Several years ago, an Innolect executive coach was featured on an ABC 20/20 segment entitled, “Excessive Talking.” The piece highlighted a newly hired leader who had something to add to every conversation, interrupted others in meetings, failed to ask questions of his team—and had been divorced twice. He talked too much. When his manager noticed that both long-term and new employees were resigning to work in other departments or quitting the company, she began to ask questions.
While inquiring, she discovered the leader had no clue about why his employees were leaving and assumed it was for better pay or benefits. She shared information from the exit interviews that indicated his employees left to be more included in decisions that impacted them, to have their ideas considered/heard, to work with someone who cared about them and who they liked. In fact, leaders who talk more than 60% of the time are not well liked.
Fortunately, through coaching, the leader gained self-awareness and learned to:
- Stop talking long enough to listen to and learn from his direct reports
- Ask questions without interrupting the response
- Look for cues of disinterest and/or frustration
- Present his own ideas more concisely
- Ask for feedback as he practiced new listening habits
By demonstrating more effective listening, his engagement, inclusion and job satisfaction scores increased, which led to improved business performance. When leaders fail to listen, understand and act on what they hear, they risk having both employees and clients disengage or leave. Successful leaders learn that listening to employees and customers is the fastest way to improve products, services and performance.
Ask about Innolect’s Strategic Listening Architecture℠ and learn how we apply qualitative and quantitative listening strategies at the individual, team and system levels. Our clients go beyond merely hearing their employees; they build high-integrity workplaces where employees want to stay.
For more information on the cost of poor listening:
https://innolectinc.com/services-overview/the-cost-of-poor-listening/
Kittie W. Watson, Ph.D.
President & Founder
kittiew@innolectinc.com