The Art of Actually Listening

Image generated with Canva's Magic Media tool (which is still rubbish, in case anyone was wondering)

Not long ago, on the recommendation of my old head teacher, I read Supercommunicators by Charles Duhigg, and it completely shifted how I think about conversations in EdTech coaching.

The book's core message? Communication, when done right, is fundamentally about listening. Sounds obvious, doesn't it? And yet it's seriously hard to actually do - especially when you're the person who people come to for answers.

And then there's the other thing that drives me wild: colleagues constantly preface their questions with "this probably sounds stupid" or "you probably already know this." Every single time, I want to grab them by the shoulders and say "NO! BE STUPID! Ask the question!"

There's this brilliant xkcd comic about how, for everything you know, there are about 10,000 people learning it for the first time today. We'd never treat our students as stupid for not knowing something, so why on earth do we do it to ourselves?

Source: http://xkcd.com/1053

But Duhigg's book made me realise something uncomfortable: maybe people feel they need to apologise for their questions because we EdTech folk have been too busy solving to actually listen. We jump in with our clever solutions before truly understanding what's being asked. And I'll be honest - I'm absolutely guilty of this.

Let me explain by sharing the customarily embarassing story. When I first got the role as EdTech coach at Dulwich College Shanghai Puxi, a new colleague was having issues with sharing documents. So I jumped on a call with him (peak Covid days, no face-to-face coaching) and immediately launched into my brilliant explanation of how to share a spreadsheet via OneDrive for collaboration.

To his credit, he waited until the very end of my monologue before politely saying, "Thanks so much for your help, I did actually try that already, but thanks for trying!"

Plot twist: I found out shortly after that he was probably one of the most tech-savvy people I worked with. Lesson learned about listening... sort of. Luckily, aforementioned colleague turned out to be a good friend now, so I believe I've been forgiven for my lack of, uh, shutting the heck up.

The new listening challenge

When I started my current role here in London, I tried a different approach. I'd jump into conversations saying, "Right, I'm here to listen. Tell me everything - what's going well, what you use, what you love, what you hate. Also, uh, what exactly is your job? Tell me that one, too."

Reader, how hard was it to just sit there and listen? Let me tell you: SO hard. Because naturally, I want to jump in with solutions. My dad used to call me the agony aunt because I'd always be the one listening to friends and trying to fix their problems. That's followed me into adult life, and with EdTech, obviously you do want to fix things. But you have to listen first.

As Duhigg puts it in Supercommunicators:

"The most effective communicators pause before they speak and ask themselves: Why am I opening my mouth? Unless we know what kind of discussion we're hoping for—and what type of discussion our companions want—we're at a disadvantage."

Three Questions That Actually Work

Drawing from my EdTech change framework, where voice (people feeling heard) is crucial, here are the three questions I use most in conversations - the ones where I have to force myself to shut up and listen:

1. "Blue-sky thinking - your idea doesn't have to exist - what would be cool?"

This works brilliantly because of that old adage: you don't know what you don't know. Sure, sometimes people give you properly wild ideas that make you think "huh, let's explore that madness." But half the time, they describe something that's a pipe dream for them but completely doable for you. They don't realise it's possible, and honestly, those are the funnest conversations to have.

2. "What have you already tried?" or "Tell me what you've done so far?"

This would've saved me from my OneDrive debacle. But it's also brilliant for finding context. They might've tried things you're about to recommend, or they might've tried things you haven't even thought of. It can unlock emotions and frustrations, identify who else has been involved, and help you work out blockers. Maybe there's a person they haven't been able to reach, or a website that seemed promising but wasn't - they need you to unblock, not just repeat the same advice.

3. "What's the ultimate goal? What do you want your students to get out of this?"

This has multiple layers. It reminds everyone that the purpose is supporting students and their learning. But it also helps paint the big picture. By focusing on the end goal, you can work backwards to find the path.

4. "If time wasn't a factor, what would you want to explore?"

This one's magic because it temporarily removes the biggest barrier we all face. Studies show that the biggest barrier for teachers in any kind of professional learning or development is a lack of time. When you take time pressure off the table, people suddenly share their actual ambitions rather than their compromised versions. Sometimes you discover that what they really want is achievable with the right templates or AI support, or that building it into protected calendar time could make it happen. It's like asking them to dream without the weight of their marking pile on their shoulders.

5. "Who else is doing something similar that you admire?"

This question is a new one that I've been testing lately and that I love for two reasons. First, it helps identify potential collaboration opportunities - maybe there's someone in another department already solving this problem. Second, it reveals what they actually value in practice, not just in theory. When someone says "I love how Ms Smith uses Padlet for exit tickets," you learn not just about the tool but about what success looks like to them.

After the listening

"But Amelia," I hear you say, "you haven't mentioned AI almost the entire blog post!"

Well, here you go: something fun that I've been playing with.

If you're speaking with lots of people, get their permission to record the conversations. Then (again with permission), upload these to a NotebookLM notebook.

I did this with all my introductory conversations in my new role this year - just those first chats where I asked "what's annoying, what's getting in your way, how can I help?" With everyone's permission to record, I could then use the transcript-filled notebook to pull out common threads. What are the common blockers? What does everyone think about specific tools? What should my priorities be?

And here's the fun bit: you can actually turn it into a proper report with a click of a button that you can share either with the people you spoke with or with school leadership. It transforms individual listening sessions into collective intelligence and gives you something really solid to move forward with.

Listening is obvious

As I started writing these thoughts down, I realised I was stating the obvious. Of course we have to listen. Of course it's tricky.

But then I remembered this line from Supercommunicators:

“So, to become a supercommunicator, all we need to do is listen closely to what’s said and unsaid, ask the right questions, recognize and match others’ moods, and make our own feelings easy for others to perceive. Simple, right? Well, no, of course not.”

Because of course it's not that easy. And, if you're anything like me, you have to force down any quick responses to be able to properly listen to what people are saying.

But hey, if you can get that part down, who knows what you'll hear.