Being an Unmessable-With Leader - Do You Listen Like a Leader

This is part 5 in our series on being an unmessable leader.  Here’s a link to part 1,  part 2, part 3, and part 4.  

Let’s start with the “previously on.”  Being a leader is being someone who communicates so that others imagine a future that matters to them and then act in service of that future’s fulfillment.  Being unmessable with as a leader involves having the capacity to do that in a way that meets the needs of the situation and the people involved.  It could mean being direct and demanding.  It could mean being gentle and nurturing.  The situation decides.   That was what we covered in part 1.  What often gets in the way of being flexible and adaptable is when we get defensive.  That was part 2, which also included some useful practices for letting go of that.  Part 3 was about identifying the “what for” that will keep you centered when the noise in your head heats up.  By the way, any time someone “insults” you, that’s noise in your head.  Part 4 gave a formula for quieting the noise that arises when agreements aren’t handled.  

Here, let’s get back to our definition of leadership and something critical most people miss when they think communicating.  .  

When I talk with leaders, the vast vast majority think leadership involves creating and articulating a vision that resonates with people.  It is, at times, doing just that.  At times.  

Just as powerful, however, is listening for what matters and then communicating in such a way that people create that vision for themselves.  In fact, if we think of a vision like a rule for action, one they take full ownership for is way, way more likely to move them into action.   

The often overlooked part of leadership is that a huge, huge part of it is listening.  The more effectively you can do that, and do it in a way that people connect to what matters to them, the easier you will find it to lead.  

I could write courses on listening (Indeed, I have).  I’ll give you the basic strokes here.  

1. Assume if people are talking, they’re expressing something they care about.  It might not be obvious to you (or them)  or you, but it is there.  
2. Welcome complaint.  The road to vision is paved with complaints.  Look at yourself: can you find a time when you were complaining that wasn’t, in some way, connected to what you care about.  If people are complaining, they care.  Welcome their complaints.  
3. Don’t get stuck with their complaints.  Whatever it is they’re complaining about, it isn’t what they care about.  Don’t get stuck on it.  A lot of times when I coach people, the complaints they bring that look very real to them have nothing to do with what they really want.  When they get focused on what they want, the complaints often disappear or, at the very least, get way more solve-able.  
4. Keep asking, “And if that were handled, what then?”  What would it provide?  What would it make available?  What would you do then?  

These are the basic strokes of listening and talking so that people will create a vision for themselves.  Once they’re at what matters, then you can explore how what you want and what they want overlap and how you can work together for all of it.