Active Listening

I remember when we learned active listening in college I dismissed it as an annoying paraphrase of what the other person is saying. But of late I’ve been putting more thought into it and I’ve found its use in retail, especially with customer feedback. There have been several instances when customers would tell me how I should have designed something. “This top would have looked much better with sleeves”, or “this is too loose on top- shouldn’t it be as fitted as the hip band?” are the kind of feedback that usually result in me gritting my teeth and saying “Hmm…. you think?” Inside, I quell my defensive thoughts quietly.

But my long drives to work every morning while listening to Tamil radio have got me thinking, and I think it would really benefit me to indulge in some active listening, or in this case, active thinking. A customer who tells me certain styles would look better with sleeves might be her way of saying that she doesn’t like wearing sleeveless clothes. And for customers who don’t like styles with a different silhouette (“Bishop Shirt” is meant to be looser on top and fitted at the hip) – I can just recommend styles with a regular, more fitted all around shape. The whole exercise when put to practice is a lot of fun; I get to recommend stuff that those customers actually like (and sometimes buy), and I also get to understand my customers' taste.

There are, however, times when it is nearly impossible to practice active listening. I have to fight extra hard when customers tell me my prices are too high. The way feedback is phrased has such a big impact on how well it is received. I don’t respond very well to “don’t you think your prices are too high”? Why would I think so - I’m the one who priced them! I know, I know, what they are really telling me is that a regular cotton top, in their opinion, shouldn’t cost that much. That’s when I slip into polite teacher mode, and give them a brief lesson on the labour costs involved in handloom, apologizing profusely for the standard of living costs these days. You get the point, right? Pricing is a sensitive issue, but the active listening task does prevent my arteries from clogging.

A time I really wished I had been more aware of my thought process was when a photographer came in to take pictures of me in my store last week (it was for a newspaper article and the journalist spoke to me over the phone). The photographer told me, almost right after introducing himself, that my shoes were too plain and that I needed some make-up. I should have just smiled and told him that I wasn’t prepared for something more glamorous while we wrapped up the shoot quickly. Instead I allowed myself to get worked up and then I couldn’t smile for a single shot.

My next step is to try and incorporate active listening with my staff. Often when I tell them what areas they need to work on, I’m not very understanding of their explanations (I tend to see the explanations as excuses). Perhaps they are trying to tell me something- something I can do to help them achieve the goals I’ve set for them.