Listening Skills

Listen to a discussion on what is a good leader taking place during some staff training.

Optional activity:While you listen, decide whether the following sentences are true or false.

1. The workers are attending a marketing training session.
2. Ian, Sue and Wendy fulfil some kind of managerial role in their company.
3. Alison is facilitating the training session.
4. ‘Practice what you preach’ means you should do what you tell other people todo.
5. If ‘something hasn’t worked out’ it has been successful.
6. Wendy likes finding out about company matters from coffee machine gossip.
7. Wendy thinks managers shouldn’t tell colleagues bad news.
8. Ian, Sue and Wendy agree with each others ideas.

Conversation

Alison: Good afternoon everyone. Now you’re all group leaders with some responsibilities for people working inyour teams. In today’s training session I want us to think about what make s a good leader in the workplace. Isthat OK?

Ian: Alison, are we talking about managers here, or all colleagues?

Alison: I’d like to talk about colleagues in general, anyone in the workplace, I don’t want to limit the discussionsolely to managers, is that OK?

All: Fine, yeah, sureAlison: Ian, would you like to kick off? What qualities should a good leader have?

Ian: Well, you know I think the most important thing is to practise what you preach, you know, you can’t goround telling people to do something in one way and they you do it in a completely different way. You’ve got tobe a good role model for people ...

Alison: OK, thanks, Sue, any other ideas?

Sue: Well, I agree with Ian there. I just want to say that I don’t like managers who blame other people for theirown mistakes. I know we’re not just talking about managers, I think it’s important for everybody to takeresponsibility for what they do. Noone’sperfect, everyone makes mistakes. I think you should trust people andjust admit it if something hasn’t worked out, managers too, I mean, they’re human aren’t they .... some of themare anyway ... (laughter)

Alison: OK, so we’re talking about trusting colleagues and being responsible for your work, OK, fine.. Wendy,any thoughts?

Wendy: Let’s see, for me I think if you want people to be on your side, you know if you want to influence peopleyou have to communicate and communicate well. You’ve got to let people know what’s happening and what’sgoing to happen, even if some of these things aren’t very nice. There’s nothing worse than finding out aboutsomething from coffee machine gossip, managers should tell it straight ...

Alison: OK, thanks Wendy, that’s very useful. So, to be a good leader you’ve got to be a good role model, youshould accept responsibility for your own mistakes and you should communicate well and tell it straight, even ifthe news is bad. Now can you think about .....(fade out) ....

Listen here
http://www.learnenglish.org.uk/prof_mp3/leadership.mp3