François Matarasso

I’ve always enjoyed talking, working through ideas and feelings with other people, listening to their perspective and, ultimately, understanding something better. Talking is central to workshops, meetings, conferences and so on. Writing, like this, is just another way of talking – testing and organising my thoughts. Mostly, I talk about ideas, but this year I’ve needed to talk about myself, with close friends and family, and sometimes even with strangers. That opening up has been unsettling, but necessary: without it I doubt I I’d be finding my way through the labyrinth.

I’ve always liked listening too. It’s the heart of co-creation and the exchanges on which it depends: artistic work, planning, shared meals, just being together. It’s a pleasure and a privilege to listen to someone talk about their ideas and experience, their dreams, desires and hopes. The material and form of artistic co-creation comes out of such conversations. Because language is my element, it’s usually the space in which that co-creation process happens, though for others it emerges in sound, imagery, bodies, space and all the other senses through which human beings engage with each other and the world.  

All this year’s talking has made me ask myself what it means to be a good listener. Why have people sometimes told me I’m a good listener? Why have I felt someone else was a good listener? It’s an easy phrase, and I suspect most of us think we are good listeners, in the same way that we mostly believe we have a sense of humour. It’s natural to feel we have these attractive human qualities and, after all, they’re rarely tested.

If I think about my own way of listening, I see that it’s an active task. It requires a high level of concentration. It’s not enough to be quiet and let someone talk. I am attentive to words, narrative, emotion, structure, manner, delivery, omissions, metaphor, imagery – all the resources humans bring to communication. I pay attention not just to the words, but to what I’m feeling, physically and emotionally as I listen. I hope the speaker feels they’re being heard with respect and empathy, that they are what matters at this moment. That’s what gives us confidence to open up and to share. Do we all get the attention we need or deserve? I doubt it. Real attention is empowering, but scarce. 

Listening well requires a good memory. I don’t take notes. I record research interviews so that the speaker has my full attention. I depend on memory to note what seems important, or might need to be explored or clarified in a question later. I have to hold both the detail of what I’ve heard and its overall shape if I am to respond to what I’ve been told. And the response is crucial because it is how the speaker knows that they have been heard. I have talked to people who then say something that tells me that they haven’t understood what I’ve been trying to communicate. It’s damaging because I lose confidence in them. A good listener reflects back what has been said with sufficient accuracy and insight that the speaker knows that they have been heard.  

And that is why listening matters so much in co-creation. It’s a way to see the other, to witness the reality of their existence and the legitimacy of their experience. That is not easy. It takes time and care because trust needs to grow. It requires setting aside habits of judgement. There is a time and place for choosing one thing over another but this is not it. Listening is the beginning of co-creation and it is only possible to go further on a foundation of mutual respect: judgement immediately poisons that. 

Listening well is a high skill and an exhilarating challenge. And the more I practice, the more I enjoy it. It’s the starting point of working together in co-creation.