• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

SafetyRisk.net

Humanising Safety and Embracing Real Risk

  • Home
    • About
      • Privacy Policy
      • Contact
  • FREE
    • Slogans
      • Researchers Reveal the Top 10 Most Effective Safety Slogans Of All Time
      • When Slogans Don’t Work
      • CLASSIC, FAMOUS and INFAMOUS SAFETY QUOTES
      • 500 OF THE BEST AND WORST WORKPLACE HEALTH and SAFETY SLOGANS 2023
      • CATCHY and FUNNY SAFETY SLOGANS FOR THE WORKPLACE
      • COVID-19 (Coronavirus, Omicron) Health and Safety Slogans and Quotes for the Workplace
      • Safety Acronyms
      • You know Where You Can Stick Your Safety Slogans
      • Sayings, Slogans, Aphorisms and the Discourse of Simple
      • Spanish Safety Slogans – Consignas de seguridad
      • Safety Slogans List
      • Road Safety Slogans 2023
      • How to write your own safety slogans
      • Why Are Safety Slogans Important
      • Safety Slogans Don’t Save Lives
      • 40 Free Safety Slogans For the Workplace
      • Safety Slogans for Work
    • FREE SAFETY eBOOKS
    • Free Hotel and Resort Risk Management Checklist
    • FREE DOWNLOADS
    • TOP 50
    • FREE RISK ASSESSMENT FORMS
    • Find a Safety Consultant
    • Free Safety Program Documents
    • Psychology Of Safety
    • Safety Ideas That Work
    • HEALTH and SAFETY MANUALS
    • FREE SAFE WORK METHOD STATEMENT RESOURCES
    • Whats New In Safety
    • FUN SAFETY STUFF
    • Health and Safety Training
    • SAFETY COURSES
    • Safety Training Needs Analysis and Matrix
    • Top 20 Safety Books
    • This Toaster Is Hot
    • Free Covid-19 Toolbox Talks
    • Download Page – Please Be Patient With Larger Files…….
    • SAFETY IMAGES, Photos, Unsafe Pictures and Funny Fails
    • How to Calculate TRIFR, LTIFR and Other Health and Safety Indicators
    • Download Safety Moments from Human Resources Secretariat
  • Social Psychology Of Risk
    • What is Psychological Health and Safety at Work?
    • Safety Psychology Terminology
    • Some Basics on Social Psychology & Risk
    • Understanding The Social Psychology of Risk – Prof Karl E. Weick
    • The Psychology of Leadership in Risk
    • Conducting a Psychology and Culture Safety Walk
    • The Psychology of Conversion – 20 Tips to get Started
    • Understanding The Social Psychology of Risk And Safety
    • Psychology and safety
    • The Psychology of Safety
    • Hot Toaster
    • TALKING RISK VIDEOS
    • WHAT IS SAFETY
    • THE HOT TOASTER
    • THE ZERO HARM DEBATE
    • SEMIOTICS
    • LEADERSHIP
  • Dr Long Posts
    • ALL POSTS
    • Learning Styles Matter
    • There is no Hierarchy of Controls
    • Scaffolding, Readiness and ZPD in Learning
    • What Can Safety Learn From Playschool?
    • Presentation Tips for Safety People
    • Dialogue Do’s and Don’ts
    • It’s Only a Symbol
    • Ten Cautions About Safety Checklists
    • Zero is Unethical
    • First Report on Zero Survey
    • There is No Objectivity, Deal With it!
  • THEMES
    • Psychosocial Safety
    • Resiliencing
    • Risk Myths
    • Safety Myths
    • Safety Culture Silences
    • Safety Culture
    • Psychological Health and Safety
    • Zero Harm
    • Due Diligence
  • Free Learning
    • Introduction to SPoR – Free
    • FREE RISK and SAFETY EBOOKS
    • FREE ebook – Guidance for the beginning OHS professional
    • Free EBook – Effective Safety Management Systems
    • Free EBook – Lessons I Have Learnt
  • Psychosocial Safety
    • What is Psychosocial Safety
    • Psychological Safety
      • What is Psychological Health and Safety at Work?
      • Managing psychosocial hazards at work
      • Psychological Safety – has it become the next Maslow’s hammer?
      • What is Psychosocial Safety
      • Psychological Safety Slogans and Quotes
      • What is Psychological Safety?
      • Understanding Psychological Terminology
      • Psycho-Social and Socio-Psychological, What’s the Difference?
      • Build a Psychologically Safe Workplace by Taking Risks and Analysing Failures
      • It’s not weird – it’s a psychological safety initiative!
You are here: Home / Communication and Consultation / What is Critical Listening when Dealing with Risk?

What is Critical Listening when Dealing with Risk?

October 14, 2014 by Gabrielle Carlton 26 Comments

What is Critical Listening when Dealing with Risk?

I was walking on a worksite the other day and engaged in a conversation with a worker. I asked how he was going. He explained that he was extremely busy, needed to get something done quite urgently and his co-worker was off sick. This raised some concern for me so I asked how he was managing things and his response was ‘just get it done’. This conversation took only a minute and a half and I already knew he was at risk. All because I took a moment to ‘critically listen’!

Has the art of listening been lost over the years? Treasure (2013) believes this to be the case. He states in his TED© talk (http://www.ted.com/talks/julian_treasure_5_ways_to_listen_better#t-153859) that listening is ‘making meaning from sound…a process of extraction’. Treasure explains that humans have filters that funnel what we focus on and listen to. Most of us are unconscious of what these filters are.

A process of extraction indicates to me that it’s a conscious action, a level of awareness. Maybe one of the reasons the art of listening has been lost over the years is because we are not often conscious of our own filters or what to listen to! Do we no longer extract or maybe we have never really been taught?

Why has this occurred? Schein (2013, p. 10) states that our culture is ‘biased towards telling’ rather than listening or asking, for fear of people knowing that we don’t know! Also, because we believe everything is there to be solved so we try to ‘fix’ rather than communicate and understanding people. If we are busy ‘telling’ how can we ‘extract’? There is no room for listening. In the Risk and Safety Industry we are well acquainted with the art of ‘telling’? With the many; ‘have to’, ‘must’, ‘shall’ and ‘should’ all in the name of the law!

Why does this matter? Isn’t that what we are supposed to do in this industry? Just ‘tell’ them how to comply? ‘Tell’ them to ‘keep safe’?

How does one ‘keep safe’? How indeed?

How do we know how a person discerns risk? How do we really know how a person makes sense of their work environment? The only way we can do this is through the act of ‘critical listening’.

What is ‘critical listening’? It is the art of knowing what to focus on. When engaging in a safety conversation with a worker it’s not about telling them it’s about listening to what’s been said. The critical factor is what to listen for. What ‘filters’ need to be used in order to ‘focus’ on specific signs. It’s about information and exformation, what has been said and what has not been said. Let’s go back to my initial conversation with the worker. I was actively listening which involved ‘focusing’ on specific signs that tell me that he was stressed, under the pump, under resourced and with no ability to change the situation. This person was at risk and it had nothing to do with the tools and equipment that he was using. It was the psychological and cultural hazards that I was focusing on not the physical hazards.

These types of hazards can further impact or lead to significant incidents or even be an indication of an embedded toxic culture. Let’s take for example the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill incident. A report by the Oil Spill Commission (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-11720907) stated that there had been “a rush to completion” and management complacency, amongst other failings, that lead to the disaster. The Commission also stated that the companies involved lacked a safety culture.

All psychological and cultural hazards that lead to such a significant event! We only have to go as far as Weick, Plous, Reason, Slovic, Long and the like to understand psychology and culture of risk are the major causes of many incidents in risk.

So when we ‘critically listen’ we can pick up on these red flags such as rushing and complacency. It’s about building our ‘muscle’ around this skill.

Newberg & Waldman (2012) identify the skill of listening is actively and knowingly shutting out external and internal ‘chattering’ in order to have a greater ability to ‘intuit’ what is being communicated. In other words we must learn and know what ‘filters’ we are using in order to ‘focus’ on the right things.

The first step in ‘critical listening’ is actually just asking a question and then being mindful of our external and internal ‘chattering’, shutting it off and listen to what’s been said. A critical listener is not one who ‘tells’ or who goes in with an agenda or puts their own ego first. It takes a lot of practice to be a critical listener but when we are being actively mindful we can see so much more than just a piece of plant or a trip hazard. We can actually get to know a person and get to know how they see their work environment and more importantly uncover risks that are not physically obvious yet which have the potential to cause greater risk.

Here are some key strategies to assist with building your ‘critical listening’ muscle:

  • Leave your agenda behind
  • Be mindful of what you are focusing on
  • Listen for ‘red flags’ such as rushing, overconfidence, assumptions
  • Be mindful of our external and internal ‘chattering’
  • Shutting of your own internal thoughts
  • Listen to what’s been said and to what’s not been said
  • Allow space to listen don’t just ‘talk at’ or ‘tell’, and
  • When you butt in you’re making it about yourself!

GABRIELLE CARLTON

M | 0407 220 094

E | gabrielle@resilyence

W | www.resilyence.com

L | http://www.linkedin.com/in/gabriellecarlton

F | https://www.facebook.com/Resilyence

  • Bio
  • Latest Posts
  • More about Gabrielle
Gabrielle Carlton

Gabrielle Carlton

Director & Principal Consultant at Resylience
Gabrielle Carlton

Latest posts by Gabrielle Carlton (see all)

  • What in the (Risk & Safety) World is Imagination? - May 11, 2023
  • Stand Behind The Yellow Line – Do Engineering Controls Affect Risk? - December 15, 2022
  • The Art of Humble Inquiry as a Pathway to Safety Improvement - September 1, 2022
  • The Different Levels of Wrongness! - August 15, 2022
  • All Care and No Care! - November 15, 2018
Gabrielle Carlton
Gabrielle Carlton is a specialist in human factors in risk and safety. Gabrielle provides training, advice, coaching and mentoring for leaders and managers. Gabrielle has well over 10 years experience as an advisor and consultant to industry as well as a strong personal background across a range of industries including: electrical generation & distribution, aged and disability in large residential facilities, construction, property management, rail, manufacturing, government bodies and corporations. Gabrielle is able to use her expertise in analysis, training, organisation psychology, research, systems auditing and human behaviour to serve a wide range of needs. She has conducted a Probability Risk Analysis (PRA) using Resylience's methodology Culture and Organisation Modelling in Risk (COMIR). This work was conducted with National power generation companies. Gabrielle has developed and delivered a range of risk and safety leadership consultancies to Tier 1 organisations in Australia.

Please share our posts

  • Click to print (Opens in new window)
  • Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)

Related

Filed Under: Communication and Consultation, Gabrielle Carlton, Social Psychology of Risk Tagged With: critical listening, risk

Reader Interactions

Do you have any thoughts? Please share them below Cancel reply

Primary Sidebar

Search and Discover More on this Site

Never miss a post - Subscribe via Email

Enter your email address and join other discerning risk and safety people who receive notifications of new posts by email

Join 7,521 other subscribers

Recent Comments

  • Rob Long on It is NOT My Responsibility to Keep You Safe
  • Chris. on It is NOT My Responsibility to Keep You Safe
  • Pierre Joubert on Zero Doesn’t Work, Road Fatalities Increase
  • James on We are all equal
  • Rob Long on We are all equal
  • James Parkinson on We are all equal
  • Brent Charlton on What Does Safety Achieve?
  • Admin on We are all equal
  • James Parkinson on We are all equal
  • Rob Long on What Does Safety Achieve?
  • Brent Charlton on We are all equal
  • Brent Charlton on We are all equal
  • Brent Charlton on We are all equal
  • Brent Charlton on What Does Safety Achieve?
  • Simon Cassin on You Can Fool Someone Some of the Time but, You Can Fool Safety All of the Time
  • Simon Cassin on You Can Fool Someone Some of the Time but, You Can Fool Safety All of the Time
  • Rob Long on You Can Fool Someone Some of the Time but, You Can Fool Safety All of the Time
  • Rob Long on You Can Fool Someone Some of the Time but, You Can Fool Safety All of the Time
  • Rob Long on You Can Fool Someone Some of the Time but, You Can Fool Safety All of the Time
  • Rob Long on You Can Fool Someone Some of the Time but, You Can Fool Safety All of the Time

RECOMMENDED READING

viral post – iso 45003 and what it cannot do

Introduction to SPOR – FREE!!

Psychosocial Safety and Mental Health Series

It is NOT My Responsibility to Keep You Safe

The KISS of Death in Safety

Is Your Safety World Too Small?

You Can Fool Someone Some of the Time but, You Can Fool Safety All of the Time

When Safety (Zero) is Abusive

Hands Up the Best Safety Fraud!

Communicating Professionally in Risk

How NOT to be Professional in Safety

How NOT to do Anything About Culture in Building and Construction

Celebrating 60 Years of Lifeline

More Posts from this Category

NEW! Free Download

Please take our 2 minute zero survey

FREE eBOOK DOWNLOADS

Footer

VIRAL POST – The Risk Matrix Myth

Top Posts & Pages. Sad that most are so dumb but this is what safety luves

  • Free Safety Moments and Toolbox Talk Examples, Tips and Resources
  • 500 OF THE BEST AND WORST WORKPLACE HEALTH and SAFETY SLOGANS 2023
  • CATCHY and FUNNY SAFETY SLOGANS FOR THE WORKPLACE
  • When Safety Delights in ‘I Told You So’!
  • Ratio Delusions and Heinrich’s Hoax
  • Road Safety Slogans 2023
  • How to Calculate TRIFR, LTIFR and Other Health and Safety Indicators
  • 15 Safety Precautions When Working With Electricity
  • Safety Acronyms
  • FREE RISK ASSESSMENT FORMS, CHECKISTS, REGISTERS, TEMPLATES and APPS

Recent Posts

  • When Safety Delights in ‘I Told You So’!
  • My Story is Better than Yours
  • Understanding Safety as a Cultural Reproductive Process
  • The Unconscious and the Soap Dispenser
  • Thinking Outside the Safety Bubble
  • Understanding Language Influencing, A Video
  • Safetie
  • You are NOT the Sum of Safety
  • Update on SPoR in India, Brazil and Europe
  • It is NOT My Responsibility to Keep You Safe
  • Safety at the Margins
  • Research Basics for Safety
  • We Need Communities and They Need Us
  • Researching Within The Safety Echo Chamber
  • Confirmation Bias, Risk and Being Offensive
  • Lemmings for Lemmings in Leadership and Risk
  • Expertise by Regurgitation and Re-Badging
  • Zero Doesn’t Work, Road Fatalities Increase
  • Can There Be Other Valid Worldviews Than Safety?
  • Evaluating Value by the Value of What You Don’t Know
  • Reality vs Theory, The Binary Divide
  • No Paradigm Shift with BBS
  • The KISS of Death in Safety
  • Is Your Safety World Too Small?
  • What Does Safety Achieve?
  • In Praise of Balance in Risk and the Threat of Extremism
  • We are all equal
  • You Can Fool Someone Some of the Time but, You Can Fool Safety All of the Time
  • What in the (Risk & Safety) World is Imagination?
  • iCue Engagement Process
  • SPoR, Metanoia and a Podcast on Change with Nippin Anand
  • For the Monarchists of Safety
  • The Sully Effect
  • All Things Must Pass in Risk
  • Scapegoating and Safety
  • Understanding Habit, Habituation and Change
  • Don’t Mention the War
  • Safety in Design for Who by Who?
  • Beyond ‘What We Do Around Here’
  • Asking the Wrong Questions
  • When Safety (Zero) is Abusive
  • Mandala as a Method for Tackling an Ethic of Risk (a Video)
  • Safety Cosmetics
  • Visualising the EHS Role
  • Towards Dumb
  • Workshops with Dr Long – Vienna, Austria 26-30 June 2023
  • Visual, Verbal and Relational Mapping in Risk Assessment
  • Abduction in Risk and Safety
  • Creating Myths and Rituals in Safety
  • The Safe Christmas Psychosis

VIRAL POST!!! HOW TO QUIT THE SAFETY INDUSTRY

FEATURED POSTS

Keep Your Head In the Game

The Curse of Behaviourism

A Poetics of Safety

The Myth of Fast and Slow Thinking

Conforming and Questioning in Safety

Study at The Centre for Leadership and Learning in Risk

Getting the Balance Right in Tackling Risk

The Seduction of Measurement in Risk and Safety

The Village Effect

Tattoos, Taboos and The Risk of Permanence

By What Method?

Safety is not Just a Choice

The Social Psychology of Risk Handbook, i-thou

Real Risk for Real Life

And the Enemy of Safety is? … Humans!

By What Method Do You Tackle Risk?

It’s Always About Paperwork

Just Tell Your Mind to Stop It

The Social Politics of Safety

Celebrating 1000 Blogs on Risk

An Ethical Psychology of Risk

Safety People Don’t ‘Save Lives’

The Idealization of Humans and The Zero Delusion

When ‘Hearts and Minds’ are not ‘Hearts and Minds’

Selective and Slow Harm is not Zero Harm

The Sound of Safety

Bridging the Disciplines for Better Outcomes

Safety Surveying What You Already Know

Safety’s Garden of Eden Complex

Post Graduate Diploma in Psychology of Risk Commences

Third Group Commences the Graduate Program in The Psychology of Risk

Social Psychology of Risk Two Day Workshop

Safety Leadership Training

Investigations and Heuristics

SAFETY IS A MYTH, LONG LIVE SAFETY

Rhythms, Musicophilia and Safety

OnLine Learning Modules with CLLR

Counter Intuitive Safety

The Religion of Safety

Military Metaphors in Safety

More Posts from this Category

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address and join other discerning risk and safety people who receive notifications of new posts by email

Join 7,521 other subscribers

How we pay for the high cost of running of this site – try it for free on your site

WHAT IS PSYCHOLOGICAL SAFETY?

What is Psychological Safety at Work?


WHAT IS PSYCHOSOCIAL SAFETY

x
x