Active Listening Skills, Examples and Exercises

In today's world of high tech and high stress, communication is more important than
ever, however we spend less and less time really listening to each other. Genuine,
attentive listening has become rare.
Active listening skills can help build relationships, solve problems, ensure
understanding and avoid conflict. By becoming a better listener, you’ll improve your
workplace productivity, as well as your ability to lead a team, persuade and
negotiate.

Active listening definition

Active listening requires the listener to fully concentrate, understand, respond and
then remember what is being said. You make a conscious effort to hear and
understand the complete message being spoken, rather than just passively hearing
the message of the speaker.

In this article, we'll cover the following:

1. Why is listening important?

2. Benefits of Active Listening
3. What makes a good Listener
4. Verbal and non-verbal signs of active listening
5. Four different listening styles
6. Examples of active listening
7. Barriers to effective listening
8. Tips to becoming an effective listener
9. Listening exercises

Why is listening important?

Listening is the most fundamental component of communication skills. Listening is
not something that just happens, listening is an active process in which a conscious
decision is made to listen to and understand the messages of the speaker.
Active listening is also about patience, listeners should not interrupt with questions or
comments. Active listening involves giving the other person time to explore their
thoughts and feelings, they should be given adequate time for that.

We spend a lot of time listening

Various studies stress the importance of listening as a communication skill. The
studies on average say we spend 70-80% of our waking hours in some form of
communication. Of that time, we spend about 9 percent writing, 16 percent reading,
30 percent speaking, and 45 percent listening.

Studies also confirm that most of us are poor and inefficient listeners. Most of us are
not very good at listening, research suggests that we remember less than 50% of
what we hear in a conversation.

Benefits of active listening

There are many important benefits of active listening, these include:

 Builds deep trust - As you cultivate the habit of listening sincerely, youinvite
people to open up. They can sense that you will not be jumping to conclusions
based on superficial details. They also realise that you care enough about
them to listen attentively. While building trust takes time, it leads to great
benefits such as lifelong friendships and a promise of help in difficult times.
 Broadens your perspective - Your own perspective in life is not the
complete truth or how everyone else sees it. The way you understand life from
your beliefs and thinking is only one way to look at it – listening to other
people’s perspectives allows you to look at life from different perspectives,
some of which you may not have thought of before.
 Strengthens your patience - The ability to be a good listener takes time and
you need to develop it with regular efforts over time. But as you gradually get
better and better at listening, an automatic benefit is that you develop
patience. Patience to let the other person express his or her feelings and
thoughts honestly while you don’t judge.
  Makes you approachable - As you present yourself as a patient listener,
people feel more naturally inclined to communicate with you. By being there
for them, you give them the freedom to express their feelings.
 Increases competence and knowledge - Great listening skills make an
employee more competent and capable, regardless of their position. The
more an individual can get information out of the meetings, the instructions,
and reports provided to him, the more efficient and successful they will be at
completing the task. Listening also builds knowledge and helps fulfil work
requirements through progressive learning.
 Saves time and money - Effective listening not only reduces risks of
misunderstanding and mistakes that could be very damaging to the business,
it saves time and money by avoiding starting a task or a project over again,
just because the directives given were misunderstood. Employees do not
waste precious time and a specific budget allocated to a project.
 Helps detect and solve problems - As a leader, they should always be
attentive to what employees have to say. In the workplace, they are the first
ones to spot flaws and come up with suggestions for improvements. Listening
to colleagues will help you understand what needs to be changed and worked
on to retain talent and make improvements.

Improve your active listening skills in our VR networking course. Click here
to learn more.

What makes a good listener

Good listeners actively endeavour to understand what others are really trying to say,
regardless of how unclear the messages might be. Listening involves not only the
effort to decode verbal messages, but also to interpret non-verbal cues such as facial
expressions and physical posture.

Effective listeners make sure to let others know that they have been heard, and
encourage them to share their thoughts and feelings fully.

You also need to show to the person speaking that you’re listening through non-
verbal cues, such as maintaining eye contact, nodding your head and smiling,
agreeing by saying ‘Yes’. By providing this feedback the person speaking will usually
feel more at ease and communicates more easily, openly and honestly.
Listening vs. hearing
Hearing is an accidental and automatic brain response to sound that requires no
effort. We are surrounded by sounds most of the time. For example, we are
accustomed to the sounds of cars, construction workers and so on. We hear those
sounds and, unless we have a reason to do otherwise, we learn to ignore them.

Hearing is:

 Accidental
 Involuntary
 Effortless

Listening, on the other hand, is purposeful and focused rather than accidental. As a
result, it requires motivation and effort. Listening, at its best, is active, focused,
concentrated attention for the purpose of understanding the meanings expressed by
a speaker.

Listening means paying attention not only to the story, but how it is told, the use of
language and voice, and how the other person uses his or her body. In other words,
it means being aware of both verbal and non-verbal messages. Your ability to listen
effectively depends on the degree to which you perceive and understand these
messages.

Listening is:

 Focused
 Voluntary
 Intentional

Verbal and non-verbal signs of active listening skills

It’s a horrible feeling talking to someone and realising that they are not really
listening. There are some simple steps you can take to let the speaker know you are
actively listening, such as asking relevant questions, positive body language,
nodding and maintaining eye contact.
Non-verbal signs of active listening
The people are listening are likely to display at least some of these signs. However
these signs may not be appropriate in all situations and across all cultures.

 Smile - small smiles can be used to show that the listener is paying attention
to what is being said or as a way of agreeing or being happy about the
messages being received. Combined with nods of the head, smiles can be
powerful in affirming that messages are being listened to and understood.
 Eye Contact - it is normal and usually encouraging for the listener to look at
the speaker. Eye contact can however be intimidating, especially for more shy
speakers – gauge how much eye contact is appropriate for any given
situation. Combine eye contact with smiles and other non-verbal messages to
encourage the speaker.
 Posture - can tell a lot about the sender and receiver in interpersonal
interactions. The attentive listener tends to lean slightly forward or sideways
whilst sitting. Other signs of active listening may include a slight slant of the
head or resting the head on one hand.
 Distraction - the active listener will not be distracted and therefore will refrain
from fidgeting, looking at a clock or watch, doodling, playing with their hair or
picking their fingernails.

Verbal Signs of active listening

 Positive Reinforcement - this can be a strong signal of attentiveness,

however too much use can be annoying for the speaker. Occasional words
and phrases, such as: ‘very good’, ‘yes’ or ‘indeed’ will indicate that you are
paying attention.
 Remembering - try to remembering a few key points, such as the name of
the speaker. It can help to reinforce that what is being said has been
understood. Remembering details, ideas and concepts from previous
conversations proves that attention was kept and is likely to encourage the
speaker to continue.
 Questioning - the listener can demonstrate that they have been paying
attention by asking relevant questions and/or making statements that build or
help to clarify what the speaker has said. By asking relevant questions the
listener also helps to reinforce that they have an interest in what the speaker
has been saying.
  Clarification - this involves asking questions of the speaker to ensure that the
correct message has been received. Clarification usually involves the use of
open questions which enables the speaker to expand on certain points as
necessary.

Four different listening styles

If listening were easy, and if all people went about it in the same way, the task for a
public speaker would be much easier.

1. People orientated
The people-oriented listener is interested in the speaker. They listen to the message
in order to learn how the speaker thinks and how they feel about their message. For
instance, when people-oriented listeners listen to an interview with a famous
musician, they are likely to be more curious about the musician as an individual than
about music.

2. Action or task orientated

Action-oriented listeners are primarily interested in finding out what the speaker
wants. Does the speaker want votes, donations, volunteers, or something else? It’s
sometimes difficult for an action-oriented speaker to listen through the descriptions,
evidence, and explanations with which a speaker builds his or her case.

For example, when you’re a passenger on an airplane, a flight attendant delivers a

brief safety briefing. The flight attendant says only to buckle up so we can leave. An
action-oriented listener finds buckling up a more compelling message than a
message about the underlying reasons.

3. Content
Content-oriented listeners are interested in the message itself, whether it makes
sense, what it means, and whether it’s accurate. Content-oriented listeners want to
listen to well-developed information with solid explanations.

4. Time
People using a time-oriented listening style prefer a message that gets to the point
quickly. Time-oriented listeners can become impatient with slow delivery or lengthy
explanations. This kind of listener may be receptive for only a brief amount of time
and may become rude or even hostile if the speaker expects a longer focus of
attention.

To learn more about listening styles, read The Importance of Listening - Listening

Styles

Examples of active listening

Here are some examples of statements and questions used with active listening:

 Paraphrasing - "So, you want us to build the new school in the style of the old
one?"
 Brief verbal affirmation - "I appreciate the time you’ve taken to speak to me"
 Asking open-ended questions - "I understand you aren’t happy with your
new car. What changes can we make to it?"
 Asking specific questions - "How many employees did you take on last
year?"
 Mentioning similar situations - "I was in a similar situation after my previous
company made me redundant."
 Summarise questions - A job candidate who summarises their
understanding of an unclear question during an interview.
 Notice people speaking - A meeting facilitator encouraging a quiet team
member to share their views about a project.
 Summarise group conversations - A manager summarizing what has been
said at a meeting and checking with the others that it is correct.

Barriers to effective listening

Everyone has difficulty staying completely focused during a lengthy presentation or
conversation, or even relatively brief messages. Some of the factors that interfere
with good listening might exist beyond our control, but others are manageable. It’s
helpful to be aware of these factors so that they interfere as little as possible with
understanding the message. Here are some key barriers:
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to learn more.

1. Noise
Noise is one of the biggest factors to interfere with listening; it can be defined as
anything that interferes with your ability to attend to and understand a message.
There are many kinds of noise, the four you are most likely to encounter in public
speaking situations are: physical noise, psychological noise, physiological noise, and
semantic noise.

2. Attention Span
A person can only maintain focused attention for a finite length of time. Many people
argued that modern audiences have lost the ability to sustain attention to a message.
Whether or not these concerns are well founded, you have probably noticed that
even when your attention is glued to something in which you are deeply interested,
every now and then you pause to do something else, such as getting a drink.

3. Receiver Biases
Good listening involves keeping an open mind and withholding judgment until the
speaker has completed the message. Conversely, biased listening is characterized
by jumping to conclusions; the biased listener believes, "I don’t need to listen
because I already know this." Receiver biases can refer to two things: biases with
reference to the speaker and preconceived ideas and opinions about the topic or
message. Everyone has biases but good listeners hold them in check while listening.

4. Listening Apprehension
This is the fear that you might be unable to understand the message or process the
information correctly or be able to adapt your thinking to include the new information
coherently. In some situations, you might worry that the information presented will be
too complex for you to understand fully.

Tips to become an effective listener and improve active

listening skills
Tips to help you develop effective listening skills.

Face the speaker and maintain eye contact

Talking to someone while they scan the room, study a computer screen, or gaze out
the window is like trying to hit a moving target. How much of the person's divided
attention you are actually getting? Fifty percent? Five percent?

In most Western cultures, eye contact is considered a basic ingredient of effective

communication. When we talk, we look each other in the eye. Do your
conversational partners the courtesy of turning to face them. Put aside papers,
books, the phone and other distractions. Look at them, even if they don't look at you.
Shyness, uncertainty or other emotions, along with cultural taboos, can inhibit eye
contact in some people under some circumstances.

Be attentive and relaxed

Give the speaker your undivided attention, and acknowledge the message.
Recognise that non-verbal communication is very powerful. In order to be attentive
you’ll:

 Maintain eye-contact with the speaker

 Direct yourself towards the speaker
 Pay attention to what's being said
 Put aside distracting thoughts

Mentally screen out distractions, like background activity and noise. In addition, try
not to focus on the speaker's accent or speech mannerisms to the point where they
become distractions. Finally, don't be distracted by your own thoughts, feelings, or
biases.

Keep an open mind

Listen without judging the other person or mentally criticizing the things she tells you.
If what she says alarms you, go ahead and feel alarmed, but don't say to yourself,
"Well, that was a stupid move." As soon as you indulge in judgmental bemusements,
you've compromised your effectiveness as a listener.

Listen without jumping to conclusions and don’t interrupt to finish their sentences.
Remember that the speaker is using language to represent the thoughts and feelings
inside her brain. You don't know what those thoughts and feelings are and the only
way you'll find out is by listening.

Don't interrupt or cut them off

Children used to be taught that it's rude to interrupt. I'm not sure that message is
getting across anymore. Certainly the opposite is being modelled on the majority of
talk shows and reality programs, where loud, aggressive, in-your-face behaviour is
condoned, if not encouraged.

Interrupting sends a variety of messages:

 I'm more important than you are

 What I have to say is more interesting
 I don't care what you think
 I don't have time for your opinion

We all think and speak at different rates. If you are a quick thinker and an agile
talker, the burden is on you to relax your pace for the slower, more thoughtful
communicator—or for the guy who has trouble expressing himself.

Ask questions to clarify what they are saying

When you don't understand something, of course you should ask the speaker to
explain it to you. But rather than interrupt, wait until the speaker pauses. Then say
something like, "Back up a second. I didn't understand what you just said about…"

Ask questions and summarise to ensure understanding

When the person speaking has finished talking, ask questions relevant to what they
are saying – try not to lead people in directions that have nothing to do with where
they thought they were going. Sometimes we work our way back to the original topic,
but very often we don't.

You can also summarise the conversation to make sure you understand all the
person is trying to say – this works well at networking events at the end of
conversations, it also gives you an excuse to move onto another conversation.

Try to feel what the speaker is feeling

Empathy is the heart and soul of good listening. To experience empathy, you have
to put yourself in the other person's place and allow yourself to feel what it is like to
be her at that moment. This is not an easy thing to do. It takes energy and
concentration. But it is a generous and helpful thing to do, and it facilitates
communication like nothing else does.

Give the speaker regular feedback

Show that you understand where the speaker is coming from by reflecting the
speaker's feelings. If the speaker's feelings are hidden or unclear, then occasionally
paraphrase the content of the message. Or just nod and show your understanding
through appropriate facial expressions and an occasional well-timed "uh huh."

Pay attention to non-verbal cues

The majority of face-to-face communication is non-verbal. We get a great deal of
information about each other without saying a word. When face to face with a
person, you can detect enthusiasm, boredom, or irritation very quickly in the
expression around the eyes, the set of the mouth, the slope of the shoulders. These
are clues you can't ignore. When listening, remember that words convey only a
fraction of the message.

To read these listening tips in more detail, visit 10 Steps To Effective Listening

Listening skills exercises

Virtual reality exercises

Practice your listening skills in realistic virtual scenarios. For example, in
ourNetworking VR course, you get scored on your eye contact, memory of the
conversation and more.

VR opens up new opportunities to practice active listening skills in a variety of

scenarios, including at networking events, team meetings and conferences.