Listening deficiency
There’s a moment in Ted Lasso—Apple TV’s heart-forward football comedy—where star player Jamie Tartt is emotionally unraveling. He’s just come off the field, raw and vulnerable, carrying the weight of his father’s verbal abuse and years of bottled pride.
Most coaches would jump in with advice. A pep talk. Maybe even tough love.
But Ted doesn’t say a word.
He just listens—fully, patiently, without interrupting or steering.
And something rare happens: Jamie lets his guard down. A deeper conversation opens. And what begins as emotional chaos becomes connection, growth, and trust.
It’s a reminder that the most powerful thing a leader can do isn’t speak. It’s listen.
Personal Realization
Early in my career, I thought great leaders were the ones with the best ideas and the boldest voices in the room. The ones who could command attention, speak clearly, and make decisions fast. But over time, I noticed a different pattern: the most trusted, respected, and quietly powerful leaders weren’t the ones who spoke the most.
They were the ones who listened best.
And I’m not talking about passive listening. I mean listening that creates gravity. The kind that draws people in, slows down chaos, and creates clarity. The kind of listening that changes what people say next—because they know it will actually be heard.
Listening in the Modern World
Our brains are under siege.
Every day, we process the equivalent of 34 gigabytes of information. Social media, Slack pings, email notifications—we're training ourselves to crave novelty, not nuance.
A recent study coined the term "popcorn brain" to describe this phenomenon: our attention becomes so fragmented from digital overstimulation that even basic tasks feel harder. Combine that with dopamine-driven platforms like Instagram or TikTok, and we’re effectively rewiring ourselves to be distracted.
I once worked with a leader who embodied this challenge. In every meeting, they showed up with one foot in the room and the other in their inbox, slack, etc. While people spoke, they half-listened—eyes darting between the conversation and their screen, fingers still firing off replies to messages from outside the room. Technically, they were 'present.' But practically, they were somewhere else entirely.
And everyone knew it. You could see it in the way people filtered what they shared, shortened their points, and slowly disengaged. They weren't a bad person—just caught in the belief that multitasking was leadership. But what they missed were the nuances, the emotions, and the signals that only come when you're fully there.
This has massive implications for leaders.
When your attention is compromised, you lose access to the full signal of what’s being said. You miss subtle cues. You default to assumptions. You filter everything through your agenda instead of listening to theirs.
Add the social dynamics of leadership—where people are watching how you respond, waiting to be impressed or approved of—and it’s no wonder most leaders talk 80% of the time.
But here’s the irony: the more senior your role, the more dangerous it becomes not to listen.
Listening Deficiency
“Most people do not listen with the intent to understand; they listen with the intent to reply.” — Stephen R. Covey
A few years back I remember working with a leader who spent 95% of our one-on-one time talking. They weren’t domineering or arrogant—in fact, they had one of the biggest hearts I’ve ever seen in leadership. Deeply thoughtful, incredibly invested in their people, and someone I genuinely admired.
But despite all that, most of their team didn’t feel heard. They didn’t feel seen. Because the space to speak, to reflect, or to share challenges just wasn’t there. The leader was doing what they thought was helpful—sharing wisdom, providing answers, showing up with energy—but unintentionally drowning out the very voices they wanted to support.
It was a powerful reminder: you can care deeply and still miss people entirely if you aren’t listening.
I think we can all agree that we don’t have a speaking problem. We have a listening deficiency.
Symptoms include:
Interrupting before ideas are fully formed.
Mentally rehearsing your reply instead of processing theirs.
Assuming you already know what they’re going to say.
Filtering responses through your own biases, fears, or need to control.
And underneath it all? Often, insecurity.
Leaders are under pressure to perform. To solve quickly. To appear smart. But that urgency often short-circuits connection. And when people don’t feel heard, they stop contributing fully.
You might think you’re moving fast. But the team around you is quietly checking out.
What the Brain Tells Us About Trust and Conversation
Neuroscience gives us a powerful lens here. Judith Glaser, in her work on Conversational Intelligence, shows how the brain responds to different types of conversations.
When we feel safe, respected, and heard, our prefrontal cortex activates—enabling empathy, strategic thinking, and collaboration.
But when we feel dismissed or judged, the amygdala (our fear center) kicks in, triggering defensiveness, anxiety, or withdrawal.
She describes three levels of conversation, each with its place and purpose in leadership communication:
Transactional: exchanging information
Positional: defending opinions
Transformational: co-creating and discovering together
Transformational conversations—the kind that lead to innovation, trust, and loyalty—require one non-negotiable input: deep, intentional listening.
Transformational Conversations
Imagine a team where people feel safe enough to share their raw, half-baked ideas. Where disagreements don’t create distance, but open up discovery. Where feedback isn’t feared—it’s welcomed. Because people trust the intent behind it.
This is what transformational listening unlocks.
It creates teams that move faster because they feel safer. It fuels innovation not through brainstorming gimmicks, but by allowing space for people to speak what they actually think.
Without this kind of listening, here’s what you risk:
Your most creative thinkers stop offering their best ideas.
Conflict goes underground and turns into resentment.
Strategy becomes consensus-driven instead of insight-driven.
Your team becomes quiet—not because they agree, but because they’ve stopped believing it matters.
The loss isn’t always loud. Sometimes it’s silent. And that’s what makes it so dangerous.
Transformational conversations aren’t fluffy. They’re the engine of high-trust, high-performance teams.
Listening Toolkit
Before diving into tools, we have to start with awareness.
If you're struggling with listening, and let's face it we all are, it's not just a matter of technique—it's a matter of self-reflection.
Ask yourself:
Why am I talking more than I'm listening?
What am I trying to prove or protect?
Do I value control over connection?
Many leaders discover that underneath the urge to dominate the conversation is a need for validation, certainty, or fear of being misunderstood or perceived as unsure. Recognizing these motivations is the first step to shifting your default setting from "direct" to "discover."
Once you build that awareness, then the following tools become exponentially more powerful.
So how do we get better at it?
Here’s a toolkit of practices drawn from neuroscience, psychology, and lived leadership experience:
Track the 80/20 Rule: Aim to speak 20% and listen 80%. Your influence increases when your airtime decreases.
Breathe Before You Speak: One conscious breath slows the reactive brain and brings you into presence.
Mirror, Then Move: Reflect back what you heard before adding your view. "What I’m hearing is... Did I get that right?"
Ask Before Assuming: Use questions like "What else is on your mind?" or "How do you see it?"
Name What’s Not Said: Use emotional labeling to surface the unsaid. "You seem hesitant—is there something you’re holding back?"
Eliminate Distractions: No phones, no checking email. Give the person the gift of your full attention.
Listening Isn’t Soft
Listening isn’t about being passive. It’s about being powerful enough to pause.
The best leaders know that attention is their scarcest resource. When they offer it fully, it becomes a force multiplier. Trust accelerates. Ideas get sharper. Culture strengthens.
So the question becomes:
Are you listening to reply? Or are you listening to transform?
