now I've developed. Not always, but it's helped me to be more present in the moment, particularly when I disagree. So step four is called Be Curious. It's about how we project on the other person. We've spoken about the importance of really appreciating that we don't already know what's in their mind because so often we do. Particularly our partner, they come home from work and we say, how was your day? And they go, yeah. And we say, oh, let me tell you about the dog and the. A garbage collection and what happened I saw on TV or on the brilliant Negotiate Anything podcast. You know, we're full of stuff that we want to tell them and we haven't really picked up how do they feel? And instead if we can say, sounds like your day wasn't brilliant, that's an invitation to have a real conversation rather than just assuming what's going on. We just often as like we talked about, we perform listening, we rather than actually listen. But when we're curious, as you were, and I was curious about your experience with food and your mother, suddenly you're opening up your life as a human being and I'm able to develop empathy for you. Now here we weren't talking about a contentious subject, but if you were, even if we disagree, I still can understand a bit more about why you feel the way you do do. And out of that empathy might even develop respect. And as we were saying, it's respect for you as a person, not necessarily for the way you think or for your arguments. And then step five, is the gaze now quite hard on a zoom or A, you know, a virtual call we're having. I want to read your body language, but I want to look you in the eye. I've actually, on my computer, at home, on my laptop, I've painted a little paper eye and put around the camera to encourage me to look at that camera. And as I'm doing now, I'm kind of darting my eyes between the camera and your image. And unless it's a First Nation elder or somebody's on the spectrum, so much research about the importance of being able to look somebody in the eye, but it doesn't mean that you're going to be looking both of you in the eye. And by the way, 60 degrees, much better face to face face, if we're face to face like we are doing now, often means we're ready to either kiss or fight, which is not appropriate for every conversation as you can imagine. 60 degrees can be far more effective, the research shows. So being able to hold the gaze, often when I'm listening to you and you're speaking, you will start, especially when you're going deeper. You will take a journey. You'll look often up and away from me, but because I'm there waiting for you, you will then return to me. Now, if I am breaking and I'm distracted and I'm looking away, you'll often feel you need to restart that point because I haven't really been with you. And by the way, surprise, surprise, we're not talking about the kind of intense gaze like Michel Foucault, the French philosopher who talked about that the prison officers would have this gaze on the prisoners who would feel entrapped in even just because of this gaze. Surprise, surprise, we're talking about a warm, empathetic gaze that can be so powerful. And then there's the body language. Actually, you might be looking really happy, but that's not because of something I've said, but it's because about. Because you're about to snag the last donut off the plate. So, you know, gestures also not so reliable unless we speak a different language or you say the river was that high and you point upwards. Otherwise gesture is not so reliable. So in my book, I talk a lot about the sort of body language is reliable. Tone of voice is super reliable, which is why voice only. Cause you can often really find out more from the person. You're not distracted by what you see. So step six is about holding the silence. Now, I don't know if you noticed when we did the little exchange, but I was giving a Little pause there. Yeah, in order to, you know, does a whole load of different things. It enables you to think more deeply and not just come up with the usual surface level stuff, but it also enables me to understand you more because I'm sense making. I'm trying to use not just my mind, but my whole body and my intuition to kind of sense what's really going on for you. And interesting around negotiation. There was a paper that came out in 2021 called Science Silence is Golden. And it demonstrated they asked people, both sides of a, both parties in a negotiation to hold 20 seconds of silence before they spoke. After the other person had spoke, nobody left 20 seconds of silence. I think the average was far less because we usually overestimate the amount of silence that we leave. The listener might find it awkward at first. And when I train people around the world, world, they always tell me they find the silence awkward, but the speaker doesn't because it's about building trust. And I would say, you know, it does depend on context. These Hollywood execs told me who I was training, we don't do silence. You know, we have to come up with quick, witty retorts. That's what we do. So it's obviously judicial. You've got to use it where you think appropriate and in your way. But I would invite your listeners of negotiate anything to practice with their silence. To start with just a few seconds and then expand and it's so, so powerful. And surprise, surprise, it's not an intimidating silence. It's not a silence of extraction. It's all of those feelings that we were talking about earlier of empathy, curiosity that you're embodying while you're silent. And step seven is reflecting back. Now, you might have been on active listening courses where you learn. Yeah, yeah, you paraphrase last thing. Yeah, yeah, I got you, you. Yeah, yeah, this is. This. That is not the reflection back. In deep listening here, you're trying to encapsulate not just what the person has said, but also, as you identified, what's not being said. And that includes their feelings. Because the research shows that unless you reflect back people's feelings, like the little example we had of somebody at work who couldn't complete the task in time, the person will not feel heard. So what's important is that you offer them very tentatively back because you might have got them wrong. And it's fine if you get the reflection wrong because the speaker, you offer it back with humility and you say, so I'm sensing that you feel really proud of Your mother for really caring for you in that way. Is that right? They then have the chance to say yes or not quite. It wasn't pride, it's more nostalgia, you know, if not this, then that. And in my book, I give a whole load of clues for people to start to use on to know what is important, what to reflect back in order that you can get to the what. The real meaning for the speaker. And Going Deeper is the title of Step eight because it enables you to really understand about the person's motivation, motivations, their values, what's really important to them, their deeper narrative. And I should say with all these eight steps, these are certainly not for every conversation. And even when not for every deep listening conversation, they're for the conversations that matter most and for you to find your own way of using them in a way that works for you. There's also self reflection sheets in the book so you can also observe your own deep listening practice, practice as it evolves, as it unfolds, and see what's working well and where you want to. May want to go a bit deeper.

Oh, Emily, there's so much to explore here. Maybe you should write a book on this so we could go deeper on it. But I have, I have my time with you. I'm still going to go deeper because this is fascinating. And again, what's something that's so unique about this and so encouraging is that that there's no limit to how good you can get at this skill. That's something I keep on hammering home because we've had so many listening experts on the podcast. This is very unique and novel, very unique. And that's hard to do in this industry. So I just want to flag that for the listeners. And then I also want to go deeper on Step eight, which is going deeper because one of the things that was, that's been revealed to me in our conversation is, is that I think I was very limited in the way that I thought about the concept of deep listening as a whole, because I used to think about deep listening purely through the lens of intensity of focus. I'm going to lock in and then really focus on what this person is saying. And it's not to say that's not part of this, but it seems like a deeper part of this is listening in a way that is so profound and advanced that the person that naturally goes deeper on the topic or subject at hand.

Yeah, you're completely right. I mean, I've drawn on the work of Theodore Reich. He was the first one of the first pupils of Sigmund Freud in Austria, and then he went and practiced in the US as a psychotherapist. And he came up with this term which I really like, called your third ear. So you're not just listening with your intellect either sides of your head, you're also listening with your third ear. It's almost as if you let your unconscious tap into the other person's unconscious. It's those small fish which escape the net which can be the most revealing. And I like to think of your third ear, and that's the way I've painted it in the book, in the middle of your heart, placed there. And so you are giving your whole intention to help the speaker and unpack what's important for them. And that's why you have this very profound connection and understanding, because it's not just, you know, Americans in particular. When I worked at the BBC and I traveled all over the world, I always found if you wanted vox pops, you want people to have quick sound bites. The US and Nigeria, fantastic countries, because people have ready things to say immediately, but they are speaking at the surface and themselves. If you want to really understand someone, it takes you getting into a space and learning to trust yourself to establish. And it might be reflecting back in silence. It might just be one word. Like, for example, I could have chosen when you were talking about your mother, just to reflect back the word love. That's a really powerful word. It might be a metaphor to really help the person and understand more about, for example, in this story, your story, about the way that your mother conveyed love in everything she did around the chicken curry. It was her vehicle to express love.

Yes. Oh, this is. It's great. And as you explain it, it's making sense how I was feeling as you were listening to. I also want to talk about reflecting back because you're. You're right on not just spotlighting this as something important, but spotlighting this as one of the biggest areas for opportunity for people, too. Because for. For. When we were doing the exercise, it wasn't just that you would reflect back your. Your understanding, you were also reflecting back the sentiments and the emotionality. And I'm recognizing that a lot of times people have a disconnect because you could have been kind of clinical and. And sterile in the way that you responded. Reflected back. So it sounds like you liked your mom and you like curry. Right. But your different elements of your tonality shifted as you were reflecting back. There were some that were a little bit more that. That was a little bit more Whimsical and intuitive, like connecting in that type of way. But then when there was clear like exuberance in my story, you not only demonstrated and reflected that exuberance back to me, reflected it back to me, you also, you sometimes even amplified it a little bit more. So there was that true emotional connection too. So you're not just reflecting back your understanding of what was said, you're reflecting back through demonstration of emotionality. So you can connect on a deeper level too.

Yeah, absolutely. And I would say that this is a journey, as you said, everyone can improve. And indeed I keep talking about research because I'm quite a research based person, but that if you believe you can improve, you're more likely to improve. So I would say to everybody, whether they think they're a brilliant listener or they think they something they want to learn to do from the beginning, that's great practice. Have a go, you know, talk to somebody. I'll tell you a little story. I was at the pharmacy picking up some drugs for my daughter. And there was a lady sitting waiting for her drugs on a platform plastic chair just at the entrance. And I said to the pharmacist, she asked me, what's the date? What's the birth date of your daughter? And I said, third of July 21st. She said, you sure? I said, wait a minute, that's crazy. No, no, third of July, 2001. Whereupon the lady sitting in waiting for her own drug said, wow, you don't even know the date of your daughter's birthday. That's kind of pretty crazy. And I agreed with her. And I said, yeah, that is pretty silly. My daughter Maya wouldn't be very happy if she found that out. And then we started to talk and the lady was talking about her grandmother. She was really. She said, yeah, my grandmother's in her 90s. And she said, I'm really proud of her having reached that age. So I thought for a moment or two and then I responded, sounds like you're proud of your grandmother, grandmother, but there's also something else going on. And she said, yeah, I think that I'm going to die before my grandmother. And then we talked some more and she shared her condition and then she started crying and then she apologized for crying. And then I went home and she presumably went home too. And it was like that moment like we can all just pick up on what's going on. It's in front of us, it's around us, us by just being present and reflecting back in just one word, as I did there, that something that somebody has said, there's something going on. And that's what really motivates me in this work, the feeling that there's so many people in the world who are so lonely. And if we can deeply listen to the people in our family who might be lonely too, in our friends, in our community, at work, work. Not all the time. We need our time in solitude. But for the moments when it matters, we can do something to challenge the epidemic of loneliness and the epidemic of polarization, which just is so tough, especially in the US Right now, but also in many countries in the world.

Yes, I'm, I'm excited for you. I'm excited for this content. I am excited for this book. Yeah, it's. It's an incredible testament to the thought leadership you've been able to create. And also the. The timing is perfect. I agree with you 100. We need this now more than ever. And for the folks who are listening to this and they're saying, okay, I need, I need this, where's the best place for them to not only get the book, but also connect with you and learn about the other things that you do?

So the book is being published by HarperCollins, and you can get it on Amazon on any bookstore. And if you want to find out more more about me, you can go to my website, emilykasriel.com that's E M I L Y K A S for Sierra R I e l for lima.com or follow me on LinkedIn. And I'm really excited for more people to get the book and practice it. That's the most important thing. If you read the book and don't practice it, it won't be a value. It's about reading the book and actually trying it out in the wild. And I'd love to hear via my website of your experience.

Amazing. Emily. Thank you so much for joining us. Really appreciate it.

Thank you so much for a great conversation. Kwame.

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