Working Together: Deep Listening

by Lee Devin

What do we do when we listen carefully? I expect we're all different. I tend to play the speaker's content against the potential answers I might make. This means that I often don't really hear what's being said. When I was acting, I was a pretty good listener. (Most actors will tell you that listening is more important than speaking.) Stage listening was quite different to the listening I do in real life. For one thing, I knew perfectly well what the speaker was going to say. I knew what I would say in response. We'd had this conversation many, many times. Therefore, I could release into sympathy and empathy. However, when I began to study collaboration, I realized that good collaboration requires listening very like that onstage listening.