 We're talking in these videos about listening and improving listening competence in different contexts different situations in this video We're going to focus on listening at work listening in our careers and this is an especially effective way to set ourselves apart in the workplace because quite frankly Listening at work has been an epic fail for many many years. We've done a face-plant in terms of Teaching people how to be effective and listening in the workplace and and This stems from a lot of different things, but really there's been a distinct lack of instruction in educational programs We have not provided a lot of education on effective listening and so people are entering the workforce They're not effective listeners because they haven't been taught how this is a skill just like anything else We've got to teach people how to be more effective listeners and as an educational System we have failed to do that to teach people going through these systems how to be effective listeners That's one aspect of the epic fail Then we don't do any better job when we're when we get people in the career in in in the workplace It's a it's a really overlooked aspect of training in the workplace employees Employers don't like to spend a lot of time on soft skills in general and certainly not on teaching how to be Effective listeners they figure people ought to just be able to do that on their own if they have enough incentive But it's hard to do anything. Well, if you haven't been taught how to do it. Well, so this has been an epic fail listening in the workplace has been just Travesty for generations now. So we need to improve this. So Why is this important? What are the benefits of listening? Well at work Well, first of all, it creates an open communication climate at work in the workplace People want to feel comfortable. They want to feel as though they are being heard whether that's employees whether that's customers Whether it's, you know, people working above or below you They want to feel like they're they're heard and they have the opportunity to speak and they're not going to do that If they don't feel like you're listening effectively or if anybody's listening effectively to them So this creates an open communication climate when people people feel as though They can speak their mind and and be heard and have somebody listen well to them It creates that kind of open communication climate. This will also enhance sales performance Customers want to be heard. They want to be listened to they want to have people understand their message and and and Respond to what it is they're saying Effectively so this can enhance sales performance when you're able to listen well that will stand out to the customer It also promotes involvement in the workplace among the employees again When people feel like they're being heard when they feel like somebody's listening to them They're more likely to be involved to to get and stay engaged in the workplace So it promotes involvement in the workplace amongst the employees. It increases motivation as well Like this is a basic human thing when we feel like we're being seen and being heard Effectively then that increases that motivation for us to do well and to do more because we want to Do things to deserve being heard like that, right? So it can increase employee motivation So there are lots of reasons why we ought to encourage effective listening in the workplace and why we ought to Help employees develop that skill. There's there's plenty of benefit to the bottom line in helping people listen more effectively So then what can we do to listen more effectively at work? What can we do to improve our listening at work? First of all, we can remove barriers to concentration We can get rid of things that are gonna Excuse me are going to distract people Get rid of it, you know, we can make it an environment that's conducive to listening We can remove if if TVs are a distraction if if construction noise is a distraction Whatever it is that's a distraction for people in the workplace. We can remove those barriers to concentration We know that listening is hard work So we can do we can to eliminate some of those different barriers that we're aware of and as we become aware of them We can reduce the noise and just in general we can again reduce distraction We can remove remove those barriers to concentration and we can remove noise whether it's uncomfortable chairs Whether it's a temperature issue that's keeping people from focusing whether it's actual noise audiological noise That people can't hear well enough then we need to remove that kind of noise whatever kind of noise We come across need to get rid of it as much as possible We need to encourage convergent language. We need to encourage people to to develop the same Vocabulary, you know, the military is great about this They they you know in the military you don't go to the kitchen you go to the mess or the dining hall or whatever it is Well, you know, we need to encourage that kind of convergent language when people start using that language It's an indicator that they are buying into the group that they want to be a part of that group They're using language that is common to that group and he's used by that group because they want to be a part of that group That will help with listening as well when we're in on the language when we're in on the message That'll help us listen more effectively. So we need to encourage that kind of convergent language and that shared language We need to create intentional listening spaces, you know, maybe you work in a factory or you work in a place It's just just noisy and that's all there is to it It's just you know, it's just going to be noisy But you can create spaces for listening Create spaces where people can go if they need a quiet space to be able to have a conversation and to listen We can be intentional about creating those kind of spaces in the workplace as well So that people do have those places to retreat to when they have need to listen more effectively or to focus more effectively on that message Couple more things we can do to improve listening at work. We can designate official listening opportunities You know quote-unquote official listening opportunities. We can say, okay, I'm gonna have a listening session My my office is gonna be open from five to six. I'm gonna put things away I'm gonna or whatever time you want to call it. I'm gonna put these other things away I'm gonna be available to people to just come in and talk if they have something they want to share with me Then we can designate these official listening opportunities or be employee observations or evaluations or another good opportunity for this We can designate those as listening opportunities as well I want to listen to you and hear what you have to say and I'm gonna again put away these distractions I'm gonna shut down my email put my phone on on silent and not let it be a distraction We're gonna have these official listening opportunities We can offer training. We've mentioned one of the fails that we've had is we have not trained employees very effectively Listening is not a natural skill. It is a learned skill So we can spend some time in the workforce training people how to listen more effectively and that can be very beneficial And a quick way we can improve listening at work as well One of the biggest things we can do is just model effective listening as a leader as a manager as a supervisor Whatever your role is we can model effective listening for others We can show people what that looks like and and what a difference it can make and you'll be amazed people start to pick up on that Quickly when they see the impact that it can have so we can model that kind of effective listening in order to improve listening at work as well So those are a few quick things we can do to improve our listening at work and why we should do so This again is a quick way for you to stand out at work You know that old saying in the land of the blind the one-eyed man is king if you can listen Well, if you can listen even moderately well, you will set yourself apart from 90% of the workforce who does not listen well because it isn't a skill that employers are looking for and it's one that you can Develop so I encourage you to Take a look at what you can do to improve your listening skills in the workplace and use that as an opportunity to set yourself apart I'm just by focusing in on again listening while you're at work