• Active listening: Building relationship by listening.
• All types of listening: A comprehensive and linked list.
• Bad listening habits: Ways not to listen.
• Critical Listening: Listening to evaluate.
• Depth of listening: False, partial, full and deep.
• Dialogic listening: Seeking true understanding.
• Environmental factors: Sensory and physiological factors.
• Good listening habits: To cultivate and use.
• High-integrity listening: Combining open listening and honest responses.
• Listen to the inner person: Identify their deep drivers.
• Listener preferences: Preferences people have when listening.
• Listening styles: According to Barker and Watson.
• Listening to Anger: That draws it out, but does not draw you in.
• Types of listening: From discriminative to dialogic.
• Why you should listen: You can achieve a lot just by listening.
• Why people do not listen: If you know these, you can address them.

Active listening

Positive encouragement

To listen actively, you should help the other person to speak, using attentive body language and encouraging words. Especially when they are uncertain, supporting them with nods, 'yeses' and eyebrows raised in anticipation can be very effective.

Sometimes encouragement is best with silent attention, given them space in which to find the word they need, quietly sitting through the pauses. If they are emotional, accept their emotional state without criticism and without saying 'please don't cry' when we really mean 'please don't upset me'. If someone is moved to tears, one of the most powerful things you can do is to allow them to cry.

Attentive listening

In attentive listening you pay obvious attention to the other person so they can see that you are interested in what they have to say.

The opposite of attentive listening is inattentive or casual listening, where you are not obviously paying attention to the person but you may (or may not) actually be listening carefully.

Total listening

Rogers and Farson (1979) describe active listening as 'an important way to bring about changes in people.' They recommend three activities:

• Listen for total meaning: Listen both for content and also for the underlying emotions.
• Respond to feelings: Sometimes the real message is in the emotion rather than the surface content. In such cases, you should respond to the emotional message.
• Note all the cues: Not all communication is verbal, so watch for the non-verbal messages.

Reflecting

When you reflect what you hear back to the other person, you are demonstrating that you have heard what they have said. What you reflect should match the key aspects of what the other person is communicating.

You can reflect data and factual information. You can also reflect feelings. Feelings are more difficult to read but are more powerful in the bondthat is created with the other person as this indicates empathy and implied concern.

Summarizing

Reflect back what you hear not by parroting back the same words but by paraphrasing, using your own words to rephrase what they have said. A good way of doing this is to summarize what they have said in fewer words.

Testing

When a person says something, even with careful understanding you may miss the point. It can help when reflecting and summarizing to add testing questions, asking whether your summary is correct. For example:

So, I think what you are saying is ... Is this right?

This gives them control and hence makes it easier for them to accept what you say.

Demonstrate respect

As Rogers and Farson point out, 'although it is most difficult to convince someone that you respect him by telling him so, you are much more likely to get this message across by really behaving that way...Listening does this most effectively'.

Listen to the inner person

Listening to the inner person means listening for specific signals within what they say and do that indicate their deeper motivations.

Needs

Listen to their needs, including statements they make about themselves, about safety, about belonging, etc. Listen to needs, wants and likes.

For example, if they say 'I like working here' then this is a statement about belonging.

Beliefs and models

Listen for beliefs, assumptions and other leaps. Listen for assertions of truth that the make. Watch for their reactions to the ideas of others.

For example, if they say 'This will make it work' then they are making assumptions about how things work.

Values

Listen for ‘musts’, ‘shoulds’ etc. that indicate their values. Listen for judgment, especially of others.

For example, if they say 'That is wrong' then this indicates that they have a right-wrong value about this domain.

Goals

Listen to what is being done and seek to find the stated goal that is driving action. Distinguish goals from needs: goals are set to achieve needs.

For example, if they say 'I am going to visit RHR tomorrow'  then ask what purpose that visit will achieve and what objective or goal will be achieved by the visit.

Emotional intelligence

Listen for their level of emotional intelligence, for example in whether they just react or are aware of and control their own emotions. Their level or emotional control may be evident in speech, whether it is lack of control, over-control or comfortable acceptance.

For example, if they say in a reasonably level tone 'I feel annoyed by that' they are demonstrating awareness of their emotions and also control.

Preferences

Look for the preferences and biases that they show. For example, if they say 'Let's look at the big picture' then this may indicate a preference for ideas and large-chunk viewpoint rather than diving into the tactical detail.

reference：

Carl Rogers and Richard Farson, Active Listening, in David Kolb, Irwin Rubin and James MacIntyre, Organizational Psychology (third edition), New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1979