Things that a boss does - Sit up, listen and understand

#03 - Listen and understand

A boss must possess a strong listening ability to hear out what employees has to say before passing judgment or making decisions.

One must give the employee some airtime so that they can reflect and inform you on the feedback and anything that could potentially undermine the operations.

Staff are actually the extended arms of the boss. They will do things that the boss can do but have no time to take care of it.

One will soon realise the power of the ability to listen. Once you hear someone, the following are some of the benefits:

a) Suss out serious potential threats because staff are eyes and ears on the ground.
b) work more efficiently as you know how things are operated and can count them in during the planning stage. E.g. the delivery time process, the timing for requesting funds and the actual date of fund delivery. Minor details can help to smooth a lot of unneccessary bumps in the plan
c) a sense of the staff performance - whether the person is a whiner, complainer or even a serious worker by judging on the things they told you.
d) know the staff well - as the interaction increases, the staff knows what you want as well as you know whether to trust that staff or not.
e) Staff loyalty - everyone wants recognition and a sense of contribution. By giving a little time for the employees to air their views, they are very much appreciative of the willingness of their boss to hear them out.

If it is not done well or not done, the threats are enormous.
1) The boss do not know what is going out. If anything goes awry, the first head to roll is the boss.
2) The high turnover rate. The boss does not even care what is being done so why bother to stay behind and be invisible?
3) Difficulty in reporting to top mgt - do not know what is going on so there is difficulty in planning. The top mgt will not tolerate that.


Of course, you may ask how to listen well.
Let's look at the famous analogy of how to listen well, by referring to the ancient chinese word for Listen.

Did you know that it takes 5 characters to represent “listen” in Chinese? Eyes, ears, heart, you and focused undivided attention.

The Chinese philosopher Chuang-Tzu said, "The hearing that is only in the ears is one thing. The hearing of the understanding is another. But the hearing of the spirit is not limited to any one faculty, to the ear or to the mind. Hence, it demands the emptiness of all the faculties. And when the faculties are empty, then the whole being listens.
"There is then a direct grasp of what is right there before you that can never be heard with the ear or understood with the mind."

Besides listening, your body language must be correct.
Match your speaker's body posture.
Maintain some eye contact.
The tone of voice is humble and kind.

Learn also to read their facial expressions so that one is able to anticipate the things that will be told and will be prepared for it.

All these can be used with family members and children. You might realise that what you are doing can be practised and will benefit children by imparting them this lifeskills from yount.