are you ready to listen? - mediators' institute of ireland version - are you... · are you...

www.controlrisks.com © Control Risks Group Limited

ARE YOU READY TO LISTEN? A new look at an old communication skill

Sean Cunningham OBE | Senior Consultant

13 October 2017, Athlone, Ireland

2 © Control Risks Group Limited

A Word of Caution

Humility – that is the magic word…No man,

champion, professional or President of the

United States ever reaches that point at which

he can say: I have learned the secret…

Sidney L James

Managing Editor

Sports Illustrated


Sean Cunningham

Police Officer 30 years

Head of Scotland Yard Hostage and Crisis Negotiation

Unit

Director of Security gambling company

Group Ops Manager and Kidnap Responder

Currently providing training in kidnap management

and consulting on kidnap plans and policies


Current Listening Training Provided

Control Risks provides communication training

Our focus is on Listening Skills

Three specific groups

• Hostages

• Kidnappers

• Families


Purpose of Session

A new look at an old skill - Listening

A look at some problems associated with listening

Review of current Active Listening Skills

Consideration about some techniques to improve

your current abilities


Are you ready to change?

Are you a good listener?

If not why not?

Do you need to improve your listening?

What have you actively done to improve your

listening?

There is no point in attending a training session

unless you are willing to change!


How do you listen?

Unconsciously

Incompetent

Unconsciously

Competent

Consciously

Competent

Consciously

Incompetent


Stop Trying

on “The Inner Game” by Timothy Gallwey

The real question is, ‘Are managers ready to

surrender trying to control people and trust their

desire and capacities to learn, starting with

themselves?’

Peter Senge, author of The Fifth Discipline: The Art

and Practice of the Learning Organization


Problems When Listening

Need to achieve objectives

Willingness to override good practice

Lack of confidence about “active listening” methods

Lack of opportunity to prove or realise benefits

Insufficient time to train and reinforce

Numbers v Individuals (FBI model of listening cell)

Unwillingness to accept critical feedback on performance

An ingrained belief that what we have already is acceptable

Variety of advice and apparent expertise


The Best Place to Hide a Leaf is in a Forest

On Friday last week, I ran searches on Amazon, YouTube and

Google to see how many references there were for the following

three subject areas:

Subject Area Books

on

Amazon

Clips on

YouTube

Hits on

Google

Negotiation skills 1,798 445,000 About 12,300,000

Listening skills 3,665 3,340,000 About 17,700,000

Communication skills 38,667 4,190,000 About 197,000,000


1. Let me tell you how lucky I am

2. Let me tell you how much I am worth

3. Let me tell you how crap the old country is

4. Let me tell you how brave I was to make this decision

5. Let me tell you what losers my old friends are who have not moved on

6. Ask a closed question "What do you do for a living?"

7. Tell me about my job and how it has affected them

8. Ask me what I am specifically doing there

9. Tell me who is there I should meet

10. Tell me who the best people they have ever met in their lives at that role were

11. Tell me how they were making nothing of themselves at school but then luck

shone down on them

12. Then ask me my name!!!!!!

The World’s Worst Listeners: ExPats


How do we communicate? Active Listening Skills (ALS)

• Minimal encouragers

• Open questions

• Reflecting/mirroring

• Emotional labelling

• Paraphrase

• I statements

• Effective pauses

• Summarise


Minimal Encouragers

Small sounds, words or physical

gestures that indicate to the speaker

to:

Go on

Explain what they mean

Show that you understand

Show sympathy

Show you don’t care

Or conversely to

Show you are not listening


Open Questions

Old

New Y/N

OPEN

CLOSED

Y/N

CLOSED

CLOSED

OPEN

CLOSED

Y/N Y/N

CLOSED CLOSED


Using similar language

Using similar tones

Using similar body language

Using the exact words

All shows the person you are dealing with that you are on their level

You are someone who understands them

You are someone they can do business with

Reflecting/Mirroring/Echoing


Emotional Labelling

Improve your vocabulary

Don’t just learn them – use them

You seem:

Happy bright, content, good humoured

Sad unhappy, down, dispirited

Frustrated baffled, irked, nettled

Angry furious, annoyed, cross

Confused perplexed, befuddled, bemused


Communicating by Tone

You are about to see a table of football results from a

few years ago.

In the following clip you will hear the results read out.

The reader of the results will intimate his emotions,

through his tones, whether the away team has done

well or not

See if you can identify from the tone the score of the

last team, Bury, to be read out.


Paraphrasing

Use the words of the

question or statement you

have heard to repeat them

back to prove you have

listened.

This will help you

understand what has been

said.

It will help you answer the

question properly.

This does not, however,

guarantee success!!!


“I” Statements

SPEAKER LISTENER

Word Count

Conversation About Self

8% 77% 15%


Effective Pauses

• A pause can help you

control a situation

• It gives you time to

think

• It makes what you say

have more gravitas

• To not pause leads to

interruption and

frustration


Summarising

When to Summarise?

At the conclusion of a session

At the restart of a session following a break

Whenever there is a change of one of the parties

What to summarise

Core issue to each party

Hooks or power words used

Points of agreement

Points of disagreement


Hooks and Power Words

We are now going to re-listen to the “Qualities

of a Family Liaison Representative” we heard

at the start of this presentation.

What hooks or power words can you identify

as being used?


Advice 3

Listen 4

Intimidate/Order/Tell/Confidence 5

Friends 6

Men/women 15


In Summary

Change your behaviour

Move from Active Listening to Conscious Listening

Be aware of your minimal encouragers

Start with closed questions to build rapport

Match the tone of the other party to signify listening

Listen for and recognise the message transmitted in the tone used

Use the exact words used when paraphrasing - but make sense

Keep your percentage ownership of the conversation low

Pause to give more weight to your messages

Summarise using the words most important to the other party

Be patient and don’t be selfish!!!


Humility???

“No one else's conversation is quite as

interesting as mine.“

Frank Skinner, Room 101, 2017

www.controlrisks.com © Control Risks Group Limited

ARE YOU READY TO LISTEN? A new look at an old communication skill

Sean Cunningham OBE | Senior Consultant

13 October 2017, Athlone, Ireland

are you ready to listen? - mediators' institute of ireland version - are you... · are you...

Documents