Listening Skills – How to Improve Your Listening Skills

Listening Skills

You wanted to have that sense of bonding with your colleague, but you are feeling that your professional relationship is only going downhill? Did you just speak to your mother, trying to explain why you can’t attend that family social, only to feel that your mom doesn’t understand your other commitments? Is this happening because of a lack of communications skills or a lack of listening skills?

When people talk, listen completely. Most people never listen. ~  Ernest Hemingway (Tweet this)

Spouses come back from work and pretend to listen to others, when all they want to do is relax and prepare for another workday; moms half-heartedly listen to their children and do their chores; while elders spend days inside the house without anyone to listen to them.

Not getting someone to listen to us is a malady affecting our lives today. So here are some tips to help you become an active listener or to improve your listening skills

Five Tips to improve Your Listening skills

1) Be genuinely interested in knowing what others are saying.

If you are interested in your conversation, your body language often conveys the message to the speaker, making him feel good about discussing things with you. Nothing discourages a conversation more than a bored listener.

2) Don’t multi-task while listening.

Working, cooking, or watching TV are things we often do while our spouses or children try to talk to us. Sometimes when I work and my child talks about her day in school, I find myself concentrating more on my work, and not on what my child says. When once I did not recollect what she said, I had to force myself to leave everything and concentrate on what she has to say, to be able to relate to her school stories.

3) Ask questions to keep your attention in listening to talks.

When we tend to get bored in conversation, a good way to keep away the distraction is by asking questions.

Ramya is known to be the confidante of the school batch. Any conversation with her is punctuated by numerous questions from her, which makes all her friends feel that she is genuinely interested in talking, and staying in touch with them.

4) Hold back that opinion of yours, or that urge to retort.

If you are out to improve your personal or your professional relations, it’s important to let the others speak, without interference. Even if we are tempted to put in our opinion, its best to let the other finish, before jumping in with what we think of the entire idea. Antagonizing the speaker is not the best way to listen to a conversation.

5) Practice active listening.

Like all good habits, the art of listening needs practice and concentration, too. We only can be heard by others if we extend the same gesture to people speaking as well. Join seminars, organized social gatherings, and practice listening without much speaking.

Conclusion – Listening skills

Listening skills as a personality-development tool, is highly rated for effective and successful people, be it in their professional or even personal life. Your active listening skills will win you your life goals one day. So get set to listen more.

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About the Author

Moumita Basu is a writer and a soft-skills trainer. She works for a news agency. When not writing, she loves spending time with her family, reading and travelling, preferably doing all three together.

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