What Is Your Listening Style

 A listening style is the perferred way of making sense out of messages you receive from others. There are four different listening styles:

• People-oriented listeners will typically empathize and search for common areas of interest between them and the person with whom they are engaged. And a people-oriented listener will be more comfortable when interacting in small groups and in face-to-face conversations.
• Action-oriented listeners like information well-organized, error-free and delivered in "sound bites," or short declarative statements. While they listen, however, action-oriented listeners may be skeptical of what they hear initially, which means that they will typically second-guess the underlying motive of the message to determine whether it is true or false.
• Content-oriented listeners are comfortable listening to complex, detailed information. They are most interested in facts, details, and evidence in a message, otherwise they can become sekeptical and reject the message. They are more comfortable engaging in listening  and learning about issues, participating in arguments (debate) and are concerned with a speaker's accuracy and credibility. 
• Time-oriented listeners like messages delivered  succintly and thwy are most interested in bottom line statements and perfer bulleted talking points.

Understanding your listening style will help you communicate more effectively with others. By understand the various listening styles, you can adjust your approach to listening and gathering information. This exercise will help you do that. Here are some questions to get you started:

1. During the next 24 to 48 hours, keep a listening journal that describes the following:
2. Particular listening situations incxluding the goal, the time of day, and the content/reason for listening, and they style used.
3. After your journal is complete, discuss the listening style in which you were most comfortable?
4. When did you find you used a particular listening style?

You might find "Charting your Listening Cycle" on pp. 154 particularlly helpful.

When you have completed your journaling, please provide you feedback to this question:

What is the effect of your listening energy cycle on the type of listening you can do successfully?

Post your answers here, then let's discuss in class.