The Art of Active Listening

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RECOGNIZE THE UNSAID

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In every story, there is a silence, some sight concealed, some word unspoken, I believe. Until we have spoken the unspoken, we have not come to the heart of the story.

—J.M. Coetzee, Foe: A Novel

Some years ago, I worked for a company that was merging five companies. The new company was spread across two countries and four states. The leadership’s main focus was to maintain its monthly recurring revenue, and employee engagement was low on its list of priorities. As you can imagine, mistrust set in and communication breakdowns became rampant. Frontline managers failed to communicate status updates around the merger, so fear set in quickly. People I knew confessed to me their concerns about being laid off. Meanwhile, ...