{"id":7411,"date":"2021-11-18T21:24:05","date_gmt":"2021-11-19T03:24:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.scottcochrane.com\/?p=7411"},"modified":"2021-11-22T15:51:16","modified_gmt":"2021-11-22T21:51:16","slug":"in-your-leadership-are-you-missing-the-messages-hidden-in-silence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/2021\/11\/18\/in-your-leadership-are-you-missing-the-messages-hidden-in-silence\/","title":{"rendered":"In Your Leadership, Are You Missing the Messages Hidden in Silence?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Effective leaders know that the art of communication is as much about listening as it is about talking.<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

But to really master this art, leaders must learn to listen to, and interpret, silence as much as they listen to words.<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

If you\u2019re going to really understand what is happening with your team and with your organization it is vitally important that you learn to pay attention to silence, and to understand what the silence means.<\/p>\n

As a starting point, here are 3 messages that silence could be telling you\u2026<\/p>\n

\u201cI am not producing results.\u201d<\/strong><\/h3>\n

When things are going well, your team will become a virtual chatterbox of updates and information. If the results are strong your email inbox will be jammed full of updates and data. People will be dropping by your office to give you the latest glowing reports on the success of the project.<\/p>\n

But when projects are not going well, things will sometimes grow strangely silent. When results are weak, when problems are brewing or when there is little progress you\u00a0might find little chatter coming from your team.<\/p>\n

Pay attention to the silence of poor results.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am unhappy.\u201d<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Long before someone announces that they are unhappy and thinking about leaving the team, they first communicate this by their silence.<\/p>\n

Whether it\u2019s because of a disagreement with you, frustration with their role or inability to advance, the first signs are often to be found in silence. There could be fewer contributions in meetings, slower responses to your inquiries and a drop off in new ideas.<\/p>\n

Pay attention to the silence of discontent.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am not engaged with our purpose.\u201d<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Sometimes even a high performer can withdraw from the overall goals of the team. They might continue to produce results, but if they don\u2019t align with the team\u2019s vision they can become more of a solo act.<\/p>\n

And the first indicator of this is silence.<\/p>\n

You\u00a0might not hear them celebrate team wins and you could hear very little enthusiasm for progress towards the organization\u2019s goals.<\/p>\n

Pay attention to the silence of low engagement.<\/p>\n

In many cases, silence can be interpreted as bad news. Learn to discern what the silence could be telling you.<\/p>\n

Because in leadership, what is not being said is as important as what is being said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Effective leaders know that the art of communication is as much about listening as it is about talking. But to really master this art, leaders must learn to listen to, and interpret, silence as much as they listen to words. If you\u2019re going to really understand what is happening with your team and with your…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":6964,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1017,478,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7411","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-communication","category-featured","category-leadership"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7411","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7411"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7411\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7413,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7411\/revisions\/7413"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6964"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7411"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7411"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7411"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}