Small Group Communication

1. Small Group Communication Welcome Back!

2. Agenda • Listening Skills Lecture • The Good, The Bad, The UGLY

3. Listening and Ethics • How responsive a listener are you? • It is our ethical responsibility to listen • Are you prepared to listen? • Listening is the fundamental process through which we initiate and maintain relationships • How well do you use your listening time? • The percentage of information you retain when listening indicates how good of a listener you are • How much of a role do you play in ensuring the integrity of a message? • Chain of command transmission or serial communication

4. Modelof Communication

5. Message Chain

6. Listening vs. Hearing • Hearing occurs automatically and requires no conscious effort • A natural and passive process • Listening is a deliberate process through which we seek to understand and retain aural stimuli • Depends on a complex set of skills that must be acquired • Who we are affects what we listen to • If information is important to us, we work harder to retain it

7. Listening Levels

8. Listening TypesThe Good, The Bad, The UGLY • The ineffective listener criticizes the speaker’s topic by calling it “uninteresting” • Poor listeners attempt to justify bad behavior. • Good listeners try to find some fact or idea that has value. • Only after listening to the entire presentation would the good listener evaluate the presentation.

9. Listening TypesThe Good, The Bad, The UGLY • The ineffective listener criticizes the speaker’s delivery • Poor listeners feel justified not listening when they find fault • Good listeners notice faults, but concentrate on the message.

10. Listening TypesThe Good, The Bad, The UGLY • The ineffective listener interrupts to challenge or disagree with the speaker, or mentally builds arguments against the speaker’s ideas • Poor listeners are easily provoked to disagree. • Good listeners pay attention to the whole idea before they agree or disagree with the speaker.

11. Listening TypesThe Good, The Bad, The UGLY • The ineffective listener listens only forfacts. • Good listeners listen forthemes, or meaningful principles being expressed. Not isolated facts.

12. Listening TypesThe Good, The Bad, The UGLY • The ineffective listener takes detailed outlines while listening • Poor listeners become so involved in taking notes, that they do not hear the message the speaker is conveying. • Good listeners take down only key ideas, words, and phrases to ensure they hear and understand the message being conveyed.

13. Listening TypesThe Good, The Bad, The UGLY • The ineffective listener creates distractions while the speaker is talking. • Avoids listening to difficult material • Reacts emotionally to some messages by tuning out the speaker • Pretends to listen • Tends to daydream during long presentations.

14. Listening TypesThe Good, The Bad, The UGLY • The effective listener can demonstrate knowledge and understanding of relationships among components of the listening process across a variety of contexts, including the ability to receive, interpret, and respond to messages.

15. Listening TypesThe Good, The Bad, The UGLY • The effective listener… • Senses: Hears what is important • Interprets: Assigns meaning to what is seen, heard, and felt. • Evaluates: Determines speaker credibility and message importance • Responds: Reacts to speech usually through nonverbal cues • Remember: Retain parts of speech in memory

16. Unethical Listeners • Fraudulent– pseudolisteners (nodders) • Monopolistic – always want to be listened to, but never want to listen • Completers – fill in missed gaps with manufactured information • Selective – zero in only on parts that interest them • Avoiders – close their ears to information they’d rather not deal with • Defensive – assume others are criticizing • Attackers – wait for you to make a mistake

17. Feedback • Feedback is essential to improving your listening skills • Evaluative feedback • Positive evaluative feedback • Negative evaluative feedback • Formative feedback • Nonevaluative feedback • Probing • Understanding • Supportive feedback • “I” messages

18. Effects of Feedback • The feedback given by the respondent in any encounter strongly influences the direction and outcome of the interaction • Feedback usually increases the accuracy with which information is passed from person to person, as well as increases the time required to transmit information

19. The Role of Critical Thinking • Critical thinking • The careful thought process about what another person has just said to you • The evaluation of the believability of the spoken message Be ready to challenge and raise questions about what you are listening to • Examine the evidence on which a conclusion is based and establish if valid or contains weaknesses and inconsistencies • Listen carefully in an effort to determine if what you are listening to makes sense and is worth retaining or acting upon

20. Technology’s Influence on Listening • Advances in technology continue to add listening wrinkles • Face to face – real-time, synchronous listening • Telephone – option of not having to share the same space when engage in real-time conversations • Voice mail – serial conversations with people in different locations and who don’t hear our words when we speak them; asynchronous listening • Caller ID – allows us to decide who we want to listen to • Call waiting – makes it possible for us to not miss a call from someone important to us

21. Increasing Your Ear Power • Become aware of the importance and effects of listening • Become aware of the importance and effects of feedback • Realize that effective listening includes both nonjudgmental and critical responses

22. Focus Your Attention • Distractions • Emotions: Red-flag words • Physical factors • Other people • Speech-thought differential • Constantly focus your attention • Attention checks • Nonverbal behaviors that support listening • Culture can interfere

23. Set Appropriate Goals • Know what you are listening for • To understand content • To retain content • To analyze content • To evaluate content • To develop empathetic relationships • Adapt goals to each situation or experience

24. Listening to Understand Ideas • Locate the central concepts in the speaker’s message • Work to recall the concepts that are most important • Seek to identify key words and phrases that will help you accurately summarize the concepts being discussed

25. Listening to Retain Information • Focus your attention • Learn how to make certain you have understood what you have heard • Aids to retain information • Repetition • Paraphrase • Visualization

26. Listening to Analyze and Evaluate • Reserve judgment until the comprehension of the situation is complete • Realize you have a choice; do not feel compelled to join the crowd • Listen between the lines

27. Listening Empathetically and Actively • Empathetic listening can be used to help individuals understand their own situations and problems • Try to internalize the other person’s feelings and see life through his or her eyes • Acknowledge the seriousness of people’s problems • Draw them out so that they can discuss a problem • Show them that you understand the problem • Paraphrase their statements • Genuine nonverbal cues • Do not judge; reflect, consider, and restate your impression of the sender’s expressions

28. Listening to Culture’s Influence We need to be more aware of cultural differences in listening • Dialogic listening – the awareness of what happens between people as they respond to each other, work toward shared understanding, and build a relationship • “Culture” can include social, ethnic, organizational, racial, etc.

29. Reflective-Thinking Framework • A system of decision making that is designed to encourage critical thinking in the group process • Reflective-Thinking is generally an agreed-upon structure consisting of six basic components: • What is the problem-what is it not? • What are the facts of the situation? • What criteria must the solution meet? • What are the possible solutions? • Which is the best solution? • How can the solution be implemented?

30. Reflective-Thinking Framework • Reflective thinking is being used when… • The resources of all group members are being used • The group is using its time to its advantage • The group is emphasizing fact-finding and inquiry • Members are listening to each other and respecting each other • Pressure to conform is being kept to a minimum • Atmosphere is supportive, trusting, and cooperative

31. GROUP THINK • Groupthink – a dysfunction in which some group members try to preserve group harmony by suppressing the voicing of the dissenting opinion, or to complete the task quickly • Groupthink impedes effective group functioning • When all group members try to think alike, no one thinks very much • It is an extreme method groups use to avoid conflict • Have you ever censored your own comments because you feared destroying the sense of community in your group? • Have you ever applied direct pressure to dissenting members in an effort to obtain consensus quickly?

32. The End