One hour. He talked for half of it.
A room full of people with something to say, and every time one of them started, he finished the sentence for them. He was Listening to Hijack. They were listening for an exit.
The scar is that I was him.
I confused presence with volume. I filled silence because silence felt like failure. I was so busy proving I belonged in the room that I became the reason nobody else spoke in it.
So I went and trained with Mary Pat Knight , Dr. Dino Signore , and Christopher Voss.
Fight Less, Win More turns on one move. Remove yourself as the threat. You cannot do that while you are the loudest voice at the table.
Levels of Listening:
1. Ignore. Tune out.
2. To Hijack. Stealing the spotlight.
3. Internal Logic. Listen for the reason.
4. Emotion and Logic. Decode feeling and reason.
5. Empathetic. You see what they see.
He never got past two. Every breakthrough I have seen in an EOS session happened at five.
So before I open my mouth, one question.
WAIT. Why Am I Talking?
The session is never mine. It belongs to the leadership team in front of me.
The best facilitator is close to anonymous. Observe. Intervene. Get out of the way.
The less I talk, the more effective I am.
Stay Curious,
JBS