Dear fellow listeners,

Here is a fun quiz: the phrase “seek first to understand, then to be understood” comes from which of the following?

1. The LEAD 365 segment on high impact listening.
2. The LEAD 365 segment on leaning in to healthy conflict.
3. Steven Covey’s book The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.
4. All of the above.

If you guessed 4, you were correct. Now I’d like to know if you are like most people (according to Covey). Habit 5 in Covey’s book is Seek First to Understand, Then to be Understood. It’s in this section that he describes “most people.” I’ve added a few “most people” descriptions of my own.

Are you like most people?

• Most people form opinions in a conversation based upon their own experiences.
• Most people listen with the intent to respond, not to understand.
• Most people understand autobiographically—they understand based on their own root systems and experiences.
• Most people seek first to be understood. (i.e. they only wish to make sure the other person knows where they are coming from).
• Most people listen more to themselves in a conversation—their inner monologue, their preparing what to say next, their filters—than the other person.
• Most people decide what others are trying to say without listening all the way through to the end.
• Most people selectively hear only certain parts of the conversation or attentively focus on only the words being said, but miss the meaning entirely.

When is the last time you watched a news program in which two guests with opposite views ended an exchange with the other person saying: “I’ve got no response yet, I was only trying to understand fully where you were coming from.” Not lately I bet!

We tend to cheer those most able to give exactly the kind of quick, witty, and damaging responses that reveal just how focused they were on formulating that good sound bite.

I don’t want to be like the “most people” that Steven Covey describes. I’m finding it takes a lot of discipline to be different. And I’ve also found the difference is worth it—not just in terms of effectiveness like Covey described, but worth it in being a leader worth following.

Lead on and listen well,
Jeff

Image by Paul Stevenson. Used under CC by 2.0 license.