Top Ten Listening Skills for Speakers

Good Speakers need good listening skills to become Great Communicators

Speakers spend a lot of time developing speaking skills and often don’t focus enough on the equally important communication skill of listening. As a Speaker trained in the art of listening I have put together the tips below.

1. What Speakers want most of all is to be heard, so does everyone else! Hence listening is the perfect gift to give to others

2. Never make assumptions about what people are thinking and feeling. Take time to listen and ask questions. Most people will be only too happy to answer. Why guess what people are thinking when they will tell you!

3. Remember silence can be as powerful as Speaking, when used skilfully

4. In conversation, repeat in your own words your understanding of what is being said. This communicates to the listener that they are really being heard.

5. Make eye contact that is not too fleeting, actually try to see the eye colour of the person/s you are communicating with.

6. When people speak, let them finish their own sentences, no matter how intuitive you are, you never really know what people are going to say.

7. Resist the urge to interrupt, and avoid planning your reply while the person is speaking; instead focus on fully hearing what is being said. This is the real skill of listening

8. Listening is a whole body experience; listen under, over and between the words spoken. Feel what your audience is saying.

9. Check your ego. When you try too hard and ‘Ease Genuine Out’– EGO, what remains can appear false. Listen to yourself and be yourself, people will love you for it.

10. People will be more prepared to listen to you, if you take time to really hear them.