Active listening requires a skill that separates managing people from processes and products. You know that, but do you know why? When we’re promoted for the first time, we tend to think about the end result as if we were still an individual contributor. But here’s the thing. The feedback you get from processes and products is devoid of the one thing that real, live people possess – emotions.

Back in the day, we use to discount employee’s emotions, referring to them as “touchy-feely” stuff and making the argument that there was no room for it in the workplace. Yeah, right. Somewhere down the line, we started to address the entire employee. Why is Robert no longer the stellar performer he was last month? Nothing has changed in the workplace but he’s falling behind. You decide it’s time to find out what’s going on. And this is where many managers fail. They talk but they don’t listen. Let’s fix that right from the start.

What is Active Listening?

I call it “listening between the lines.” I hear the words but what are you telling me? Active listening means understanding not only the speaker’s words but also their emotions and the overall message they’re sending. It means asking questions that get to the heart of the matter. It’s not called the heart of the matter for nothing – this is your opportunity to see what’s causing the situation good or bad. Active listening is work, you can’t be a passive  listener and it’s a skill you can learn and practice

Active listening improves your overall skillsets by:

• Building trust – when people feel seen and heard, they feel valued
• Improves critical thinking skills – getting to the heart of the matter allows you to see the big picture and how to carve out sustainable solutions instead of slapping a band-aid on the problem
• Reduces Miscommunication – minimized errors and confusion

How to do it

So, what are some steps you can take to make sure you hear what’s being said?

• Turn off the noise inside your head. You have to be 100% present in the conversation. You can’t be thinking about your next meeting, what you’re going to have for lunch, what you’re going to say in response to what you’re hearing. Focus completely on what you’re being told.
• Practice being emotionally intelligent. Regardless of whether you love or don’t like what you’re hearing, understand your emotional reaction and keep it in check. Why? Because part of active listening is managing the relationship between you and the speaker. Body language matters
• Acknowledging the speaker. This is the “active part.” Let the speaker know that you are engaged in what they’re saying. You can do this physically (nodding your head, making eye contact, etc.) and verbally (checking for understanding, asking open-ended questions to get more information, paraphrasing what you hear, etc.)

When to do it

I’m going to tell you to do it in every conversation. Why? The more you practice, the better you’ll get. But there are situations where it is especially important to make sure you hear what people say.

• One-on-one meetings. It is important that you meet with your people regularly. These meetings provide opportunities to get to know your employee, create and monitor career development plans, address performance issues, and understand the person behind the worker. Listening to what’s important to your people makes it easier to improve your performance as well as theirs.
• Team discussions. Using active listening skills in team meetings models the process for others. The end result is a team where everyone can contribute in a meaningful way.

The Bottom Line

Active listening is a soft skill with a powerful impact. By making a conscious effort to hear and understand your team, you’ll foster trust, collaboration, and a positive work environment. Like any skill, it takes practice, but the payoff in employee satisfaction and team success is well worth the effort.

As a new manager, remember listening is not a passive act; it’s an active investment in your team’s potential.

Your Professional Legacy

Legacy: something transmitted by or received from an ancestor or predecessor or from the past

“Legacy.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/legacy. Accessed 13 Oct. 2024.

Legacy usually means the things we leave to others when we die. What’s in the will? Who gets the car?  I believe that it’s much more and plays a part in how we approach our work. Our legacy doesn’t have to be about things. It can also be about impact. Have you ever wondered what your workplace legacy will be like once you’ve left? We often think of what we’ll leave family and friends but rarely think about what we’ll leave the people at work. Start thinking about it today, especially if you’re a new manager. Why? Because everything you do and say impacts someone in some way and often in ways that aren’t obvious to you. You build your reputation daily with your team, organization, or industry, but when you leave, you leave your legacy. How do you want to be remembered?

Types of Legacies

Think back to your favorite boss. What did they do or say that you still carry with you in your current workplace? Now think back to the last person who cut you off in traffic. Can you still feel the anger or fear that they might have caused an accident? Did it change the way you drive when you approach that spot in the road? Both of these memories, feelings, and actions represent legacies left to you by those who came before you. They are not material but they do or did impact you. The thing is, they can be direct (your boss) or indirect (the bad driver). They can also be long-lasting or instantaneous. As managers and leaders, we must keep this in mind. What we do, what we say, and how we act impact others whether we interact with them for years or seconds.

Direct Legacy

Unless we live alone in a cave, we interact with other people. Either by choice or by necessity. Regardless of how they come into our lives, how we treat them leaves them with some sense of who we are and how it affects them. Think about it. How you show up affects the actions and attitudes of your team. Are you the type of manager that encourages them to be creative or do you micromanage the hell out of them because you don’t trust them to be able to do the job better than you?

How does working with you day in and day out impact their job performance? Does it affect how they react to situations outside of the workplace? It does. I once had a boss who negatively impacted the team to the point that they had filed more than thirty grievances against her. One of the complaints? She never said, “Good morning.” While that may seem like a trivial complaint, it not only affected her relationship with the team, it affected their attitudes and dealings with customers and the overall reputation of the team suffered.

Indirect Legacy

These are the people who exist on the fringes of our world. We often forget about them because they are the ancillary people who keep the wheels turning in the background. It is important to remember that we impact them too. When was the last time you said “thank you” to the person who cleans your building or delivers your packages? What about the customer service person you called to repair something? Your interactions with these people leave an impact. If you come in and are in a foul mood, do you ignore them and act like they don’t exist? Are they just “the help” and not part of the team? Take a moment and think about how their job affects your job. What is the legacy they leave to you?

Why it Matters

“When people show you who they are, believe them,” said the great poet and author Maya Angelou. The advice can help us plan the legacy we want to leave. We create wills to leave our material possessions, so why not develop a plan for impacting others before we leave? What do we want them to remember? Our emotional intelligence?  Our ability to think calmly and lead with confidence? What about the managerial courage to do the right thing for our people? If not, our legacy might be one of laziness, cowardice, and incompetence. But If we take the time to increase our self-awareness, use the tools, and apply the skills we’ve not only learned but taught,  we will leave a legacy of that person who encouraged others to be the best at what they do. This is the art and skill of management and leadership.

Image by Thomas from Pixabay

Shifting  Your Focus Affects Your Leadership

Individual contributors get promoted for different reasons. It’s often a reward for strong individual performance. For others, it’s because they have the potential to help the company meet its goals.  Being promoted is good for the individual but the company has to benefit also. The benefit improves things for the bottom line and myriad stakeholders. When the company succeeds, employees have jobs, customers have products and services and stockholders have income. To be successful, you have to direct your focus in two directions, first inward and then outward – in that order.

Looking Inward

In the beginning, you concentrate not so much on getting things right but on not getting them wrong. It’s normal to want to have all the answers right from the start because you want to be liked and respected, especially by the new team. You don’t want to screw up because the boss has placed their trust in you and you want to look like you know what you’re doing. After all, first impressions mean a lot so you have to work on yourself before you can take care of your team.

Inward focus means learning the hard skills that drive the company  How do you schedule the team, assign the work, and review their progress? It means writing reviews and knowing what meetings to attend. It’s understanding what you have to do day in and day out to get the work done and it takes all your effort and concentration to get it right. The problem is it takes time to develop the knowledge and the skills. At first, you don’t even know what you’re supposed to do beyond assigning work and approving time off. You have to focus on yourself because your success depends on it. Once you get comfortable in the role, it’s time to shift outward and when you do, the job starts to morph into the craft.

Shifting Focus

Your job starts with a learning curve but changes as you get the hang of the routine stuff. Now you can start to think more about what the team needs. This means finding out which team member needs close supervision, which members can be left alone, and to what degree. More importantly, it means finding out why. Do you know if Jake can’t or won’t do his job? It makes a difference in how you handle his training and his assignments. Once you know what he needs and how you can help him, everyone benefits. Jake, the team, you, the company, and the stakeholders reap the rewards. The road to successful leadership requires seeing the big picture and this is where it begins.

So How Do You Do It?

Changing your focus is a matter of developing skills, hard and soft. I’ll be honest, many managers often think soft skills mean handholding and pop psychology sessions with the team. That’s not what I mean at all. Developing your teams’ hard skills will get them through the workday. Developing their soft skills will help them, and you, sleep at night. Here are a few examples:

Hard Skills:

• Project Management
• Presentations
• Marketing
• Accounting

Soft Skills

• Emotional Intelligence
• Communication skills
  • Verbal
  • Nonverbal
• Critical Thinking
• Conflict Resolution
• Problem-Solving

Hopefully, you see how the skills in one group can affect performance in the other. A lack of critical thinking skills can torpedo a marketing campaign and botching the accounting could affect a team member’s problem-solving abilities. As the manager, your job is to develop each team member’s ability in both groups and you can’t do that if your focus is on yourself. The team is your direct responsibility and by focusing more on their success, you will ensure yours.

Conclusion

Working your way up the ladder means constantly shifting your focus to see the big picture. Always start with yourself. Discover where you are, where you want to go, and how you plan to get there. This involves being a lifelong learner, whether it’s what the job entails or developing soft skills that grow your outlook.  In time you’ll start to see the role others play in your worldview and how your actions impact them. It’s all about being aware and willing to lead the way.