This is the last in a series of blogs on achieving authenticity in public communications.  Authenticity is the sine qua non of our age. We all want it, and when it’s lacking in a public figure, we turn off to that person.  I talk more about authenticity in my book, Trust Me:  Four Steps to Authenticity and Charisma, but these blogs cover a condensed discussion of the topic. 

The final step in achieving authenticity is to listen to your audience. 

Communication is always a two-way activity.  If you think of a persuasive communication as a journey you take your audience (one or one thousand) on to change minds, then you’ll see that listening is a vital part of that process. Changing one’s mind occurs in a series of steps, and you need to know what step the other person is on in order to be effective in leading the process.

At its most basic, good listening offers feedback.  Feedback, which is often critical, is simply a response, usually involving evaluation of some kind.  Here’s how to do it without destroying the ego of the receiver and ultimately the relationship. Begin by describing the actions of the person to whom you’re giving feedback.  Then describe the consequences of the behavior, and the reasons for them.  Finally, check for comprehension and agreement.  Avoid criticism and emotional words.  Just the facts. 

To go a little further as a good listener, try paraphrasing what your audience is saying.  Paraphrasing means simply saying something like, “So let me be sure I’ve understood. What you’re saying is that the green ones are tastier than the brown ones?”  The point is to play back, like a recorder, what the person has said to you. That’s all. Resist the temptation to embroider (“But that’s ridiculous! That can’t be true!”) because that undoes all the good work of the paraphrase.

A subtle improvement on paraphrasing is clarifying what the speaker has said while essentially repeating it back to him.  The point is to translate and clarify what the other person is saying and play it back in order to check understanding. This is much harder work than merely paraphrasing, because you have to think about what you’ve heard and offer a fair summary or restatement.

So far, we’ve been dealing with the surface level of communication: the ostensible meaning of the words that are said.  To really begin to listen, you need to hear, see, and reflect the deeper, emotional meanings of the dialogue. This level might be called empathic listening.

Here, you identify the emotion underneath the words and respond in kind:  “I understand how painful this is for you, Joseph. I too had a project go bad early in my career. It really hurts.”  Note that this response first identifies, and accurately, the pain that the other person is feeling and then takes it on, sharing a similar experience or emotion from your own life story to identify with the other.  That’s empathy.

Finally, the most powerful form of listening — the one that people most strongly react to, feeling that they are both heard and understood — is a form of empathic listening where you identify the emotion and state its underlying causes without trying to solve the problem.  This form of active listening is the hardest to undertake. In a contentious situation, it can feel as if you’re giving in to openly express how the other is feeling. But you’re not; you’re just stating the other’s position as fully and honestly as you can. Agreement, compromise, or resolution will come later. For the moment, active listening is a powerful first step toward solving any serious problem in a communication.  And forming a strong, authentic bond with an audience.