Life Coaches Blog

How was it for those of you who consciously decided to pay more attention to the people you were talking to these last couple of days?

Today I’m going to introduce the first part on what specifically to focus on and what it is, so you can increase your awareness even more.

Like I said earlier, we’re going to start with the easiest chunks first and move on from there. And what’s the easiest chunk to start with? Why, it’s the very thing you pay most attention to already (consciously, at least).

It’s content, the words people use. And we’re going to focus on one of the very important ones; called value words.

Value words are words that describe abstract ideas or values that are important to someone. For example, a conversation might go like this:

Friend: He’s a good friend of mine, I really enjoy being with him.

You: Oh, why’s that?

Friend: Hmm, I guess it’s because I feel really comfortable with him, you know? I feel like I can really be myself around him.

You: Oh, I see. Being able to just be yourself with a friend is really important, isn’t it?

Friend: Oh, yes, of course! I mean, it makes me feel like I can really trust this person.

You: Yes, it’s great when you find someone you can trust.

Friend: Yea…you know, you really understand me.

You: Yea, of course, I learnt all this from the Life Coaches Blog.

Value words are always abstract, they describe things you cannot see, hear or touch, like ‘being yourself’ or ‘trust’. Other examples are words like ‘love’, ‘justice’, ‘contribution’, ‘compassion’, ‘achievement’.

Now, why is this so important?

Do you think it might be important to know what your partner values most in a relationship?

Do you think it might be important to know what your customer values most in the product you’re selling?

Do you think it might be important to know what your client values most in the project you’re going to deliver to her?

Now that you know all that, some of you might be thinking, “That’s all great, Alvin, but how do I find out their values?”

Here’s where I’m going to say something immensely important that you must know before any technique you might learn, and it’s crucial you not just listen but put this into practice immediately.

To find out more about someone, you must shut up and listen more than you talk.

In fact, I see so many people unintentionally lose lots of rapport opportunities just because they don’t know how important this is (heck, I’ve made the same mistake myself lots of times) that I’m going to repeat it again.

To find out more about someone, you must shut up and listen more than you talk.

Now, just how do you find out someone’s values?

People tell them to you all the time.

It’s true. I’m going to put myself on the line here and say that if you don’t agree because you think you’ve never heard them, that’s not true. You just haven’t listened enough.

So, here’s your coaching assignment for the day, and it’s going to be easy to do because it’s something you already do, you just need to pay a little more attention this time.

In the conversations you’re going to have over the next 2 days, open up your ears, listen, and find out how many value words you can pick out that the people around you are practically throwing at you all the time.

Doing this is important, because then you’ll get even more value out of the next articles in the series. Watch for them!