It’s been mentioned time [1] and again [2] that Active Listening is a key component to exercising empathy. Further, we all know by now that empathy is a main focus of practicing Design Thinking. Despite this, we often notice that although many companies intend to practice active listening, they sadly miss the mark. We believe this miss is due to a failure in truly understanding what Active Listening means.
In lieu of this deeper understanding, companies think all they need to do in order to transform themselves from business-centric environments to human-centric ones, is to “get out of the building and talk with customers”.
They think by solely having conversations with customers regarding a new idea or prototype, then taking detailed notes about what customers like/don’t like/want, and finally turning those comments into features, they have mastered human experience design and are thus practicing design thinking. In reality, they are usually only doing part of what is needed to master the practice.
We believe talking to customers IS the way to transform an organization, but if businesses aren’t actively listening during these conversations the real value will get swept aside. Active listening is more than having an interview with a customer. It’s a practice which requires the listener to fully concentrate, understand, respond and then remember what is being said [3].
In Customer Interviews practicing active listening means being fully immersed in the customer’s dialogue, versus trying to solution on the fly or get the participant to answer a question the way the interviewer wants. Active listening means being quiet most of the time, and, more importantly, being fully present.
We’ve found by recording interviews, with the customer’s permission, you can accomplish this present moment awareness much more easily. In this way, you can go back later to notate, analyze, and solution, and save the time with the customer for listening actively.
Instead of companies thinking research can solve it all, we encourage them to investigate the quality of that research. We instruct them to simply be in the interview. If they forego this simple shift, how can they feel the customer’s experience? How can they practice empathy?
They can’t.
And, if they’re not practicing empathy, they certainly aren’t being human centric.
*Photo by kyle smith
Sources
- RIT. Design Thinking: Empathizing to Understand the Problem. Retrieved from https://www.rit.edu/ritonline/ritx/THINK502x
- Common Good (2016, July 14). Practicing Active Listening & Empathy Workshop. Retried from https://medium.com/common-good/practicing-active-listening-empathy-workshop-d0895a8f3a00
- Wikipedia. Active Listening. Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/
