WATCH: Why active listening is crucial to motivating teams

From incessant app buzzes to impromptu meetings, noisy neighbours to endless building works, today’s professionals are harangued by distractions to their workflow. With the rise of hybrid and remote working, self‐motivation has taken on a new prominence, and the risk is that professionals disengage, feel overwhelmed and put lesser effort into multiple tasks.

Potential distractions can be minimised, whether it’s muting notifications or finding a quiet area to operate from, but how professionals interact on a daily basis can be a further powerful remedy. A senior leader who felt this acutely is Dropbox‘s director of international HR, Laura Ryan.

In 2019, Ryan was assigned an executive coach; the coach’s ability to fully engage and actively listen over the course of their time together truly struck Ryan. Ryan worked on incorporating this practice into her leadership style and believes it to be a vital behaviour, while her organisation continues pursuing its purely virtual working model.

Not only does Ryan feel it’s been a positive change in her own professional life, but an approach which can lead to happier teams.

Over the course of the newest video in our Leadership Learnings series, where top HR figures outline a significant experience in their career, you’ll discover actionable insights including:

0.08 ‐  Effective communication as an essential component of workplace culture

0.32 ‐ Whether professionals can be totally ‘present’ when faced with a host of distractions

0.51 ‐ Laura’s work with an executive coach and why it was a meaningful experience

1.47 ‐ How active listening allows for deeper and more effective connections

2.49 ‐ The way that active listening offers teams a ‘real sense of value’

3.31 ‐ What leaders need to do to adopt active listening and how to encourage it in others

Subscribe to HRD Connect. You’ll receive daily updates on the future of work, including thought leadership, video interviews, the HRD Live Podcast and more.