Question

For this activity, you will explore your understanding of effective listening skills in an organizational setting. You may be able to use the ideas you develop here in your final project.

Objective: This question is designed to help you gain insight on your final project’s communication problem. You may be able to use material from this activity in your final project.

Background: Please begin this exercise by reading the following information carefully.

Research on adults’ listening styles by Sargent and Weaver (2003) and others suggests that women use their listening skills to learn about people and to make connections with others, while men listen more for information and to solve intellectual challenges. The findings do not mean women do not engage in content-oriented listening and that men do not engage in people-oriented listening. Both sexes clearly engage in both types of listening. However, Sargent and Weaver and other researchers say findings like these indicate that women and men generally do, indeed, have different approaches to listening.

Activity:

How might you apply this information about sex differences in listening styles to your communication in the workplace*?

Answer 1

S*e*x differences in listening styles to communication in the workplace:-

The greatest gender barrier to communication in the workplace during decision making is the style differences. Women are process oriented and prefer to gather information while men rely on product driven communication styles. A female leader will always seek the advice of other colleagues when an issue arises in the workplace. Communication can be affected because of the different ways in which men and women express themselves and interpret others. If we recognize these differences in communication, it will prevent misunderstandings when communicating with the opposite gender. Each person has a unique communication style in which they interact and exchange information with others. The main difference between the gender communication are as under:-

1. Men keep their problems to themselves and do not see the point in sharing personal issues, while women are more relationship oriented and looks for ways to connect with other women.

2. Women have the ability to read the body language and pick up non verbal cues, while men have commanding physical presence.

3. Women have good listening skills while men prefers direct and to the point interactions.

4. Women display empathy in an effective way while men displays power in an effective way.

5. Women are very emotional while men are blunt and direct.

6. Women likes to meander i.e, they will not get to the point while men are insensitive to audience reaction.

7. Women are not authoritative while men are too confident in their own opinion.

8. To a women good listeninfg skills include making an eye contact and reacting visually to the speaker while to a men, listening can take place with a minimum of eye contact and almost no verbal feedback.

9. When a women nods, it means she agrees or is listening and encouraging another to continue speaking, while when a man nods, it means he agrees.

10. Women are more spontaneously emotionally expressive and have less ability in controlling and displaying their emotions, while men have a greater ability to hold their emotions in check and to keep a poker face in buisness situations.

11. Women tend to avoid confrontation and prefers indirect accusations, while men makes direct accusations. So we can see that  men are more likely to communicateas away to maintain their status and independence while women tend to view communication as a path to create friendships and build relationships. men communicate in such a way as if to negotiate power,be a winner , avoid failures and offer advice.