Have you ever said to someone “Are you listening to me?” And have the responded with something like: “Yes” and the tone of their voice clearly indicated they were not? Did you ever stop to ask yourself why you are asking that? You can certainly see the person appearing to pay attention, they told you “yes” they were listening and yet you didn’t feel heard in that moment. What if your words were really falling on deaf ears? Would that change the way that you communicated? In business, communication is an often under-discussed yet over arching challenge that affects every element of our professional life. Inc. magazine reports that in a study done by Watson Wyatt (now Towers Watson), effective communication within organizations brings a market premium of nearly 20 percent. What would a 20% increase in revenue do for your company?
Last week, I discussed the Visual Proclivity and the way that Visual people not only see the world but the way they process it. There are 4 operational proclivities and while we use all of them sometimes, we each have a favorite. Actually we each have two, but that's another blog!
Auditory Proclivity people, AKA ‘Auditories’ are easily distracted by noise, have a need to be heard and are more responsive to tones of voice than the words that are spoken. Auditories listen closely to people and will accept it if it “sounds right to them.” In fact, they listen so well, they often detect subtle nuances in vocal patterns that tell them whether or not someone is being truthful. They remember moments in time by the music they were listening to or the tone of voice they heard, not by the lyrics or words that were said. They often have music playing when they are working. Additionally, they will usually have the music turned down so low that it is difficult to hear the words of the song; Auditories don’t care so much about the words, they care about the sounds that the music makes. Regardless of their preference all the research tells us that Auditories effectiveness at work and home only occurs when the ‘ears are happy’.
How do we recognize the Auditories among us and make the ears happy? Always a great place to start is to listen to words your team members use when speaking. Auditories need to be heard so they will of course use words, but it’s the tone and volume that they rely on to make their point. Words like “ Hear, Listen, Silence, Resonate, Sound” are all great indicators of an Auditory Proclivity. If you notice people using these words and you want to be heard, alter your language pattern to incorporate their words and pay attention to your tone and volume (louder isn’t necessarily better) and you will be heard on a level they have never heard you before. How will you know if an auditory is hearing you? Often they will tilt their heads to align their ear with the sound to receive it as directly as possible. Are you listening to me now?
Effective communication is the cornerstone of high performance. Without it, communication breaks down, projects are delayed, clients are unhappy and management is baffled how their strategy isn’t working. What about you? Is your team maximizing their communication and thereby maximizing revenue opportunities? Next week, we’ll cover another proclivity and address what you can do to optimize communication and improve your organization’s bottom line.
Seanlai M. Cochrane is the CEO of Divirsus™, a multi-million dollar national provider of professional construction services. A professional speaker with the National Speakers Association Ms. Cochrane speaks to and consults with top business leaders, Fortune 500 companies and serial entrepreneurs. @SeanlaiC
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