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I was having lunch at a bistro in St. Paul
de Vence, a picturesque hill town in the south of France.
In my fractured French, I tried to order a bottle of beer.
"Je voudrais une bouteille de biere, sil vous plait." I
would like a bottle of beer, I told the waitress.
"In a can," she replied. "Non," said I, "En bouteille!"
In a bottle. With her hands on her hips and a sneer on her
face, she repeated, "In a can!"
Now I was really getting mad. "Not in a can," I insisted.
"In a bottle. En bouteille. EN BOUTEILLE!"
She threw her hands up in despair. "Monsieur, IN A CAN!"
"All right," I said. "Have it your way. Give it to me in
a can. Anything. Just give me a beer!"
She stormed off and returned with a bottle of Heineken.
Heineken, when you say it in French, loses the "H" and sounds
like, "In a can." I practically fell off my chair, I was
laughing so hard. She thought I was nuts.
The point of the story is exactly what I stress in my negotiation
presentations. We hear mostly what we want to hear, not
what the other person is trying to communicate to us. Many
conflicts can be resolved easily if we learn how to listen.
The Catch
The catch is that listening is the forgotten art. We are
so busy making sure that people hear what we have to say that
we forget to listen.
The first indication I had that my education had a hole in
it occurred in the Marine Corps. A kindly colonel gave me
a bit of advice. "Lieutenant," he said, "you need to learn
how to listen." "What?" I replied. Obviously it was going
to take more than his counsel to get the point across.
Luckily for me, my next escapade was tailor made. Dun & Bradstreet
hired me as a salesman in an enterprise based upon a new technology
called data processing. D&B had just computerized its entire
data base of credit information on millions of companies and
was now selling information for marketing purposes.
For example, if your company sold ice to Eskimos, D&B could
give you a printout of all the Eskimo companies in your market
area, with pertinent information such as the number of Eskimos
in each company and the names of key decision-making Eskimos.
This was cutting-edge stuff back in 1968.
Well, my sales territory was the Canal Street area in New
York – the armpit of Manhattan Island. This was the toughest
place to try selling door-to-door, which is what I was being
under-paid to do. I learned very quickly that the key to success
in selling – as it is in negotiating – is keeping
your mouth shut and listening to what people have to say.
I discovered that my sales prospects would tell me everything
I needed to know in order to make the sale – if I just
kept my mouth shut long enough. If I tried to make a flowery
presentation, I would be thrown out. But if I let them tell
me what their problems were, they would buy anything from
me – even ice.
Staying In Shape
It turns out that listening is not a difficult art to master.
In fact, it's quite simple. It's similar to what I go through
in order to keep physically fit. The easy part of staying
in shape is doing all the exercises. The hard part is getting
to the gym on a regular basis. The excuses I come up with
for not going are amazing. Once I get to the health club,
I'm home free.
Learning to listen is the same. The hard part – the equivalent
of "getting to the gym" – is shutting up. If you can
train yourself to keep your mouth shut most of the time, you
will be a great listener and a great negotiator.
Listening Tips
Here are some suggestions for developing your listening
skills:
- Develop the desire to listen. You must accept
the fact that listening to others is your strongest weapon.
Given the opportunity, the other person will tell you everything
you need to know. If this doesn't create desire, I don't
know what will.
- Always let the other person do most of the talking.This
is a simple matter of mathematics. I suggest a 70/30 rule.
You listen 70% of the time and you talk 30% of the time.
- Don't interrupt. There is always the temptation
to interrupt so you can tell the other person something
you think is vitally important. It isn't, so don't. When
you are about to speak, ask yourself if it is really necessary.
- Learn active listening. It's not enough that you're
listening to someone – you want to be sure that they
know you're listening. Active listening is the art of communicating
to the other person that you're hearing their every word.
- Ask for clarification if needed. This will clear
up any misunderstanding you have.
- Get used to 'listening' for nonverbal messages –
body language. The other person may be communicating
with you via body language. You need to decode the message.
- Ask a question...then shut up. This is a foolproof
way to listen. Think of yourself as an interviewer –
Barbara Walters! She listens and questions – so should
you.
Tips For Asking Questions
Once you have learned how to keep yourself from speaking,
the art of asking questions is the shortcut to effective listening.
Here are some tips for asking questions:
- Ask open-ended questions. Questions that can't
be answered with a simple yes or no. "How could we do this?"
"What do you think?" Your objective is to get them to talk
as much as possible.
- Don't ask questions that put them on the defensive.
For example, "Why?" is intimidating. Don't ask "why?" Ask
"how come?"
- Ask "What if?" What if we did it this way?
- Ask for their advice. "What would you suggest
we do to resolve this?" Everyone loves to be asked for advice.
- Offer alternatives. "Which way would you prefer?"
This demonstrates your respect for the other person.
- Ask about their feelings. "How do you feel about
this?" People love to have their feelings validated.
- Repeat back what they said. "Let me be sure I
understand what you're saying. You're saying that...?" This
technique will prevent misunderstandings and convince them
that you really are listening.
Being A Detective
Well, there it is. Now all you need to do is practice. If
you want to watch a role model for all of this, turn on a
rerun of a Columbo episode. He's my role-model. I advise all
my negotiators to think of themselves as detectives.
One more thing. If you get to St. Paul de Vence, do me a favor.
Don't be an ugly American. Take whatever they give you.
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