Executive Listening with Sue Jacobs Matzen
Listening is the powerful communication tool that allows leaders to see and be seen, to understand and be understood. To lead.
I help leaders earn personal and strategic followership, by helping them listen.
Your best decisions are made based on reliable information. Yet the higher you climb, the harder it is to access unfiltered truth from colleagues.
You are responsible to set vision and strategy. Yet the further you are from the front line, the less your employees see or hear from you.
By inviting questions and listening, you get access to others’ reality and a platform to make the company’s big picture relevant to them.
Listening takes less time than you’d think, when you have a plan, commitment to it and a trusted partner to help make it happen.
Examples of executive listening
Gain followership with open Q&As
Every day, your employees are bombarded with opinions and “truths” from inside and outside the organization. Those voices are highly influential, though they often lack context and nuance — or are just plain wrong.
When you invite questions, listen to others and act on what you hear, you show integrity that earns trust and followership.
Your clear conversations reinforce consistent messages for everyone, including your leadership team who is tasked with passing them down the line. Your listening also role models the behavior for others.
Drive engagement by demonstrating values
You need to show — not just tell about — your organization’s purpose and values. Commitment to these inspire people to join a company, stay, innovate and break down silos.
Listen across silos to broaden others’ perspectives instill a common sense of purpose.
Listen to customers and partners to see if your values and purpose are having an impact on the world beyond your employees and, equally importantly, dare to put a human face on your company and dive into real conversations, rather than only relying on third-party surveys.
Build culture in M&A, new partnership and rapid growth contexts
When companies fuse or grow rapidly, everyone feels threatened.
The instant new colleagues have experiences together – including simply listening to each other – they begin create aspects of a common culture. They recognize each other. They start to understand each other. It’s quite remarkable how quickly a common language and reality starts to emerge, thawing the fear so people can get on with their work.
Set the tone with open conversations and clear answers, and show others how to turn fear of the unknown into mutual understanding and commitment to a shared future.
About Sue Jacobs Matzen
Sue has facilitated F2F, online and hybrid listening and dialogue events across the world. In settings with thousands of participants and those with fewer than 10, Sue has brought together C-suite leaders with frontline workers, government officials with NGOs and local citizens, and many others to unlock mutual understanding and build shared commitment to results.
Trained as an anthropologist and with broad experience as corporate communicator and leadership advisor, Sue has held positions at the World Bank, Outward Bound Professional, Maersk and most recently as listening partner to the former CEO of Novo Nordisk.
“Thanks Sue …. Most of all for creating a relaxed setting, enabling me to be myself and foster trust in the organization. Forever grateful!”
Lars Fruergaard Jørgensen
Former CEO, Novo Nordisk
“Sue has an incredible talent of getting people to talk about important things in an open and honest way.
She encourages dialogue that is genuine, lively and trustworthy to everyone involved.”
Camilla Sylvest
Former Executive Vice President, Novo Nordisk
“I highly recommend Sue for her abilities to think systemically, to facilitate very high level conversations with our top clients, and for her overall intelligence and perceptiveness.”
Craig Imler, Former Regional Director, Outward Bound Professional Development