Mother Teresa once said: “Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless.” In other words, taking time to listen to others, and establish genuine empathy and rapport before we speak, is what we should always be striving to do. In this way our words will consequently be wiser and will echo for longer, in positive ways, on the person to whom we are speaking. Listening with empathy becomes a critical skill, especially for leaders, and we need to practice it a lot more often than we think we have the time to do.
There are 5 steps which everyone can take to become a more empathetic listener:
Naturally, most people would prefer to be listened to by a person who is warm and attentive than someone who is cold and distant. We should therefore always try to observe and identify the feelings of the other person (e.g. happy, angry, confused, sad or scared) and the strength of feeling (e.g. strong or weak). We can then more appropriately find a few words that capture the essence of what the other person is feeling, for example, “I sense that you are really annoyed” or “you appear to be a little sad.” Use these words as a response to check how accurately you perceive the other person. Feedback from the speaker may confirm your perception, “Yes, that’s exactly how I feel,” or it may indicate that your perception needs to be modified. For example the other person might say: “That’s not quite right: I feel very angry and frustrated.”
2. Accept the other person’s experience as real and important by having a positive and encouraging attitude
Any good listener needs to have a positive and accepting attitude to what is being said. They need to show that they are relating to what is being said. They show sensitivity by indicating that they accept the other person’s standpoint even if they may not agree with it. Hence, by trying to understand what the speaker has been saying at the level they have expressed it and by showing that you understand and accept the speaker’s feelings and experience, you will be able to encourage people to open up their experiences to you more fully.
3. Be sensitive to your own reactions and focus on understanding the speaker’s message
Carefully check yourself out as a listener by taking note of your own emotional reactions when someone is talking with you or offering his or her feedback. Ask yourself: Are you being focused, tuned in and interested or are you showing too much indifference? Are you being impatient? Are you switching off when complex or difficult topics arise? Are you reacting to emotional words that have a particular meaning for you? Does your pulse rate or breathing rate increase when certain subjects are raised with you?
Most importantly we need to keep our own emotions under control so that we can focus on understanding the speaker’s thoughts and feelings. A speaker may express feelings verbally and directly or indirectly through his or her tone of voice, body language or just by describing a situation. If you get over excited emotionally you may miss the cues or even lose the point.
4. Show a willingness to understand the other person by “walking in their shoes”
In order to respond to a speaker’s feelings you need to have a good understanding of how the situation is being experienced by the speaker. Empathy is a way of responding to another person’s feelings. You should therefore ideally ask yourself: “If I were the speaker and I were doing and saying these things, how would I feel?” Put yourself in the speaker’s place. Try to see what is being said through their eyes. Understand the speaker’s values and attitudes.
Empathy sometimes gets linked with sympathy but the two are very different. Sympathy means sharing in the feeling being experienced by another person and showing compassion. Empathy, on the other hand, involves putting yourself into another person’s shoes to try to understand how they experience a situation from within their world. Listen for the speaker’s emotional meaning as well as to content. Hence, in summary, a sympathetic response would be: I feel what you are feeling, and an empathetic response would be: I understand how you are feeling, and an apathetic response would be: I don’t care how you feel.
5. Develop a positive relationship with the speaker by mirroring his or her gestures (e.g. voice rate, vocabulary, facial expressions, and favourite phrases)
A very useful way to engage in empathetic listening is to build your relationship with the speaker by focusing very carefully on what he or she is both doing and saying. Observe and (within reason) mirror the actions and expressions of the speaker. This technique is called pacing and can be used to help the speaker feel at ease. Pacing involves mirroring the speaker’s breathing, voice rate and volume, vocabulary and even facial expressions. You can match the speaker’s behaviour by speeding up or slowing down your voice, using the same words and phrases, using similar gestures and even breathing at the same rate. The speaker will notice the similarities and feel more comfortable. You will build rapport by showing that you are actively listening. Once again, be patient as this requires practice.
Summary
The word “empathy” comes from the Greek noun empatheia, meaning passion, or empathes, meaning emotional. Empathy can therefore be said to be the act of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and experiencing the feelings and thoughts of another. From a listening perspective, to feel true empathy you need to shift your focus of attention away from yourself strongly toward the other person and genuinely hear not only what they are saying in words, but also where they are really coming from. The more consistently that you apply the above steps, the more natural this will become in all of your future conversations.
Dr. Jon Warner is a prolific author, management consultant and executive coach with over 30 years experience. He has an MBA and a PhD in Organizational Psychology. Jon can be reached at OptimalJon@gmail.com
Colin is the Director of ResourceZone International. He has 35 years of ministry experience as a pastor, college lecturer and consultant/coach to consultants, denominational leaders and local church pastors. He can be reached at info@resourcezone.com.au
Related Resources
- Listening: Skill Builder Booklet – Ministry Specific Resource (PDF)
- Listening Effectiveness Profile – Ministry Specific Resource (PDF)
- Listening: Coaching Guide with Storyboard – Ministry Specific Resource (PDF)
- Emotional Intelligence: Skill Builder Booklet – Ministry Specific Resource (PDF)
- Emotional Intelligence: Coaching Guide with Storyboard – Ministry Specific Resource (PDF)
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