Mentoring for Business: Active Listening 6

Start >Active Listening >Some Results of Poor Active Listening Skills

Active listening is used to glean as much information as possible from the mentee. It is also to demonstrate that the mentee is an important and central part of the whole mentoring process. However, for various reasons this is not always the case. There could be pressure of work that reduces the mentor's concentration or the environment may make active listening difficult.

Below are a number of situations highlighting the effects of poor objective setting. For each identify the most probable cause:

Situation 1
During the meeting the mentee becomes disillusioned as whilst she is talking the mentor is fidgeting and seems to be looking for something in his case. What might be the cause of this ?	Most probable cause: Mentee feels that the mentor is not interested in him/her - mentor seems uninterested
Situation 2
For the majority of the time both the mentee and mentor are happy discussing their social activities and spend only the last 5 minutes on completing the documentation. What might be the cause of this ?	Most probable cause: The mentoring process is seen as merely an exercise to be completed. - mentoring process appears unimportant.
Situation 3
During your session people continue interrupting for documentation to be completed and signed. Also your mentor keeps leaving the meeting to check on things in the general office. What might be the cause of this ?	Most probable cause: The mentor has more pressing things to do.
Situation 4
After the mentee has spoken, the mentor provides feedback to her. However, during this the mentor notices that the mentee is busy doing something else and is not listening to what's being said. What might be the cause of this ?	Most probable cause: The mentor feels that the mentee is not interested in his/her own development. - mentee not interested in development.
Situation 5
During the session both the mentor and mentee are struggling to listen to what each other has to say over the noise from the adjacent office. What might be the cause of this ?	Most probable cause: Wrong environment
Situation 6
Throughout the meeting your mentor has been struggling to actively listen to you due to a heavy cold. He has misunderstood numerous points that you have raised. What might be the cause of this ?	Most probable cause: Physical influences