Better leadership through better listening

Leadership is often associated with vision, charisma and decisiveness, but at its core, effective leadership depends on listening well.

The best leaders recognize the importance of all the voices they need to hear, not just those that affirm their perspectives and support the status quo. These might include the voices of those who disagree with them, those who are typically excluded from leadership-level conversations, folks who tend to challenge their ideas, or those who are traditionally marginalized or under-resourced.

Listening to so many voices can feel uncomfortable, inconvenient and inefficient when trying to move quickly. But being attentive to a wide spectrum of input surfaces perspectives that help leaders out of path dependence and confirmation bias.

It is human nature to gravitate toward those who think, look and live like us. It feels good to be surrounded by people (in real life and on social media) who validate our decisions and beliefs.

However, this can create echo chambers and perpetuate blind spots. Leaders who seek out additional perspectives gain a fuller picture of the opportunities and challenges before them and make wiser and more informed choices.

Who are the people you usually turn to for counsel? If they have given you consistently good advice, it is natural to want to return to them over and over. But breaking out of our conversational patterns and widening our circle enable us to make new connections and create innovative solutions to problems.

Hearing hard truths also cultivates trust and accountability across an organization. When leaders acknowledge they are not experts in everything and clearly value a variety of voices — especially those offering critique or concerns — they nurture an environment of respect.

Team members are more likely to share their honest thoughts when they trust that they will be heard and not dismissed. More than embodying healthy communication, it contributes to a culture of shared risk and responsibility.

At the same time, leaders should be clear about how decisions are made and who ultimately makes them. Governance theater — giving the illusion that someone’s contributions to a conversation matter when they don’t — can be demoralizing and erode trust. Clarity and transparency around how decisions are made generate a culture in which team members know where they stand, so they can make informed decisions about how and when they want to use their voice.

One executive leader always clarifies with her staff whether she is conducting a poll or a vote. This way, those around the table know the weight of their input.

In a poll, everyone can express opinions, but the leader will finally make the decision. In a vote, everyone gets a say, and the numbers determine the course of action. This clarity helps folks understand the process and can lessen the sting if they do not agree with the final decision.

It is also important to recognize that timing is not always on a leader’s side. Sometimes decisions must be made quickly in order to deploy resources and maximize effectiveness, such as when responding to an emergency. In those situations, path dependence and swiftly gathering a few trusted colleagues is the best that leaders can do. However, circling back to include a variety of voices after an emergency can be a good practice to learn what could be done differently next time.

By listening to the voices that need to be heard, leaders cultivate the conditions for growth and innovation. Creativity and progress often come from the margins, places where those in the center overlook or simply cannot see. These voices provide perspectives that can help address wicked problems that span organizations and communities.

Too often, well-meaning community leaders will charge forward with an idea they are certain will positively impact those they serve — without asking their constituents what they want, need, hope for or can contribute to solutions to the challenges they are facing. This can lead to the misuse of resources, wasted time and the breakdown of trust.

Effective leadership is not relegated to small conference rooms of like-minded colleagues. It happens in spaces of open dialogue around ever-expanding tables of truth-tellers, even when the resulting feedback is contrary to what a leader wants to hear. Effective leaders welcome dissent, and they seek out conflicting opinions because they know that is where the best ideas originate.

They are also self-aware enough to know that their voice carries disproportionate weight in most conversations. When they enter a room, conversations shift. It takes intentionality and focus to commit to staying humble, listening carefully to what is being said and what is not being said, being attentive to who is speaking and who is remaining quiet, and guarding against drowning out the voices of others.

A leader I deeply respect shared a series of mantras they repeat to themselves every day and, specifically, prior to a challenging conversation or meeting:

• I am good and loved for who I am, not what I do.
• I am committed to staying curious and remaining open.
• The world needs my true self, not a performance.
• Life is about practice and presence — not perfection.

This leader is clear that their value is rooted in being a child of God, not in what they produce. They call themselves into an open posture while remembering who they are as their truest self. And they are committed to the journey through practice and presence, not the glory of an achieved destination.

This is a leader who recognizes the messiness and complexity that comes from working with humans in their most fragile states. How they show up and who they listen to matter in how they lead.

Listening to unexpected voices requires courage, humility and a willingness to be changed by their wisdom. The best leaders are those who do not merely hear what they want to hear, but who seek out and honor what they need to hear for the sake of their people, their organizations and the futures they are building in conversation with a variety of others.