Radio Show #438: What is a ‘listening culture’ and how can we engage leadership

Special Guest: Mike Pounsford: Founder of Couravel; Howard Krais: President of UK Chapter of IABC; Kevin Ruck: Co-Founder of PR Academy

The three guests in this episode have worked together on the Listening Project since 2019.  Their purpose is to promote listening to employees as an under-valued element in the communications mix, to challenge organisations to listen more and to provide practical tips and advice on how to listen well.  We have  published 3 reports now, the third of which is the write up of the global research.  This is based on feedback from over 550 organisations – 57% in the UK.  5 key highlights include:

1. A robust link between how well we listen to employees and how well we manage innovation, change, and the creation of a sense of fairness
2. Leaders are significantly more important than line managers when it comes to delivering the outcomes from listening
3. Surveys are by far the most dominant tool for listening while numerous other valuable approaches are used much more sporadically
4. Digital listening in particular is overlooked and under-utilised
5. Organisations think they listen better than they do.  In other words we are in danger of thinking we listen well when we don’t.  (This is arguably the most significant issue we have uncovered)

Join us as we discuss the link between how well we listen to employees and manage innovation, change, and the creation of a sense of fairness

Listen Live (Archive Available)

Host: Jo Dodds