The Success Zone

Recently I wrote of the 5 hallmarks of a great listener. In summary, these were: Quiet mind listening Full observational attention on the speaker Listening for the speaker, not for you Absence of agenda, assumption, advice and judgment High self awareness Perhaps not surprisingly, great listeners are quite rare in our current world. Try counting [...]

So you think you are a great listener? Test yourself against these five traits and see how well you do. Give yourself a rating from 1 to 5 on each trait (1 is rarely or poorly expressed, 5 is habitually and permanently a part of the way you listen). 1. Quiet mind listening Great listeners [...]

8. Playing favourites It is easy, as a teacher (and as a parent or leader), to socially and emotionally reward those who meet your expectations and conditions. It is also just as easy to be socially and emotionally distant from those who don’t. This is a form of conditional respect (do as you are told [...]

5. Judgement and Assumption Your brain is particularly ‘wired’ to present you with what you are expecting to see. It is wired for assumption: If you are about to buy a brand new red BMW, it is amazing how many red BMWs you see. When you label students, when you give them what you think [...]

Warmth and competence are two measures that we use to judge according to a new model from psychologists Susan Fiske of Princeton University and Peter Glick of Lawrence University. While these judgements are often inaccurate and stereotyped, this model still provides some interesting points of comparison and reflection. Interestingly, incorrect correlations were seen in the [...]