The Active Listening Framework

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When someone makes a statement, it's common to respond with an opinion, feeling, or suggestion. There’s an underlying assumption in this response: that you have fully understood what was being communicated to you.

Surprisingly, it’s often untrue. This framework is a way to ensure and confirm that you fully understand what has been communicated to you — and to ensure that the other person feels validated and heard — before you respond. 

It’s important to note that in this Active Listening framework, you are not necessarily indicating you agree with what’s being communicated. It’s valuable to separate out “ensuring the speaker feels validated and heard” from “feeling forced to agree with what the speaker is saying.” Active Listening is the former, not the latter.

Here’s an example of the framework, using the same example from The Action/Impact Framework :

• Step 1: An employee makes a statement (ideally using action/impact!):
• Example: “When sales does deals without input from customer success, the data shows that there’s a higher probability the deal will churn. I feel upset when I have to support these deals because they keep me from being able to focus on other deals that we could be expanding.”
• Step 2: The recipient repeats back what s/he heard. The goal is mutual understanding —you want the speaker to feel validated and heard. This means you need to adapt your style of active listening to the speaker. Familiarize yourself with these approaches :
• a) echoing back what you heard (use their words, not your own)
• Example: "What I'm hearing you say is that there's an issue with sales doing deals without consulting customer success, and this leaves you feeling upset because you have to support deals with a high probability of churn when you'd really like to put your focus elsewhere. Is that right?"
• b) paraphrasing or summarizing what you heard (using your words, maybe some of theirs)
• Example: "What I'm hearing you say is that we have a disconnect between sales and customer success, and that's causing inefficiency and a lack of focus, which is leaving you pretty upset. Is that right?"
• c) reading between the lines — can be a combination of paraphrasing and echoing with an added layer of depth, i.e "I imagine you're feeling X, I sense you're feeling Y")
• Example: "What I'm hearing you say is that sales is operating without the depth of knowledge of our customer success team, and that means we're putting our attention in the wrong place, which could really hurt our business. I'm imagining you have a lot of valuable insight to offer, but there's no one to receive it, so instead you're having to support deals that you know won't go anywhere, which has you feeling upset and, I imagine, frustrated. Is that right?"
• Setting expectations: It’s extremely likely that the recipient will not get a thumbs-up from the speaker on the first try. This can be surprising to both parties!
• Step 3: If the speaker feels validated and heard, s/he would say something like, “Yes, that’s exactly right.” However, if the employee did not feel fully validated and heard, s/he could say something like, “You got that partially right. Here’s what else I said: x, y and z.” It’s really important to be really clear when you don’t feel fully heard, and explain exactly what the recipient didn’t fully absorb.
• Reminder: this isn't a "discussion." Stay true to the goal of clarity and don't argue with what you're hearing (or get feisty about how well you're being heard). If the recipient got something right (but not everything), use a "Yes, and" approach to set them on the right track.
• Step 4: The recipient then restates what s/he heard using this new information. 
• Step 5: Repeat steps 2-5 as many times as necessary until the speaker feels fully validated and heard. It may take a number of tries! Don’t get frustrated if it does. Remember, your goal here is to fully understand what someone is trying to tell you and what they're feeling around it.
• Step 6: Once the speaker has indicated they feel validated and heard, you can make your own statement in response. It’s now the speaker’s turn to practice Active Listening with you to ensure you are also validated and heard.

When is it useful to use the Active Listening framework? (re: The Three Levels of Conversation )

• Active Listening isn’t normally used (or needed) in most Level 1 interactions.
• In Level 2 and 3 conversations, Active Listening is extremely valuable for helping ensure a conversation doesn’t go off the rails.

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