Weekly Challenge – Listen & Learn
September 27, 2009The Challenge:
Many people will tell you that the best communicators are expert listeners. Think about Larry King, he is likely one of the worlds best communicators because he listens to his subject and drives the conversation based purely on answers to open-ended questions. During this week, choose someone you would like to get to know more about. Write out 10 open-ended questions and schedule time to “interview” your subject.
This task is worth 50-points on your scorecards.
Thought Provoking Questions:
How long did you speak with your subject?
Did you learn something you didn’t expect to learn about your subject?
The Lesson:
It is human nature to try to speak over those that you are conversing with. Typically, this is a result of our ego’s and the need to prove our self-worth or intelligence. Our ego may be one of the top hurdles to becoming a great communicator, so if you can set aside the need to look smart, you will actually learn far more about your subject.
Two more hurdles to becoming a great communicator is asking general questions and asking questions in which you have no genuine interest in hearing the answer. The largest culprit is asking someone “how are you?” This is fine for an ice-breaker but it will not likely lead to earth shattering conversations. Instead, find something specific to ask and then listen and learn. If your subject speaks for several minutes on a single question, you know you have formulated your question well. Be genuine with your questioning and if you don’t know enough about your subject or their industry, make that part of your questioning or do your research beforehand. Having enough discipline and interest to do research will lead to hours of great conversation and will gain you tremendous respect from your subject.
“We have two ears and one mouth so that we can listen twice as much as we speak.” – Epictetus
thanks for sharing them