What comes to mind when you think of inspiring people? Motivating people?
Do you picture a really charismatic leader on stage giving a speech that merits a standing ovation at the end?
Well, the reality is, that’s NOT what it means to inspire and motivate people.
Because, think about it: how many times have you clapped for someone and then forgotten everything they said?
A key to INSPIRATION and MOTIVATION is to:
Listen with the 3 A’s!
Listen ACTIVELY
Listen ASSUMPTION-FREE
Listen with ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
The majority of the leaders I talk to, if I ask them if they thought they were good listeners, most of them say YES, absolutely.
But when we start to explore what being a good listener really means, what we find are leaders who are:
● finishing people’s sentences in their head while the other person is speaking,
● making assumptions about the meaning of what others are saying, or
● typing on their keyboard or answering a text on their phone while they’re in the middle of a conversation, and then
● once the person has completed what they’re saying, the leader moves on to the next thing, without any type of confirmation or acknowledgement of what he or she just heard.
Listening with all 3 A’s (actively, assumption-free, and with acknowledgement) are acts of TRULY listening and giving people your attention.
It makes people feel VALUED, HEARD, and APPRECIATED…which translates into inspiring and motivating them.
It seems counterintuitive that LISTENING does more to inspire and motivate people than SPEAKING does.
***There is a famine in the land of leaders who know how to listen!!!***
The greatest gift you can give someone is to be present and truly listen.
In school, we are taught to read, to write, to speak. We are not taught how to listen and how to let people know that they’ve been heard.
And that’s part of what The Coach Approach to Leadership™ does.
If you want to learn more about this approach to leadership training, contact me for a call!