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LeadershipREPOST

REPOST: Listening With the Intent to Understand

by Ron Potter
A Note From the Editor:
As we recently mentioned, we are reposting popular blog posts while Ron is recovering from some health issues.

The next time you’re listening to something, especially on a topic where you don’t necessarily agree, try this experiment: Use part of your brain to pay attention to what you’re thinking when listening to the other person. It’s okay. Your brain has a lot more capacity than your think. You can actually listen to another person at the same time as you act as an observer to watch what your own brain is doing. I know you can.

If you’re like most of us, you’ll find your own brain developing some sort of checklist:

  • Those two points support my side of the argument so I’ll immediately respond with those.
  • That point is not supported by fact, so I can instantly discount that.
  • That reminds me I need to pick up dog food on the way home.
  • I can’t believe they actually think that point is valid. How could they be so naive?

Then the moment happens. The other person pauses; they may not even be finished with their point of view, but just pausing a moment to collect their thoughts or even pausing a moment before presenting their obviously convincing closing statement. It makes no difference; it’s a pause.
So you jump in:

“Let me reinforce a couple of statements you made earlier because I believe they make my point exactly. And let me also clarify another conclusion you reached that is counter to all the facts we have.”

And on and on and on until you’re forced to pause and the cycle repeats.

If this scenario reflects in any way what you are experiencing while “listening” to other people, then you listen with the intent to respond. Most of us do it. Most of us do it most of the time. It takes a conscious effort and some practice to actually start listening with the intent to understand. But what a difference it will make in your life if you even get marginally good at it.

When you listen with the intent to understand, your curiosity kicks in. You’re not trying to catalog the points you’re hearing. You’re wondering:

  • I wonder why they believe that?
  • I wonder what experience they’ve had with this in the past?
  • I wonder who they trust on this and why?
  • I wonder what they believe will be the best outcome?

If you’re truly curious and wondering, then your response when that inevitable pause comes will be totally different.
Your first reaction to the pause may be to simply wait to see if there is a conclusion or further thoughts.
You may actually ask if there is a conclusion on further thought.
You may express your wonderment and curiosity and begin to ask questions or clarification or deeper understanding or more background.

Whatever you’re response. If it’s driven by curiosity and wonderment, the other person will immediately know that you’ve been listening to understand. You want to understand, you want to know their viewpoint. This sparks a very different reaction on their part.
A few key things happen from their point-of-view:

  • Once they realize you’re trying to understand their point-of-view, they become less rigid in their stance and more willing to admit it’s just their point-of-view.
  • They become more open to questioning their own point-of-view because you’re honestly questioning it in an attempt to understand and not with the intent to control or discredit it.
  • And most importantly, once you’ve fully listened to and attempted to understand their point-of-view, they’re much more willing to listen to and be open to your point-of-view.

Steven Covey, in his The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, indicates that one of the seven habits is to “seek to understand before being understood.” This is what he was talking about.

Listen with the intent to understand. Practice it. Use it often. You’ll be amazed at how much people are willing to share with you and how much they’re willing to listen to and understand your point-of-view.
Try it. It will be refreshing.

And one more solid point: In my book, Trust Me: Developing A Leadership Style People are Willing to Follow, the number one trait of great leaders is humility. The foundation of humility is the willingness to listen with the intent to understand.

What’s your reaction when someone actually listens to you and truly wants to understand?

This post was originally posted here on January 15, 2015.
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BlogCulture

Consensus Building

by Ron Potter

I meet on a regular basis with a group of highly intelligent and successful guys.  We have a name for ouselves which is SPACE CADETS.  The story is too long about how we became known by that name but we’ve enjoyed it.

Our topics range across the things we’ve been thinking about: a difficult situation we find ourselves in or sometimes simply curiosity.  But it often deals with how we reach consensus with our team or client.  One of the definitions of consensus from Merriam-Webster is “group solidarity in sentiment and belief.”  You can look up the word solidarity but it often leads back to something solid.  You build something together that is solid and that you’ll all defend.

There are two words in the English language that are often associated with building consensus.

One of those words is discussion.  The other word is dialogue.  Most people think of a good discussion as a way to reach consensus.  Most of us don’t think of the word dialogue.  If fact we often mix the two words up and misunderstand their meaning.

Discussion

There are some interesting ideas that discussion is based on.  They include:

  • Narrow focus
  • Debate of what is “right”
  • Defending certainty
  • Seeking closure

Notice that there is an assumed “right” and “certainty” in the word discussion.  Add to that the narrow focus and seeking closure (instead of understanding) and you begin to see that discussion may not be the best approach to building consensus.  One of the best definitions that I found said that the word discussion is based on the same root word as percussion.  What do you think of when you think about percussion?  Drums!

I played percussion in our high school band.  When we were in an orchestra situation I remember our band director asking me to bring down the volume on the percussion.  But when we were outdoors in marching band, it seemed like he was always asking me to raise the volume.  He wanted more percussion.  Discussion in an open area with lots of listeners may be useful.  But in a small team setting, percussion is not useful.  It seems to have all the negative aspects of the bullet list above.

Dialogue

Dialogue is very different from discussion.  Dialogue is an exchange of ideas and opinions.  Dialogue has some very interesting aspects that you would probably love to have in most instances.  It:

  • Surfaces all assumptions
  • Names and faces defense routines
  • Slows down conversation to create learning and shared meaning
  • Suspends certainty

Suspending Assumptions

The last point in dialogue is suspending certainty.  All of us have certain ideas that we feel certain about.  This is natural and it’s certainly OK as long as we know they come from our own views and observations.  I think we would have a tough time with life if we didn’t have things we were certain about.  But it’s important that they are really our assumptions and another person (especially one with different experiences and coming up in a different culture) may see them entirely differently.

I was very fortunate that my consulting career had me working around the world and being exposed to different cultures.  I remember one team that was made up of people from Spain, Italy, Germany, Sweden, and the UK.  It was fascinating to see them start talking about a topic from their own culture and history.  Fortunately, this was a team that respected each other and was willing to understand how the different cultures viewed certain topics.

One funny experience I remember was working with a US CEO.  He had gotten tired of people being late for meetings so he instituted the rule that if you were late, you had to stand on your chair or table and sing your college fight song or country national anthem.  From his point of view that would have been very humiliating.  Then one day we were waiting for a meeting to start and I asked him if he saw the people standing outside the conference room door.  It seems that all the Irish were waiting outside the door so they could be late and have to stand on the table and sing their national anthem.  They loved it.

Suspending Assumptions II

A couple of things to think about when you’re suspending assumptions are:

  1. Let go of your own assumptions in order to understand the assumptions of others.
  2. When it comes to your turn, help everyone understand your assumptions and what formed them.
  3. Move from discussion to dialogue to help everyone understand all of the assumptions so that together you can come up with the best team solution.

It’s important to remember that you won’t win every argument and your assumptions won’t carry the day in every instance.  Most often one assumption persuades most of the team but is enhanced by portions of some of the other assumptions.

One way to judge your ability to do this well is how you respond to people after the decision is made.  When someone (who may have been fully aware of your position before the meeting) asks you what the decision of the team was, your answer should be something like, “The team thought this was the best solution.”  When the person says they know that was not your opinion prior to the meeting, say again, “The team thought it is the best solution.”

Keep in mind that we all have different assumptions.  I grew up with three siblings in the same house.  We have certain similarities but, as a whole, we are each very different people.  You’re no better or worse than the other person, you just have different assumptions.

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BlogCulture

BS Indicator

by Ron Potter

I’ve started reading a book titled The Life-Changing Science of Detecting Bullshit.  I started reading it just because it sounded like a fun read (my warped sense of humor, I guess).  However, once I started to read the research and science behind it, the topic is fascinating.

The Causes and Consequences of B.S.

John Petrocelli is a social psychologist and professor of psychology at Wake Forest University, who actually studies this issue.  How fun would that be?

He finds that people tend to spread B.S. when they feel obligated to have an opinion about something they know little about—and when they feel they aren’t going to be challenged.  The Wall Street Journal did a fascinating interview with Dr. Potrocelli.  A couple of findings I found interesting were:

  • B.S. is when someone communicates something with little regard for the truth, genuine evidence, or established knowledge.
  • Liars actually know and care about the truth. They need to know the truth so they can distract you from it. The BS’er not only doesn’t know the truth, they don’t care about it.
  • One reason people BS is simply the obligation to have an opinion. People feel they have to have an opinion about everything.  They tell each other what they want to hear to avoid conflict or hurt feelings.

Obligation to Have an Opinion

Why do we feel we need to have an opinion?  We could just as easily remain silent or openly indicate that we don’t have an opinion on a particular.  Even better, if we were to indicate that we haven’t formed an opinion because we don’t know all the facts and haven’t yet figured out the truth.

The WSJ indicates that the main reason people BS is to promote one’s status—to get ahead, appear knowledgeable, competent, skilled, or admired.  Unless these BS’ers are challenged, it can lead to some of these consequences but when challenged properly, their BS is quickly exposed and leads to the failure of accomplishing any of those goals.

Detecting BS

Our ability to detect BS has been dulled through this time of isolation.  We’ve lost some of our natural ability to detect.  The WSJ article points out a couple of great questions that we can ask to retune our BS detector.

  • Ask people to clarify, they’ll often take a step back and think. And a lot of times, they’ll dial back their claim. So the first question is: “What? What are you saying?”
  • “How? How do you know that’s true? How did you come to that conclusion?”  We have often been taught to ask the “Why” question first.  However, Dr. Petrocelli suggests that the “Why” is not a good question to ask. That leads people into the abstract, to talk about their values and the heady stuff. The “how” question gets them down to the concrete, real-world, practical things that we would call evidence.
  • The other question should be: “Have you ever considered any alternatives?” The reason for this question is that if they say no, you know they probably haven’t thought through the thing very well.

The Power of Detecting BS

Something on your radar just pinged and you’re not sure if this person is telling you the truth or just BSing.  Or you might simply be ignorant of the situation, the facts, and the truth.  In either case, asking the questions above will help you, your team, and your leadership be better at what you’re trying to accomplish.  Become a good BS detector simply by keeping your radar up and asking the right questions.

You’ll be thought of as a solid citizen and a critical thinker.  Don’t accept or spew BS.

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BlogTeam

Is Criticism Slowing You Down?

by Ron Potter

As you’ve probably noticed in my blogs, I’m a fan of Aristotle’s philosophy.  One of his quotes makes a great point about criticism:

“There is only one way to avoid criticism: do nothing, say nothing, be nothing.”

I have seen and met those people.  They are so afraid of what others think that they tend to not do anything in fear of criticism.  Therefore they say nothing that could be constructed as critical or even innovative.  In doing so they become nothing.  They become invisible.  They are never considered for promotion.  They are never considered to lead a team.  Their thoughts are never considered when looking for innovative ideas.  They are nothing.

Criticism Happens

If we think about Aristotle’s quote in reverse:

  • Do something
  • Say what’s on your mind (in a constructive way)
  • Be something.

You are a unique human being.  You bring something unique and different from every other person.  Recognize the value in that uniqueness.

Do Something

Doing nothing can be the result of a boss who is all-controlling.  If that’s the case, look for another position, look for another job, look to a new company.  Being in a position of never doing anything other than what you’re told and how to do it, will suck the life out of you!  You will find yourself a greatly diminished human being that will destroy your self-esteem and it will be noticed by your loved ones.

But doing something will almost always bring criticism.  If you step back and view the situation almost from a third-party position, you’ll often see that the criticism comes from people who themselves have low self-esteem.  The criticism comes in an effort to make themselves look better or feel better about themselves.  It never works.  Healthy people see right through that maneuver and discount the other person, not you.

Say What’s on Your Mind

This one must be accomplished with good self-esteem.  When you’re in that state of mind, you’re not criticizing, you’re just trying to look at things from a different perspective.   Remember that we are all unique.  We all see things from a different perspective.

Teams that can listen and respect each other’s points of view are the healthiest and strongest teams. 

Always stay in a respectful position.  Acknowledge that everyone has a unique perspective and it’s best if we all hear and understand that perspective.  Great teams are not “group think” teams.  We’re not lemmings blindly following the herd off the cliff.  Someone needs to say “I see us heading for a cliff and the results aren’t good”.  Just that simple statement will often get others sharing “you know, I’ve been wondering the same thing.  This just doesn’t feel right”.

Be open, honest, and respectful.  Understand what’s on everyone’s mind.  It can save the team

Be Something

What do you want to be known for?

  • The one who gets the team thinking?
  • The respectful one who always brings the best out in others?
  • The Jerk?
  • The non-existent, silent one in the room?

This is your choice.  Get to know the other team members as human beings.  Help them get to know you as a human being.  We are all unique.  We become the best team when we understand, respect, and use that uniqueness to build a great teams and reach great team decisions.

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BlogCulture

Heeeeere’s Johnny!

by Ron Potter

I’ve recently noticed there are Johnny Carson reruns from his old “Tonight” show on one of the networks.  I always considered Carson the best night-time TV host so I began to watch a few.  Overall, I have not been disappointed.

Humility

While I’m sure that Johnny Carson had a reasonably big ego, it seemed that he treated every guest with equal respect and humility.  It didn’t make any difference if the person was the hottest movie star of the day or had just won a contest for catching gumdrops in their mouth.  The person had accomplished something and Carson respected them for it.  He would often join the person on stage and attempt to duplicate their effort almost always failing miserably.  Once again to demonstrate their accomplishment and respect them for it.

Monologue

But the real topic of this blog is listening!  Elizabeth Bernstein wrote an article for the Wall Street Journal titled No One is Listening?  Maybe You’re the Problem.

I’ve written several times about listening with the intent to understand vs. listening with the intent to respond.  Many of our communication problems happen because we’re preparing our response rather than trying to listen and understand what the other person is saying.

But Ms. Bernstien made one point in the article that many talkers engage in monologue rather than dialogue.

Carson always started his show with a monologue.  While he certainly was listening to the audience for clues about how funny his statement was, he simply went on with the rest of his monologue just as he had written and practiced it.

The WSJ article said “Often talkers engage in a monologue rather than a dialogue.  They drone on and ignore the listener’s clues that he or she is disengaged.”

They’re speaking in a monologue while seemingly engaged in a dialogue.  And then rate the “listener” poorly for not being engaged.

Dialogue

But once Johnny had a guest sitting across the desk from him, he seemed to fully switch to a dialogue.  He listened.  He made eye contact.  He asked open-ended questions.  He encouraged the other person to elaborate.

Let’s examine the word Dialogue for a minute.  I have observed teams that use:

  • Debate
  • Discussion
  • Dialogue (although very few understand or have been taught what it means to dialogue)

Debate

Many of you have been on debate teams in high school or college.  If you’ll recall, you were often given positions on a topic that you may not have even believed.  But you still had to debate and in fact, were graded on your debating skills whether you believed in the topic or not.  The goal of the debate was to “win.”  If your goal in a team meeting or engaging with another person is to win the debate, you may actually accomplish the goal but over time will be ignored and shunned for your lack of dialogue abilities.

Discussion

Most teams will tell me that they’ve learned the negative aspects of debating and have avoided them by making sure the team is having a good discussion.  While their intentions and often their actions are good, they don’t really know the root of the word discussion.  The word discussion has the same root as percussion.  I played in the percussion section in my high school band.  When we were out marching in a parade or other pageantry, I played the snare drum and my job was to play it as loud as possible to help the band stay in order and be heard over the crowd.  All too often, teams turn to discussion where the loudest person wins through sheer force and percussion.

Dialogue

Dialogue has a pattern that will help a team reach a unified position.  There is much to be learned about dialogue and it can be modified to the team’s particular needs but in general, follows this pattern:

  • Boil the issue down to two positions so that you can decide (eliminate one of the options)
  • Once down to two positions, dialogue them one at a time.
    • This means that for a period of time “everyone” on the team is on the same side to help lead the position to great success.
  • Once each position has been dialogued, decide.  Eliminate one position and put all the team’s energy into the chosen position.  It’s amazing how quickly one position can be reached when the debate and discussion are removed from the process.  It’s also amazing how powerful one position can become when everyone is behind its success.

Heeeeere’s Johnny!

Treat each other with respect!

Treat each topic and position with dignity!

Get the entire team on the same page!

You’ll experience power and speed beyond what you imagined possible.

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BlogCulture

What’s your Therefore there for?

by Ron Potter

The word therefore has only been used in its current form for around 200 years. It’s a relatively new word in our language.

In the original old English, it meant: for that or by reason of that. Or it could be understood to mean “in consequence of that.”

The question is “What is that?”

We all too often give our reason for something without ever explaining what that reason is based upon.

By reason of that

In consequence of that

One of the practices I find myself talking to corporate teams about is conducting good dialogue. Good dialogue begins with clearly stating the “that” which your argument or conclusions are based upon.

Peter Senge wrote the book The 5th Discipline in 1990. In my experience with corporate clients, it was one of the most impactful books written at the time. Every client I worked with during the late 90’s and early 2000’s was anxious to show me what they were doing with systems thinking (the point of Senge’s book) and re-engineering projects to rethink how they were approaching their work. The book itself was over 400 pages long and my personal notes of highlights were nearly 40 pages. That means I highlighted nearly 10% of all the words written. It was impactful thinking!

One of the basic mental models in the book was Triple Loop Learning. It is most often attributed to Chris Argyris who was a colleague of Senge. In this model, they helped us understand that until we get at the beliefs and assumptions that drive our reasoning we will never actually learn or will always fall short of accomplishing major change efforts. Beliefs and assumptions will always overrule systems, policies, procedures, and processes.

Teams that get good at starting with beliefs and assumptions of each team member find renewed understanding and respect for each other and make great strides accomplishing great things beyond what one individual could accomplish.

In my experience, if you were to watch high performing teams from behind a soundproof glass, you would think they were at each other’s throats. They seem to be aggressively going at each other and getting in each other’s face. But, if you removed the glass and began to hear the discussions, you would be aware that they want to understand each other so deeply that they are aggressively going after the beliefs, assumptions, backgrounds, experiences that support everyone’s starting points when dealing with a difficult issue. By understanding beliefs and assumptions, the team is better at solving problems and reaching a committed solution they all will back and support.

So, what is your therefore there for? If you can’t share what you believe without condemnation, ridicule or repercussions your “therefore” conclusions, suggestions or directions will never be understood or respected. Build great teams that can openly share Beliefs and Assumptions so that “therefore” is understood and respected.

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BlogLeadership

Are you egocentric?

by Ron Potter
Source: Kristoffer Trolle, Creative Commons

Source: Kristoffer Trolle, Creative Commons

Here’s a clue… YES!

Elizabeth Bernstien, a columnist for the Wall Street Journal wrote a piece titled “But you never said…”  In this column she quotes Dr. Michael Ross, professor emeritus in the psychology department at the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada:

People also remember their own actions better. So they can recall what they did, just not what [the other person] did. Researchers call this an egocentric bias, and study it by asking people to recall their contributions to events. Whether the event is positive or negative, people tend to believe that they had more responsibility.

Your mood—both when an event happens and when you recall it later—plays a big part in memory, experts say. If you are in a positive mood or feeling positive about the other person, you will more likely recall a positive experience or give a positive interpretation to a negative experience. Similarly, negative moods tend to reap negative memories.

Negative moods may also cause stronger memories. A person who lost an argument remembers it more clearly than the person who won it, says Dr. Ross.  And how often you recall an incident may affect your memory. It is quite possible to remember your most recent version of the story, not the way it actually happened.

Yes, we are egocentric.  It’s natural and essential in many cases.  But, if we tend to remember what we said or did more than what anyone else said or did, how do we build a great team solution rather than a narrow egocentric solution?  Dialogue!

Dialogue is a practiced technique that will help you build better solutions to difficult problems.  We each have our own memory and perspective.  It’s important to remember that your view is not “right” it’s just your view.  In dialogue we start by sharing our “beliefs and assumptions” about a situation.  Once we’ve really heard each other than we can start building some common ground rather than simply fighting over who’s view is right thereby making the other views wrong.  Many, many arguments are actually right vs right, not right vs wrong.  Start with that assumption and you’ll begin to build better teams.

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BlogLeadership

Pay Attention

by Ron Potter

What are you willing to pay for?

Maybe it’s that nicer car or maybe just the nicer option package on the car you’ve already decided to buy.

Maybe it’s shopping at Whole Foods versus another grocery store.

Maybe it’s those concert tickets in the center stage seats.

There are certain things beyond our necessities that we’re willing to pay for. But why? That less expensive car still gets you from point A to point B. Sitting farther back at the concert may even provide better sound. So why do we pay for these items? Perceived value!

Image Source: 401(k), Creative Commons

Image Source: 401(k), Creative Commons

We’re willing part with our hard earned resources because our perception is that it will provide us with value that we appreciate.

Have you noticed that from our elementary school days, we’ve been told to pay attention! Why do we have to pay to give someone our attention? Because it takes focus, concentration, discipline, and, most importantly, there will be a value received for the price paid.

Therein lies the problem. If we don’t actually believe that we’ll learn something by paying attention or that the other person has nothing of value to offer, we’re not willing to pay. This relates closely to another blog I wrote about listening with the intent to understand. If we’re not willing to discipline ourselves to truly understand the other person or pay to give someone our attention then we’re exposing our own ego and arrogance.

When our ego and arrogance is the driving force behind our inability to understand another person or we’re not willing to pay the price of granting another person our attention, we’ve violated the first principle of great leadership: humility.

When great leaders are willing to work from a foundation of humility by offering to pay to give others their attention in order to truly understand the other person, they begin to create a culture that develops great teams that are able to grow together to generate a synergy that surpasses their own expectations.

Be willing to pay attention, you’ll be blown away by the value you’ll receive.

I think of doctors in clinical environments. I consider my cardiologist one of the best doctors I’ve ever had because while he is with me it seems that I’m the only thing that matters to him. Although I know he is paying a great price by giving me his attention and not being distracted by all of the commotion going on outside the room. I appreciate the price he pays.

Share with us about the time when someone paid the price to give you their attention.

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BlogLeadership

Listening With the Intent to Understand

by Ron Potter
Image Source: shorpy.com

Image Source: shorpy.com

The next time you’re listening to something, especially on a topic where you don’t necessarily agree, try this experiment: Use part of your brain to pay attention to what you’re thinking when listening to the other person. It’s okay. Your brain has a lot more capacity than your think. You can actually listen to another person at the same time as you act as an observer to watch what your own brain is doing. I know you can.

If you’re like most of us, you’ll find your own brain developing some sort of checklist:

  • Those two points support my side of the argument so I’ll immediately respond with those.
  • That point is not supported by fact, so I can instantly discount that.
  • That reminds me I need to pick up dog food on the way home.
  • I can’t believe they actually think that point is valid. How could they be so naive?

Then the moment happens. The other person pauses; they may not even be finished with their point of view, but just pausing a moment to collect their thoughts or even pausing a moment before presenting their obviously convincing closing statement. It makes no difference; it’s a pause.
So you jump in:

“Let me reinforce a couple of statements you made earlier because I believe they make my point exactly. And let me also clarify another conclusion you reached that is counter to all the facts we have.”

And on and on and on until you’re forced to pause and the cycle repeats.

If this scenario reflects in any way what you are experiencing while “listening” to other people, then you listen with the intent to respond. Most of us do it. Most of us do it most of the time. It takes a conscious effort and some practice to actually start listening with the intent to understand. But what a difference it will make in your life if you even get marginally good at it.

When you listen with the intent to understand, your curiosity kicks in. You’re not trying to catalog the points you’re hearing. You’re wondering:

  • I wonder why they believe that?
  • I wonder what experience they’ve had with this in the past?
  • I wonder who they trust on this and why?
  • I wonder what they believe will be the best outcome?

If you’re truly curious and wondering, then your response when that inevitable pause comes will be totally different.
Your first reaction to the pause may be to simply wait to see if there is a conclusion or further thoughts.
You may actually ask if there is a conclusion or further thought.
You may express your wonderment and curiosity and begin to ask questions or clarification or deeper understanding or more background.

Whatever you’re response. If it’s driven by curiosity and wonderment, the other person will immediately know that you’ve been listening to understand. You want to understand, you want to know their viewpoint. This sparks a very different reaction on their part.
A few key things happen from their point-of-view:

  • Once they realize you’re trying to understand their point-of-view, they become less rigid in their stance and more willing to admit it’s just their point-of-view.
  • They become more open to questioning their own point-of-view because you’re honestly questioning it in an attempt to understand and not with the intent to control or discredit it.
  • And most importantly, once you’ve fully listened to and attempted to understand their point-of-view, they’re much more willing to listen to and be open to your point-of-view.

Steven Covey, in his The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, indicates that one of the seven habits is to “seek to understand before being understood.” This is what he was talking about.

Listen with the intent to understand. Practice it. Use it often. You’ll be amazed at how much people are willing to share with you and how much they’re willing to listen to and understand your point-of-view.
Try it. It will be refreshing.

And one more solid point: In my book, Trust Me: Developing A Leadership Style People are Willing to Follow, the number one trait of great leaders is humility. The foundation of humility is the willingness to listen with the intent to understand.

What’s your reaction when someone actually listens to you and truly wants to understand?

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