Squiggly Skill Sprint Day 9: Listening

It’s day 9 of the Squiggly Careers sprint, and today’s topic is Listening, or as I would spin it, “Not talking all the time” https://www.amazingif.com/listen/skills-sprint-listening/

It’s been a great learning experience being an Irishman living in Helsinki. The Irish are famously talkative, and someone in my family once said to me that a silence was something to fill. Conversely, the Finns are infamously taciturn and not prone to wasted conversation. I’ll use this chance to link to a video of everyone’s favourite Finn, and the only person that I have an autograph from in my office: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=caHhMPscrQg

Either way, I’ve learned the value of silence in conversation, and could probably put metrics about how much longer I can sit in silence. This means that the other person can talk. It gives me time to reflect on what I want to say, and allows the other person to continue if they want. The first three questions in Michael Bungay Stanier’s The Coaching Habit coaching questions are “What’s on your mind?”, “And what else?”, and “What’s the real challenge for you here?”. I’ve learned that if you let people talk, or provide minimal prompting, you often don’t even need to ask those explicitly.

Silence also gives other people the opportunity to contribute, when they may be having a hard time making it into the conversation. Especially in remote meetings, it can be very easy for people in the room to forget about people on the phone. I remember such a meeting where someone said that I had been very quiet and I had to bite my tongue on the fact that I hadn’t been able to get a word in.

A great actionable piece of advice I give people is to count the beats when someone stops talking, and see how long they go before they start again. Most people feel really awkward after a few seconds and will say something. Half the time, they weren’t even finished their train of thought, and if you’d jumped in to say something you would have been interrupting them. This is especially great for people who are nervous and feeling pressured, like at a networking event.

Anyway, two weeks of the squiggly sprint completed, and nine days out of twenty. It’s been a fun experience so far putting my own spin on these podcasts, and I’ve written over 3,500 words so far. I’ve also loved seeing the other content that people are putting out about this, and seeing some community spirit build up. Shout out to Vanessa for her great content.