Strategies to Become a Better Listener

To become a better listener, one must do more than simply hear the words the speaker is presenting. Listening is an active, not passive role as some might imagine. Three strategies help listeners become better at their role during message communication between a speaker and audience. Those strategies are: listening with your eyes, as well as your ears; listening mindfully; and listening skillfully.
Listening with your eyes means following speaker cues. These nonverbal clues are an important part of message delivery. Ensuring you are accurately interpreting these non verbal clues is important in making sure you are receiving the correct message. For example, a speaker's facial expressions will express an emotion trying to be conveyed. To practice this skill, a listener should consider nonverbal cues in context. This means considering the situation you are in and the situation the speaker is in when interpreting the non verbal cues. Another strategy to practice this skill is to adapt to the speaker's delivery style. Focus on a speaker's message, not his delivery style. Both a poor speaker and well-polished speaker can distract from the content of their actual message. For example, a smooth talking salesperson might pressure you to buy a product because you failed to carefully consider the content of his or her message.
Listening mindfully means being aware of what you are doing while listening to others. If you aren't mindful, you might daydream or drift off in the middle of a speech without even being aware you aren't listening. To be a skilled listener means being aware throughout the entire message communication process, not thinking of personal problems or other distractions. The skill can be learned and bettered through a couple of techniques. The first is monitoring your emotional reaction to a speech. Having a strong reaction to a message might make a listener not able to mindfully listen. The next is to avoid jumping to conclusions. Give a speaker time to develop his speech before assuming you know what to expect.
Listening skillfully means adopting certain behaviors to become a better listener. Some of those behaviors are: identifying the listening goal, for example, to gain information or for leisure; listening for major ideas; practicing good listening methods; understanding your listening style, for example some people are time-orientated others are action-orientated listeners; being an active listener. Adopting all of these skills, and working on using them in real-life situations will improve a listener's effectiveness.