Listening

The Forgotten Skill

By: Madelyn Burley-Allen

Narrated by: Madelyn Burley-Allen

Length: 6 hrs and 14 mins

Publisher's summary

Here's a proven program for turning effective listening into a powerful business tool.

Managers and other employees spend more than 40 percent of their time listening to other people but often do it so poorly that the result is misunderstood instructions, misdirected projects, and erroneous actions: millions of dollars' worth of mistakes just because most people don't know how to listen. In this new edition of her classic guide to the art of effective listening, Madelyn Burley-Allen shows you how to acquire active, productive listening skills and put them to work for you professionally, socially, and personally. With her time-tested techniques, you'll learn how to:

• Eliminate distractions and improve your concentration on what is being said
• Locate key words, phrases, and ideas while listening
• Cut through your own listening biases
• Interpret body language clues
• Ask constructive, non-threatening questions that elicit real information
• Get others to listen to you
• Master a whole range of listening skills that you can use on the job and in your personal life

©1995 Madelyn Burley-Allen (P)2007 Gildan Media

An unlistenable book about Listening

What disappointed you about Listening?

Refers to exercises in book that aren't there. WHY would she read WORD for WORD the exercises in the book that aren't there. Does she LISTEN to herself when she reads?

Sounds awful!
VERY VERY VERY VERY VERY little

Would you ever listen to anything by Madelyn Burley-Allen again?

NO!

How could the performance have been better?

Better narrator. Read through the exercises that are in the print book

If you could play editor, what scene or scenes would you have cut from Listening?

Re cut the whole book with a different narrator add a little music

OK, but mixed

There's nothing like listening to the author narrate their own book. One reviewer stated the author sounded tired I think, and slow. Well...so are people in real life. So not to negate what that reviewer said, it just illustrated to me, the importance of focusing on the message. I agree with another reviewer who said having a PDF of the appendices would have made listening to the book and following along much easier and more practical. What I found interesting is the author seems to focus more on the listener's bias or point of view of what's getting in the way of understanding the message. I would consider this a companion book, of sorts, to Tony Alessandra's The Dynamics of Effective Listening, also here on Audible. Hope this review helps...if you're not sure - listen to the preview.

Good message/Bad narration

The message of the book is lost in the poor narration. The constant mispronounciations and forced pace by the author make it difficult to accept the message is one of quality.

Not worth the listen

I forced myself to listen to 5 hours, finally giving up because the message is repetitive, the listening exercises are boring, and most of all the narrator's constant mispronunciation poor speaking ability is so distracting it makes "Listening" hard to listen to.

Excellent Book on Listening

This book is exactly what I was looking for. It provided great techniques for me to improve my listening and also helped identify some road blocks to better listening.

Not Recommended

Narration was difficult to listen to. Words were mispronounced, narrator often sounded breathless, unnatural and awkward as she read. Book often refers to exercises (contained in the appendix) to complete as you go along - since there is no download provided with this content ... much of the benefit is lost.

Mixed

A little long winded and beats around the bush. I was hoping a little more in-depth focus on the skill of listening itself and not the psychological analysis why people don't listen. There are lots of good points but still lots of chaff mixed in.

If you want a better, clear cut and no nonsense approach on the art of listening, I suggest checking out Covey's Seven Habits of Highly effective people on Listening