Eavesdropping is not listening

Given the choice between more or less communication in building a business, most managers, whether new or long-standing, would say “more.” It is the prevailing view.

That commitment is tested daily, when events occur, initiatives are hatched or almost anything changes. Change not only requires communication, but it can give managers second thoughts about saying anything at all. That’s because change can be unsettling. Consider the loss of a customer or resignation of a colleague. The initial reaction is more likely a question, “What do they know I don’t?,” than it is an answer to what comes next.

Compounding the problem is that over the last five years, companies have become leaner, less hierarchical and more flexible so as to take advantage of subtle market shifts. In such an environment, communication is the key to developing the kind of coordination that helps a company do more with less. But is it also an environment less able to withstand even modest bumps in the road.

The management dilemma – the need to communicate and the need to maintain stability – has led to a handful of approaches. Some rely on a handful of insiders with whom they counsel and decide a course of action. In this way, others always know, so the burden is shared. Some rely on the fact that what is to be known will get out anyway, so why not get it out first and under control. Still others take each instance on a case-by-case basis; viewing each event in its time and to its near-term consequence.

The first two courses are defensible, though incomplete solutions. Simply, they create differences that can get in the way of productivity or ignore the need for perspective. But the third way is a real recipe for disaster. As a successful company is built on a set of persistent values, a theory of “communications relativity” does more to undermine its ability than to promote it. Equally damaging is a key feature of this last approach. Too often it relies on "keeping an ear to the ground” or eavesdropping.

For managers who seek to cultivate relative calm by editing the news, eavesdropping is viewed as important to knowing the mood of the company. What better way than unobtrusively dropping in on the hallway and lunch room chatter that fills the time between assignments? However, what is said when colleagues don’t think anyone is listening is far from unvarnished sentiment.

Eavesdropping earns only a fragment of a conversation among others. It offers none of the history or context for what is heard and gives equal weight to things that are either essential or unrelated to the team. Eavesdropping also presumes that what is said among colleagues carries more decision-making weight than what is said directly. It undervalues the desire of employees across the board to participate in their companies’ success. The structural changes in companies have encouraged this commitment – it is necessary to survival.

All this makes eavesdropping a poor substitute for listening. Listening requires a back-and-forth, freighted (thankfully) with history, rank and opportunity, which can make communication more a default than fault while leading to decisions more fully embraced.

When a long-time colleague resigned recently it led to concerns over work reassignment, customer notification and an internal announcement. Seen one way, it could be viewed as a link in too heavy a chain. Seen in another way, it could be a market comment on the company's likelihood of success. Yet in another, better angle, it could be seen as part of the normal retrenching and revitalization that marks a healthy business.

So, how to focus attention on our “better angle?”

By talking to a couple of people, and not just managers, the key questions and anxieties were identified and able to be addressed upfront. Just because communications is necessary does not mean it should be without thought or perspective. It also needs to be timely; better to hear it from your boss than the customer.

In each case -- certainly in this one -- listening is far more effective than eavesdropping when it comes to providing perspective.