By Anders Christian Hjort

Have you ever thought of how difficult it is to listen, and the value you lose by not being good at it❓

Sales champs🥇not only prepare to articulate their value proposition persuasively, they are preparing and planning to be better listeners.

Most sales people have learned to ask questions. Very few have learned “deep listening skills”, what to listen for, and the value this brings in conversations with clients.

The Indian philosopher Krishnamurti puts it this way:

“I do not know if you have ever examined how you listen, it doesn’t matter to what, whether to a bird, to the wind in the leaves, to the rushing waters, or how you listen in a dialogue with yourself, to your conversation in various relationships with your intimate friends, your wife or husband.

If we try to listen we find it extraordinarily difficult, because we are always projecting our opinions and ideas, our prejudices, our background, our inclinations, our impulses; when they dominate, we hardly listen at all to what is being said. In that state there is no value at all.

One listens and therefore learns, only in a state of attention, a state of silence, in which this whole background is in abeyance, is quiet; then, it seems to me, it is possible to communicate.”

– Krishnamurti

Now, reflect…

What did you do in your last sales conversation?

So, how can you improve your listening skills?

What will you do differently now?