October 16, 2025 • 30 mins
Today, we're diving into the art of listening with our guest, Mark Vincent, a process consulting pioneer. Mark shares insights on how truly understanding others can pave the way for better business continuity and succession planning. He emphasizes that listening is not just about hearing words; it involves engaging fully and asking the right questions to draw out deeper insights. We discuss how effective listening fosters ownership and accountability within teams, transforming the way organizations operate. Join us as we explore the vital role of listening in achieving unstoppable success and how it can lead to meaningful collaboration and innovation.
Unstoppable Success welcomes Mark Vincent, a distinguished leader in process consulting, to share insights on the crucial role of listening in business. The episode dives into the complexities of listening, emphasizing that it is not merely about hearing words but involves a deeper understanding of emotional cues and non-verbal communication. Mark highlights the challenges many face in truly listening, often distracted by their thoughts and responses. He explains how effective listening fosters engagement and collaboration, allowing individuals to take ownership of their solutions rather than relying solely on consultants. By discussing Edgar Schein's foundational work in process consulting, Mark illustrates how asking the right questions can lead to meaningful problem-solving and a greater commitment to change. The conversation culminates in an exploration of the Society for Process Consulting, which Mark founded to professionalize this essential competency, encouraging leaders to enhance their listening skills as a pathway to success.
Takeaways:
- Listening is a complex skill that requires being present and fully engaged with the speaker.
- Effective listening fosters ownership and accountability, empowering individuals to solve their own problems.
- Curiosity is essential in leadership; asking questions opens doors to innovation and better solutions.
- Transformative leadership involves shifting focus from speaking to listening and facilitating dialogue.
- Distractions during conversations hinder true understanding; we must learn to embrace silence and patience.
- Building a culture of inquiry allows for creative solutions and deeper engagement among team members.
Links referenced in this episode:
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:38):
Foreign.
Well, hello everybody, andwelcome to another amazing episode
of Unstoppable Success, thepodcast where we hear from amazing
leaders, humans, businessprofessionals, all about how they
became unstoppable.
Their tips, their wisdom, allthings that can help you continue
and to be unstoppable success.
(01:01):
And so today I want to welcomeMark Vincent as our guest.
And let me tell you a littlebit about Mark.
He partners with accomplishedleaders to pave a road through the
complexity of businesscontinuity and succession.
It'd be great if I could speakthis morning.
Mark has established DesignGroup International, the Society
for Process Consulting, andthe Maestro Level Leaders.
(01:24):
A process consulting pioneerand systems convener, he is an author
and contributor across variouschannels, as well as a frequent presenter.
And his latest book,Listening, Helping Learning, lays
out the core competencies ofprocess consulting and a roadmap
to partner with his clients.
(01:45):
Mark, welcome.
I love the fact that you havea whole book on listening.
No, thank you, Jacqueline.
So this conversation.
So, Mark, you know, I'm really curious.
How, how has, how has first ofall, like the book come about and
like, take me up to thisjourney because, you know, again,
(02:09):
listening is, I, you know, wejust shared.
Listening is something that Ithink is, you know, we all talk about
it, but I actually think it'sharder to do than people think.
Oh, yeah, it is.
Listening takes work and ittakes being present and it takes
being conscious.
You can look like you'relistening and be kind of elsewhere
(02:32):
in your brain, but then you'renot listening.
You're not going to retain things.
And listening isn't justhearing words.
It's perceiving.
It's facing, taking in visualinformation and experiential information.
You know, what's thetemperature of this person's temperament
and that kind of thing.
So that it's hard work andit's a, it's a big discipline to
(02:53):
do that.
And, you know, the socialscientists tell us it's the majority
communication isn't how wellyou speak or how passionately you
speak.
It's how well you listen andretain information so that your responses
can show that you are engagedwith the people that are on the other
side of the table or at theother end of the couch or across
the restaurant table from you.
(03:14):
So the, the real genesis of alot of this goes back to Edgar Schein.
If we're talking aboutlistening, particularly in a leadership
context or a business context.
Edgar Schein was an MIT Prof.
So up your way, up in yourneck of the woods.
And he was starting out reallyin not just Teaching, but working
(03:34):
in large manufacturing andhelping to refine processes that,
that were not working right.
And the old way of doing thisis that you would listen a little
bit, just to listen for what?
What's the problem?
And now I'm going to tell youwhat the solution is.
So it's a hook that you'relooking for when you're a subject
matter expert.
And we all need subject matter experts.
(03:56):
We need people who know theirfield really well.
But when you're dealing with aprocess, you often don't know what
the problem is right away.
And the person telling youdoesn't know what the problem is.
That's why they're checkingwith you.
So now you have to figurethings out.
And that requires conversation.
And if they're going to fixthings that they're responsible for,
they have to own it.
(04:16):
Well, adults own things thatthey, they've decided they want to
do.
How do they decide they're apart of the problem solving?
How do they feel like thereare problems, a part of the problem
solving?
Somebody's listening to them,somebody's curious, somebody's asking
them questions.
And what Edgar Schein foundout is if he asked questions like
what else did you try?
Or what else did you thinkabout trying?
(04:37):
Or what do you think wouldhappen if we did X or Y or Z?
Or was there any other ideathat was left out and would just
draw people out to own theirideas, they were actually committed
to taking their next steps anddefining solutions as opposed to
blaming the consultant.
Like, we tried it, it didn'twork, you know, so they would have
more grit in their next steps.
(05:00):
So he began to apply this inall kinds of situations and started
consulting with human serviceorganizations and healthcare organizations,
some NGOs, and found that ifyou listen and ask questions that
draw out more comments andthen people actually start listening
themselves, they startlistening to the problem.
So not everybody's listening.
Everybody's listening to thisthing that they're examining together.
(05:23):
They're facing the work andthen they own their stuff.
So my own work with this wassaying, okay, now that in the academy,
like at MIT and Edgar Schein'swork and his extensive consultation,
you have data for how thisworks, how do we turn this into a
field, how we turn this into aprofession where people will be process
(05:45):
consultants, not just havingthat in their toolbox, they would
actually be this kind of a person.
This would be what they lead,this would be the thing they brought
into their profession.
So out of that, the Societyfor Process Consulting was established,
which provides A professionalcredential for this approach.
And along the way we did someextensive work to say, what are the
(06:08):
core competencies?
How do we recognize when it'sbeing done and being done well, and
how do we evaluate it and keeplearning and bring it to an art form?
And what was cool was that ofcourse listening is the first of
those competencies.
You have to listen so wellthat people are saying, you just
said it better than I did.
When you finally play it back,that's exactly it.
(06:30):
Or yes, and you got that.
Yes.
Now they're engaged and youcan begin to move toward helping.
But in this case, helpingisn't me helping you.
If you're the client, it's usco creating what help looks like.
So it's not something Iperform as a consultant, I've helped
you get into a listening modeas well.
So now we've co created it.
(06:50):
So listening in that level ofdepth continues forward.
It doesn't end because we'rehelping now.
So we stop listening.
We keep listening.
But it's joint.
No, it is listening for theelements of an architecture for the
process that will actually engage.
And then you start to have atrusted relationship because there's
(07:12):
dialogue and it's a, it's apowerful discipline and it sounds
easy and it's hard work.
You have to be very mindful,you have to be very present.
You have to deal with your owntechnical term here, frap, in order
to be able to be present withother people and not be, you know,
yin yanging with your brain.
So that's a little bit of the background.
(07:35):
Okay, so you said.
First of all, that isabsolutely amazing.
And one thing.
Well, there's a couplecomments I want to share listeners,
because how many times.
And, and you have to beconscious about this, you know, listening
to somebody speak.
How many times as you justsaid, the stuff that's going in your
brain because you're thinking, right?
You're thinking about, oh, Ishould, oh, I could.
(07:58):
But you know, you actuallyhave to stop thinking, thinking in
your brain about what commentsand just intently listen.
Because then after that, youknow, there may be a pause and it's
okay, but then you canactually articulate and even, you
know, create a better cohesivesentence versus saying oh, I understand
(08:22):
that.
Like, yeah, I love that youbrought that up.
Because the difference here isnot thinking.
It's.
It's a word that's kind of amade up word here.
It's a wearing.
Yeah, it's facing.
It's embracing the moment withyour eyes and with your body to be
(08:43):
aware of the person or of thegroup and, and to let the thoughts
come as they wrap up.
Because if I start engagingthe thought, I'm doing it out of
a dimension or a little facetof what they're saying, not the whole
thing.
And there's a whole mess ofpeople out there that it takes them
(09:04):
a while to wind up to whatthey're really trying to say if they
process out loud.
Right.
So I need to hear it all toget really what they're saying at
the end.
And then there are others thatcan't express quickly, don't express
quickly because they want thethought to come out complete.
And so they're going to haveslower speech.
(09:25):
And they might start withsilence rather than end with silence
in order to get to the thought.
Well, I can't get distractedduring that time.
I have to let what I'm awareof become more clues to better understand
the person more quickly.
And that's what you try to useyour brain for as opposed to.
(09:48):
Oh, I've got a story aboutthat too.
Right.
And that takes practice, butit's a powerful result as you get
more practice.
At it, you know, and you knowwhat you just said, it's, it's such
a powerful result and, andpracticing it.
And I would say one of thethings that you shared as you were,
(10:09):
you know, talking about even,you know, having people understand
a, you know, you know, theprocess when there is a bottleneck
or a problem, to listen to thewhole thing, to get people engaged.
Listening and asking questionswill help you, will help any person
(10:32):
be, you know, have bettersuccess with people or in business
when they can ask thequestions, listen and not jump to
solutions.
But get people, as you said,get their buy in, get them to actually
take ownership of, of thesolution and then they're going to
(10:53):
go in with excitement becausethey are going to have that ownership
of it.
Yeah, right.
If they don't own it, thenthey're asking me to persuade them,
prove that what your idea iswill work.
Who else does this?
How would you, you know, put.
How would you implement this?
(11:13):
This is the kind of thingsthat people will ask.
Well, now that has me talking.
I'm not listening anymore.
I am, I'm now speaking.
I'm trying to persuade.
I'm searching for data.
I'm now doing their work.
Their work is to be able toown their steps, to be committed
to those steps, to takeresponsibility, to be accountable.
(11:37):
If they want me to do thework, then I'm not a consultant in
that instance, I am actuallynow moving into being a contractor.
The contracting work is good,that's fine.
But if I'm there to help themsolve a problem and I end up doing
their work, then they didn'tsolve their problem.
They're not going to be betterequipped to solve the next one.
(11:58):
So it is a tough part of thediscipline, but one of the rewarding
aspects is to get non anxious enough.
Excuse me.
That's all right.
Get to be non anxious enoughto not have to answer the question
I'm asked, but to be able tomove to the questions that they are
(12:19):
asking that are underneaththose questions.
Because there's an issue thatput us in the conversation in the
first place.
If I'm listening, well, I cankeep returning to the important conversation
and not get caught up in thedistracting ones that in the end
become rather expensive.
Because everybody's on theclock here.
If it's an organization andthey need to get after their work.
(12:43):
And so I can with, withoutanxiousness, keep calling them back
if I'm paying attention, ifI'm not paying attention and it's
about me, then I'm going totry to persuade them and sell them
and, and show how expert I am.
You know, something that youjust said, I think is, again, this
is really important and I, andI want to share this.
This is a little story, alittle, again a little insight into
(13:07):
learning a little bit of, youknow, something that I did that was
a, aha moment for me that madea switch.
And that is if you are, ifpeople are asking the questions right,
it takes.
And as you said, you know,people in that anxiousness will actually
(13:28):
want to almost like more, morein a sense pontificate their ideas
or share share versus ask,ask, ask.
I would also even say it is an insecurity.
Yes, it's a big insecurity.
So this was a huge lesson for me.
I will never forget.
I was sick sitting at a round table.
(13:48):
I was new to a company.
I was.
I knew nobody, everybody elseknew people.
I was like the odd, odd girlout, so to speak, or odd man out.
And very insecure in my skinat the moment.
And I remember somebody askeda question and instead of me listening,
(14:11):
I just pontificated what I did.
Like I just had to share I'mthis I'm.
And almost like to in a way ofalmost proving my greatness, which
is not at all great.
That's asshole.
Sorry.
Right.
Like, you know, and insteadit's, you know, and a huge lesson
(14:33):
was, oh, that wasn't right.
Jaclyn, you need to listen.
Listen and then ask questions and.
And then maybe drip in some ofthe things that, you know.
But the biggest, you know, youknow, the best leaders, right, don't
talk.
They listen and they write.
The smartest person at thetable is not the person who's talking.
(14:56):
It's a person.
And you described that as atransformative moment for yourself,
the way you just played thatstory out.
And I. I would suggest thatculturally, in.
Particularly in the NorthAmerican business scene, people are
pressured to be performative.
(15:19):
Show that, you know, stuff.
Show what you can do.
Compete, win.
Right?
You gotta be visible.
Well, when we are in alearning mode early in career, that
can work, okay?
Because we're learning, youknow, and we are competing.
Once we're moving into more ofa formal leadership role where we're
(15:40):
now responsible for anorganization and people, our performance
is no longer tied to our expertise.
So if you come up, likethrough a marketing vertical, when
you now are responsible forthe whole P and L of a company, it's
not about your marketingperformance anymore.
In fact, a few weeks in the Csuite, you won't be the most expert
(16:04):
marketer for the companyanymore because you're not going
to all these other meetings.
And, you know, you'reresponsible for things you're not
even the expert in.
So what helps you here?
Continuing to learn.
That means you ask questions,you write things down.
Because if you keep going toyour old hammer and nails and saying,
marketing, marketing,marketing, marketing, or R D, R D,
(16:26):
R D. And everything has an Rand D answer, and look how smart
I am.
And I've got to win and I'vegot to have the answers.
And now you've stopped learning.
So the very thing that got youto success, you're shutting down.
What got you to that successwas learning and becoming an expert
in something.
So now you got to become anexpert in leadership, which means
a lot more question asking, alot more writing down, a lot more
(16:47):
connecting dots.
So I.
That.
It's a.
It's an important turningpoint in a career.
And it sounds like you hadthat experience.
It's like, ah, aha.
I have to.
I have to not just talk about me.
I've got to ask these questions.
Yeah.
And for me, you know, thatmoment was what actually came out
of it for me was I. I rememberwalking away from that roundtable
(17:11):
and I was like, God, I didn't.
That was.
That didn't feel right.
And then I, you know, I thinkI listened to or reread a book and
it was like, oh, you know,remember, you have to be the listener.
You know, remember you learnfrom the people that are smarter
(17:32):
than you.
You know, you always want to.
Again, Dale Carnegie said itbeautifully, right?
You always want to hire peoplewho are smarter than you.
And.
And it is so you can learnfrom them and help them rise up.
And I just remember thinking,okay, we need to flip the switch.
Yeah, good for you.
It is a switch deflect.
(17:53):
It really is.
It's a continuation oflearning, but it's.
I often say you're.
You're going from risingvertically to moving horizontally.
So how do you do that?
It's new muscles.
It's a new process.
You just keep doing whatyou've done.
You learn, you.
You bring the questions andassume you don't know, which is a
(18:14):
quicker way to know somethingis to start with, I don't know.
Right.
And actually, you know, on thePot, the podcast actually, that's
getting released today is the24th of July.
In the book Lead It LikeLasso, Nick Coniglio, he's one of
the authors, and he sharedthat he realized that when he.
(18:40):
One of the ways he became abetter leader was when he started
admitting that he didn't haveall the answers and he started asking
questions.
And as you were just sharing, right?
Like when you can ask thequestions and be a learner and not
an as.
As I knew, like, don't be aknow it all.
(19:03):
It's amazing what comes out.
Right?
Innovation and differentiationand marketplace acceleration.
All these things we say wewant to do.
They start with inquiry, notwith, I already have the answers.
(19:23):
I already have the answers.
Puts you into managing an eversmaller set of resources because
over time, what we know servesus less well.
You know, few of us are goingout and buying ipods these days as
(19:44):
an example, right?
So we carry all that on ourphone now.
So that came out of innovation.
Not assuming the way we did itwould be the way we will continue
to do it.
And we can have hundreds ofthose kinds of examples.
It comes from the.
The stuff that doesn't existyet that will drive future value
for the enterprises we're inwill come from our curiosity, not
(20:05):
from what we know.
Now.
That I think being able to becurious and what you just said, I
think is so important.
You know, the.
The thing that I always hearthat drives me crazy is hearing the
(20:25):
words.
Well, that's because that'show we do it.
Right?
Because now you.
It might not be the best way.
Yes.
It might be the way thatyou've done it all, all the time.
But maybe there might be abetter way.
Might be a better way.
But imagine being a newbie inthe organization.
(20:46):
You've just been told that,which means my ideas aren't welcome.
And you're also not going totell me how it is that you arrived
at this method.
So I'm outside.
Either way, I can't open thisdoor because you're behind a locked
door, not revealing the storyabout how you arrived at this value.
(21:06):
So I can contribute to it.
And I'm trying to show you mycommitment by bringing an idea and
you're throwing that out right away.
So I've just had the doorslammed in my face in two different
directions when that happens.
And listeners, I think that'sa really key thing you have to think
about in your business andyourselves and your companies.
(21:27):
Like, are you slamming doorson people inadvertently and squashing
curiosity and creativity, orare you embracing and letting people
actually start thinkingoutside the box and maybe coming
up with a better way?
(21:48):
Let people think and come upwith solutions or changes to something
and let them just let themtell you how it could be better.
We can, we can go right back,circle back to the curiosity factor
because a lot of times so whensomeone's coming with an idea, they'll
do it in the form of a question.
They'll say, can you tell memore about this?
(22:10):
Or I was wondering if wecould, you know, look at this.
You know, they're coming witha, an openness and a softness much
more than a declaration.
Right.
So I'm bringing curiosity ifthe door slammed in my face.
Now we are reinforcing thatcuriosity inquiry is not welcome.
And that means culturally weare reinforcing a come with what
(22:35):
you know and with what isdon't rock the boat, don't make the
changes.
Why are you always changing everything?
That kind of stuff.
So now the talented curiositydriven creatives are going to go
elsewhere to where they arewelcome and they're, they're going
to start becoming quietbecause what they are bringing isn't
(22:56):
welcome.
So if we're not careful, wereinforce the closeness to curiosity.
No matter what our missionstatement says, if we are slamming
the door in that way.
You know something, you just,you, when you just said the mission
statement, it just, it waslike, you know what?
(23:17):
And it's really true thatyou're as a business really think
and are your actions alignedwith that mission and do you actually
practice what the mission is statement?
It is do, says, does and whatnot.
And if it doesn't you need torewrite that or change your, think
(23:37):
about changing your PR practices.
And if you're, if, if there isnot an alignment there, and I'm just
going to bring it right back,Start listening to the people that
are in your fold, within yourcompany and ask them to help you
rewrite that mission and letthem get buy in.
(23:58):
Yeah, because buy in is whatmakes it live.
Yeah, right, right.
Because then they're going to,they're going to have better ownership
of it and when it becomes acollaboration again.
It'S.
Going to help make everybodyreally work better together.
That's right.
I love it.
You know, Mark, I could talkto you about this forever because
(24:18):
I think this is such animportant topic and I think that,
you know, listeners, I thinkyou'll understand, you know, and
I'm hoping that, you know, youget the book, you know, listening
Helping Learning.
Listening is again, it is a,it is a, it's.
We do it.
We all, we all do it.
But we, but are we doing it well?
(24:40):
And are we really, reallylistening or are we just hearing
the word but.
Not trying to look like we're listening?
Right, right, right.
So Mark, what, what, what isnext for you courses?
(25:02):
Any speaking?
Sure.
Well, the Society for ProcessConsulting offers a number of courses
and there is one in particularon the core competencies of process
consulting.
Listening is being at thecenterpiece of that.
And so that's one place peoplecan go and sign up for a course and
(25:26):
be on their way to aprofessional credential.
I occasionally have peoplethat say, Mark, well, I really like
to learn from you.
Can we do something where Iengage you to help me do this and
I'm able to do that.
I sometimes will bring a grouptogether on kind of on our own schedule.
I have one just about to startand it's also can be used as a way
(25:49):
to move toward thatprofessional credential because we
got, we set it up where nowthat others are teaching it, I could,
because I was the writer ofthe curriculum, I can do some private
ways of doing that.
And anybody who wants tocorrespond with me about that can
just go to markelvincent.comthat the Middle initial needs to
be there.
You'll get Vin Diesel.
(26:09):
He and I share the same given name.
So that, that doesn't, peoplecan't find me.
They get him, another baldheaded, more muscular man.
But so markelvincent.com thenwe can correspond about that if that's
of interest.
I continue to do a fair bit ofspeaking and training around this
and what I really like to dois working with organizations who
(26:30):
want some kind of training, asopposed to bringing a canned speech.
I like to say, what are thegoals of this thing?
Let's tailor something thatreally helps you deliver what you
need in your culture with thepeople that, that will be there.
And you can walk out saying,this is one of the best events we've
ever had.
So I, I really like gettinginto the, the grist of putting that
(26:52):
event together.
When groups want to do that,that's a real delight.
Most of what I do now is workwith senior leaders who are looking
at some kind of businesscontinuity and succession.
I found that in process consulting.
It's one of the highest art forms.
If it's an art where so manythings can go wrong, organizations
(27:15):
are houses of cards, and allit takes is an ego that's out of
whack or a black swan event or something.
You didn't anticipate a health scare.
Anything can just bring thatfuture value down.
We're in business not for thecurrent value.
We're in business for thefuture value.
Next year and the year afterthat, and seeing share prices rise,
(27:38):
making more of an impact,doing more of our mission.
And if it's going to now be inthe hands of somebody else, there's
so many things we're afraid ofor they're afraid of that can bring
that down.
So I'm usually almost all ofmy clients now walking with them,
their board, maybe familymembers through those years of bringing
that change about, and thenthat means I can connect them.
(28:02):
If they don't have thoserelationships with estate attorneys
and financial planners andbusiness evaluators, those are all
technical things that areneeded and it needs to be well mapped
at the right time.
What I am doing is being athought partner to those leaders
at this time where they'regoing to do this only once, they're
going to do this.
Well, they, but they've neverdone it before, and they, they want
(28:25):
to come through it without scars.
They actually want.
The phrase I love is they wantto slingshot their successor into
the future.
People who care about thatdon't want obstacles in their way,
don't want the organization togo down into a, you know, trough
for two years before it can do anything.
Because almost all thesesuccession events don't achieve the
(28:47):
intended value.
Just like mergers andacquisitions don't.
We have to be as planful aboutthese moments as when we launch the
businesses.
So getting to be with them inthose moments is a delight.
And that's become thecenterpiece of what I do.
That's that's really fantastic.
I absolutely love that.
All right, so, listeners, dome a favor.
I want you to go tomarklvincent.com and connect with
(29:12):
Mark.
Get the credential.
Go start getting those credentials.
I actually may head over there myself.
And then I want you to do meanother favor.
I want you to hit subscribe.
And then I would love for youto also share this episode with any
of your business colleagues,because I know that they could learn
(29:32):
a lot from hearing aboutlistening in the and how important
it is and also learning a lotmore from Mark.
So thank you all for listening.
I'm Jacqueline Schuminger.
This is unstoppable success.
And thank you, Mark, for beingan amazing guest.
My pleasure.
Foreign.
Well, hello everybody, andwelcome to another amazing episode
of Unstoppable Success, thepodcast where we hear from amazing
leaders, humans, businessprofessionals, all about how they
became unstoppable.
Their tips, their wisdom, allthings that can help you continue
and to be unstoppable success.
(01:01):
And so today I want to welcomeMark Vincent as our guest.
And let me tell you a littlebit about Mark.
He partners with accomplishedleaders to pave a road through the
complexity of businesscontinuity and succession.
It'd be great if I could speakthis morning.
Mark has established DesignGroup International, the Society
for Process Consulting, andthe Maestro Level Leaders.
(01:24):
A process consulting pioneerand systems convener, he is an author
and contributor across variouschannels, as well as a frequent presenter.
And his latest book,Listening, Helping Learning, lays
out the core competencies ofprocess consulting and a roadmap
to partner with his clients.
(01:45):
Mark, welcome.
I love the fact that you havea whole book on listening.
No, thank you, Jacqueline.
So this conversation.
So, Mark, you know, I'm really curious.
How, how has, how has first ofall, like the book come about and
like, take me up to thisjourney because, you know, again,
(02:09):
listening is, I, you know, wejust shared.
Listening is something that Ithink is, you know, we all talk about
it, but I actually think it'sharder to do than people think.
Oh, yeah, it is.
Listening takes work and ittakes being present and it takes
being conscious.
You can look like you'relistening and be kind of elsewhere
(02:32):
in your brain, but then you'renot listening.
You're not going to retain things.
And listening isn't justhearing words.
It's perceiving.
It's facing, taking in visualinformation and experiential information.
You know, what's thetemperature of this person's temperament
and that kind of thing.
So that it's hard work andit's a, it's a big discipline to
(02:53):
do that.
And, you know, the socialscientists tell us it's the majority
communication isn't how wellyou speak or how passionately you
speak.
It's how well you listen andretain information so that your responses
can show that you are engagedwith the people that are on the other
side of the table or at theother end of the couch or across
the restaurant table from you.
(03:14):
So the, the real genesis of alot of this goes back to Edgar Schein.
If we're talking aboutlistening, particularly in a leadership
context or a business context.
Edgar Schein was an MIT Prof.
So up your way, up in yourneck of the woods.
And he was starting out reallyin not just Teaching, but working
(03:34):
in large manufacturing andhelping to refine processes that,
that were not working right.
And the old way of doing thisis that you would listen a little
bit, just to listen for what?
What's the problem?
And now I'm going to tell youwhat the solution is.
So it's a hook that you'relooking for when you're a subject
matter expert.
And we all need subject matter experts.
(03:56):
We need people who know theirfield really well.
But when you're dealing with aprocess, you often don't know what
the problem is right away.
And the person telling youdoesn't know what the problem is.
That's why they're checkingwith you.
So now you have to figurethings out.
And that requires conversation.
And if they're going to fixthings that they're responsible for,
they have to own it.
(04:16):
Well, adults own things thatthey, they've decided they want to
do.
How do they decide they're apart of the problem solving?
How do they feel like thereare problems, a part of the problem
solving?
Somebody's listening to them,somebody's curious, somebody's asking
them questions.
And what Edgar Schein foundout is if he asked questions like
what else did you try?
Or what else did you thinkabout trying?
(04:37):
Or what do you think wouldhappen if we did X or Y or Z?
Or was there any other ideathat was left out and would just
draw people out to own theirideas, they were actually committed
to taking their next steps anddefining solutions as opposed to
blaming the consultant.
Like, we tried it, it didn'twork, you know, so they would have
more grit in their next steps.
(05:00):
So he began to apply this inall kinds of situations and started
consulting with human serviceorganizations and healthcare organizations,
some NGOs, and found that ifyou listen and ask questions that
draw out more comments andthen people actually start listening
themselves, they startlistening to the problem.
So not everybody's listening.
Everybody's listening to thisthing that they're examining together.
(05:23):
They're facing the work andthen they own their stuff.
So my own work with this wassaying, okay, now that in the academy,
like at MIT and Edgar Schein'swork and his extensive consultation,
you have data for how thisworks, how do we turn this into a
field, how we turn this into aprofession where people will be process
(05:45):
consultants, not just havingthat in their toolbox, they would
actually be this kind of a person.
This would be what they lead,this would be the thing they brought
into their profession.
So out of that, the Societyfor Process Consulting was established,
which provides A professionalcredential for this approach.
And along the way we did someextensive work to say, what are the
(06:08):
core competencies?
How do we recognize when it'sbeing done and being done well, and
how do we evaluate it and keeplearning and bring it to an art form?
And what was cool was that ofcourse listening is the first of
those competencies.
You have to listen so wellthat people are saying, you just
said it better than I did.
When you finally play it back,that's exactly it.
(06:30):
Or yes, and you got that.
Yes.
Now they're engaged and youcan begin to move toward helping.
But in this case, helpingisn't me helping you.
If you're the client, it's usco creating what help looks like.
So it's not something Iperform as a consultant, I've helped
you get into a listening modeas well.
So now we've co created it.
(06:50):
So listening in that level ofdepth continues forward.
It doesn't end because we'rehelping now.
So we stop listening.
We keep listening.
But it's joint.
No, it is listening for theelements of an architecture for the
process that will actually engage.
And then you start to have atrusted relationship because there's
(07:12):
dialogue and it's a, it's apowerful discipline and it sounds
easy and it's hard work.
You have to be very mindful,you have to be very present.
You have to deal with your owntechnical term here, frap, in order
to be able to be present withother people and not be, you know,
yin yanging with your brain.
So that's a little bit of the background.
(07:35):
Okay, so you said.
First of all, that isabsolutely amazing.
And one thing.
Well, there's a couplecomments I want to share listeners,
because how many times.
And, and you have to beconscious about this, you know, listening
to somebody speak.
How many times as you justsaid, the stuff that's going in your
brain because you're thinking, right?
You're thinking about, oh, Ishould, oh, I could.
(07:58):
But you know, you actuallyhave to stop thinking, thinking in
your brain about what commentsand just intently listen.
Because then after that, youknow, there may be a pause and it's
okay, but then you canactually articulate and even, you
know, create a better cohesivesentence versus saying oh, I understand
(08:22):
that.
Like, yeah, I love that youbrought that up.
Because the difference here isnot thinking.
It's.
It's a word that's kind of amade up word here.
It's a wearing.
Yeah, it's facing.
It's embracing the moment withyour eyes and with your body to be
(08:43):
aware of the person or of thegroup and, and to let the thoughts
come as they wrap up.
Because if I start engagingthe thought, I'm doing it out of
a dimension or a little facetof what they're saying, not the whole
thing.
And there's a whole mess ofpeople out there that it takes them
(09:04):
a while to wind up to whatthey're really trying to say if they
process out loud.
Right.
So I need to hear it all toget really what they're saying at
the end.
And then there are others thatcan't express quickly, don't express
quickly because they want thethought to come out complete.
And so they're going to haveslower speech.
(09:25):
And they might start withsilence rather than end with silence
in order to get to the thought.
Well, I can't get distractedduring that time.
I have to let what I'm awareof become more clues to better understand
the person more quickly.
And that's what you try to useyour brain for as opposed to.
(09:48):
Oh, I've got a story aboutthat too.
Right.
And that takes practice, butit's a powerful result as you get
more practice.
At it, you know, and you knowwhat you just said, it's, it's such
a powerful result and, andpracticing it.
And I would say one of thethings that you shared as you were,
(10:09):
you know, talking about even,you know, having people understand
a, you know, you know, theprocess when there is a bottleneck
or a problem, to listen to thewhole thing, to get people engaged.
Listening and asking questionswill help you, will help any person
(10:32):
be, you know, have bettersuccess with people or in business
when they can ask thequestions, listen and not jump to
solutions.
But get people, as you said,get their buy in, get them to actually
take ownership of, of thesolution and then they're going to
(10:53):
go in with excitement becausethey are going to have that ownership
of it.
Yeah, right.
If they don't own it, thenthey're asking me to persuade them,
prove that what your idea iswill work.
Who else does this?
How would you, you know, put.
How would you implement this?
(11:13):
This is the kind of thingsthat people will ask.
Well, now that has me talking.
I'm not listening anymore.
I am, I'm now speaking.
I'm trying to persuade.
I'm searching for data.
I'm now doing their work.
Their work is to be able toown their steps, to be committed
to those steps, to takeresponsibility, to be accountable.
(11:37):
If they want me to do thework, then I'm not a consultant in
that instance, I am actuallynow moving into being a contractor.
The contracting work is good,that's fine.
But if I'm there to help themsolve a problem and I end up doing
their work, then they didn'tsolve their problem.
They're not going to be betterequipped to solve the next one.
(11:58):
So it is a tough part of thediscipline, but one of the rewarding
aspects is to get non anxious enough.
Excuse me.
That's all right.
Get to be non anxious enoughto not have to answer the question
I'm asked, but to be able tomove to the questions that they are
(12:19):
asking that are underneaththose questions.
Because there's an issue thatput us in the conversation in the
first place.
If I'm listening, well, I cankeep returning to the important conversation
and not get caught up in thedistracting ones that in the end
become rather expensive.
Because everybody's on theclock here.
If it's an organization andthey need to get after their work.
(12:43):
And so I can with, withoutanxiousness, keep calling them back
if I'm paying attention, ifI'm not paying attention and it's
about me, then I'm going totry to persuade them and sell them
and, and show how expert I am.
You know, something that youjust said, I think is, again, this
is really important and I, andI want to share this.
This is a little story, alittle, again a little insight into
(13:07):
learning a little bit of, youknow, something that I did that was
a, aha moment for me that madea switch.
And that is if you are, ifpeople are asking the questions right,
it takes.
And as you said, you know,people in that anxiousness will actually
(13:28):
want to almost like more, morein a sense pontificate their ideas
or share share versus ask,ask, ask.
I would also even say it is an insecurity.
Yes, it's a big insecurity.
So this was a huge lesson for me.
I will never forget.
I was sick sitting at a round table.
(13:48):
I was new to a company.
I was.
I knew nobody, everybody elseknew people.
I was like the odd, odd girlout, so to speak, or odd man out.
And very insecure in my skinat the moment.
And I remember somebody askeda question and instead of me listening,
(14:11):
I just pontificated what I did.
Like I just had to share I'mthis I'm.
And almost like to in a way ofalmost proving my greatness, which
is not at all great.
That's asshole.
Sorry.
Right.
Like, you know, and insteadit's, you know, and a huge lesson
(14:33):
was, oh, that wasn't right.
Jaclyn, you need to listen.
Listen and then ask questions and.
And then maybe drip in some ofthe things that, you know.
But the biggest, you know, youknow, the best leaders, right, don't
talk.
They listen and they write.
The smartest person at thetable is not the person who's talking.
(14:56):
It's a person.
And you described that as atransformative moment for yourself,
the way you just played thatstory out.
And I. I would suggest thatculturally, in.
Particularly in the NorthAmerican business scene, people are
pressured to be performative.
(15:19):
Show that, you know, stuff.
Show what you can do.
Compete, win.
Right?
You gotta be visible.
Well, when we are in alearning mode early in career, that
can work, okay?
Because we're learning, youknow, and we are competing.
Once we're moving into more ofa formal leadership role where we're
(15:40):
now responsible for anorganization and people, our performance
is no longer tied to our expertise.
So if you come up, likethrough a marketing vertical, when
you now are responsible forthe whole P and L of a company, it's
not about your marketingperformance anymore.
In fact, a few weeks in the Csuite, you won't be the most expert
(16:04):
marketer for the companyanymore because you're not going
to all these other meetings.
And, you know, you'reresponsible for things you're not
even the expert in.
So what helps you here?
Continuing to learn.
That means you ask questions,you write things down.
Because if you keep going toyour old hammer and nails and saying,
marketing, marketing,marketing, marketing, or R D, R D,
(16:26):
R D. And everything has an Rand D answer, and look how smart
I am.
And I've got to win and I'vegot to have the answers.
And now you've stopped learning.
So the very thing that got youto success, you're shutting down.
What got you to that successwas learning and becoming an expert
in something.
So now you got to become anexpert in leadership, which means
a lot more question asking, alot more writing down, a lot more
(16:47):
connecting dots.
So I.
That.
It's a.
It's an important turningpoint in a career.
And it sounds like you hadthat experience.
It's like, ah, aha.
I have to.
I have to not just talk about me.
I've got to ask these questions.
Yeah.
And for me, you know, thatmoment was what actually came out
of it for me was I. I rememberwalking away from that roundtable
(17:11):
and I was like, God, I didn't.
That was.
That didn't feel right.
And then I, you know, I thinkI listened to or reread a book and
it was like, oh, you know,remember, you have to be the listener.
You know, remember you learnfrom the people that are smarter
(17:32):
than you.
You know, you always want to.
Again, Dale Carnegie said itbeautifully, right?
You always want to hire peoplewho are smarter than you.
And.
And it is so you can learnfrom them and help them rise up.
And I just remember thinking,okay, we need to flip the switch.
Yeah, good for you.
It is a switch deflect.
(17:53):
It really is.
It's a continuation oflearning, but it's.
I often say you're.
You're going from risingvertically to moving horizontally.
So how do you do that?
It's new muscles.
It's a new process.
You just keep doing whatyou've done.
You learn, you.
You bring the questions andassume you don't know, which is a
(18:14):
quicker way to know somethingis to start with, I don't know.
Right.
And actually, you know, on thePot, the podcast actually, that's
getting released today is the24th of July.
In the book Lead It LikeLasso, Nick Coniglio, he's one of
the authors, and he sharedthat he realized that when he.
(18:40):
One of the ways he became abetter leader was when he started
admitting that he didn't haveall the answers and he started asking
questions.
And as you were just sharing, right?
Like when you can ask thequestions and be a learner and not
an as.
As I knew, like, don't be aknow it all.
(19:03):
It's amazing what comes out.
Right?
Innovation and differentiationand marketplace acceleration.
All these things we say wewant to do.
They start with inquiry, notwith, I already have the answers.
(19:23):
I already have the answers.
Puts you into managing an eversmaller set of resources because
over time, what we know servesus less well.
You know, few of us are goingout and buying ipods these days as
(19:44):
an example, right?
So we carry all that on ourphone now.
So that came out of innovation.
Not assuming the way we did itwould be the way we will continue
to do it.
And we can have hundreds ofthose kinds of examples.
It comes from the.
The stuff that doesn't existyet that will drive future value
for the enterprises we're inwill come from our curiosity, not
(20:05):
from what we know.
Now.
That I think being able to becurious and what you just said, I
think is so important.
You know, the.
The thing that I always hearthat drives me crazy is hearing the
(20:25):
words.
Well, that's because that'show we do it.
Right?
Because now you.
It might not be the best way.
Yes.
It might be the way thatyou've done it all, all the time.
But maybe there might be abetter way.
Might be a better way.
But imagine being a newbie inthe organization.
(20:46):
You've just been told that,which means my ideas aren't welcome.
And you're also not going totell me how it is that you arrived
at this method.
So I'm outside.
Either way, I can't open thisdoor because you're behind a locked
door, not revealing the storyabout how you arrived at this value.
(21:06):
So I can contribute to it.
And I'm trying to show you mycommitment by bringing an idea and
you're throwing that out right away.
So I've just had the doorslammed in my face in two different
directions when that happens.
And listeners, I think that'sa really key thing you have to think
about in your business andyourselves and your companies.
(21:27):
Like, are you slamming doorson people inadvertently and squashing
curiosity and creativity, orare you embracing and letting people
actually start thinkingoutside the box and maybe coming
up with a better way?
(21:48):
Let people think and come upwith solutions or changes to something
and let them just let themtell you how it could be better.
We can, we can go right back,circle back to the curiosity factor
because a lot of times so whensomeone's coming with an idea, they'll
do it in the form of a question.
They'll say, can you tell memore about this?
(22:10):
Or I was wondering if wecould, you know, look at this.
You know, they're coming witha, an openness and a softness much
more than a declaration.
Right.
So I'm bringing curiosity ifthe door slammed in my face.
Now we are reinforcing thatcuriosity inquiry is not welcome.
And that means culturally weare reinforcing a come with what
(22:35):
you know and with what isdon't rock the boat, don't make the
changes.
Why are you always changing everything?
That kind of stuff.
So now the talented curiositydriven creatives are going to go
elsewhere to where they arewelcome and they're, they're going
to start becoming quietbecause what they are bringing isn't
(22:56):
welcome.
So if we're not careful, wereinforce the closeness to curiosity.
No matter what our missionstatement says, if we are slamming
the door in that way.
You know something, you just,you, when you just said the mission
statement, it just, it waslike, you know what?
(23:17):
And it's really true thatyou're as a business really think
and are your actions alignedwith that mission and do you actually
practice what the mission is statement?
It is do, says, does and whatnot.
And if it doesn't you need torewrite that or change your, think
(23:37):
about changing your PR practices.
And if you're, if, if there isnot an alignment there, and I'm just
going to bring it right back,Start listening to the people that
are in your fold, within yourcompany and ask them to help you
rewrite that mission and letthem get buy in.
(23:58):
Yeah, because buy in is whatmakes it live.
Yeah, right, right.
Because then they're going to,they're going to have better ownership
of it and when it becomes acollaboration again.
It'S.
Going to help make everybodyreally work better together.
That's right.
I love it.
You know, Mark, I could talkto you about this forever because
(24:18):
I think this is such animportant topic and I think that,
you know, listeners, I thinkyou'll understand, you know, and
I'm hoping that, you know, youget the book, you know, listening
Helping Learning.
Listening is again, it is a,it is a, it's.
We do it.
We all, we all do it.
But we, but are we doing it well?
(24:40):
And are we really, reallylistening or are we just hearing
the word but.
Not trying to look like we're listening?
Right, right, right.
So Mark, what, what, what isnext for you courses?
(25:02):
Any speaking?
Sure.
Well, the Society for ProcessConsulting offers a number of courses
and there is one in particularon the core competencies of process
consulting.
Listening is being at thecenterpiece of that.
And so that's one place peoplecan go and sign up for a course and
(25:26):
be on their way to aprofessional credential.
I occasionally have peoplethat say, Mark, well, I really like
to learn from you.
Can we do something where Iengage you to help me do this and
I'm able to do that.
I sometimes will bring a grouptogether on kind of on our own schedule.
I have one just about to startand it's also can be used as a way
(25:49):
to move toward thatprofessional credential because we
got, we set it up where nowthat others are teaching it, I could,
because I was the writer ofthe curriculum, I can do some private
ways of doing that.
And anybody who wants tocorrespond with me about that can
just go to markelvincent.comthat the Middle initial needs to
be there.
You'll get Vin Diesel.
(26:09):
He and I share the same given name.
So that, that doesn't, peoplecan't find me.
They get him, another baldheaded, more muscular man.
But so markelvincent.com thenwe can correspond about that if that's
of interest.
I continue to do a fair bit ofspeaking and training around this
and what I really like to dois working with organizations who
(26:30):
want some kind of training, asopposed to bringing a canned speech.
I like to say, what are thegoals of this thing?
Let's tailor something thatreally helps you deliver what you
need in your culture with thepeople that, that will be there.
And you can walk out saying,this is one of the best events we've
ever had.
So I, I really like gettinginto the, the grist of putting that
(26:52):
event together.
When groups want to do that,that's a real delight.
Most of what I do now is workwith senior leaders who are looking
at some kind of businesscontinuity and succession.
I found that in process consulting.
It's one of the highest art forms.
If it's an art where so manythings can go wrong, organizations
(27:15):
are houses of cards, and allit takes is an ego that's out of
whack or a black swan event or something.
You didn't anticipate a health scare.
Anything can just bring thatfuture value down.
We're in business not for thecurrent value.
We're in business for thefuture value.
Next year and the year afterthat, and seeing share prices rise,
(27:38):
making more of an impact,doing more of our mission.
And if it's going to now be inthe hands of somebody else, there's
so many things we're afraid ofor they're afraid of that can bring
that down.
So I'm usually almost all ofmy clients now walking with them,
their board, maybe familymembers through those years of bringing
that change about, and thenthat means I can connect them.
(28:02):
If they don't have thoserelationships with estate attorneys
and financial planners andbusiness evaluators, those are all
technical things that areneeded and it needs to be well mapped
at the right time.
What I am doing is being athought partner to those leaders
at this time where they'regoing to do this only once, they're
going to do this.
Well, they, but they've neverdone it before, and they, they want
(28:25):
to come through it without scars.
They actually want.
The phrase I love is they wantto slingshot their successor into
the future.
People who care about thatdon't want obstacles in their way,
don't want the organization togo down into a, you know, trough
for two years before it can do anything.
Because almost all thesesuccession events don't achieve the
(28:47):
intended value.
Just like mergers andacquisitions don't.
We have to be as planful aboutthese moments as when we launch the
businesses.
So getting to be with them inthose moments is a delight.
And that's become thecenterpiece of what I do.
That's that's really fantastic.
I absolutely love that.
All right, so, listeners, dome a favor.
I want you to go tomarklvincent.com and connect with
(29:12):
Mark.
Get the credential.
Go start getting those credentials.
I actually may head over there myself.
And then I want you to do meanother favor.
I want you to hit subscribe.
And then I would love for youto also share this episode with any
of your business colleagues,because I know that they could learn
(29:32):
a lot from hearing aboutlistening in the and how important
it is and also learning a lotmore from Mark.
So thank you all for listening.
I'm Jacqueline Schuminger.
This is unstoppable success.
And thank you, Mark, for beingan amazing guest.
My pleasure.
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