{"id":32515,"date":"2019-11-14T16:40:06","date_gmt":"2019-11-14T21:40:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.glensfalls.com\/glensfallsbusinessjournal\/?p=32515"},"modified":"2019-11-15T13:28:08","modified_gmt":"2019-11-15T18:28:08","slug":"business-report-now-hear-this","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.glensfalls.com\/glensfallsbusinessjournal\/2019\/11\/business-report-now-hear-this\/","title":{"rendered":"Business Report: Now Hear This!"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_31941\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-31941\" style=\"width: 200px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-31941 size-medium\" src=\"https:\/\/www.glensfalls.com\/glensfallsbusinessjournal\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/109\/2019\/05\/cruz-c-200x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"200\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.glensfalls.com\/glensfallsbusinessjournal\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/109\/2019\/05\/cruz-c-200x300.jpg 200w, https:\/\/www.glensfalls.com\/glensfallsbusinessjournal\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/109\/2019\/05\/cruz-c.jpg 432w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 200px) 100vw, 200px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-31941\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Michael Cruz, president of Lighthouse Advisors LLC in Queensbury.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>By michael cruz<br \/>\nSam Walton (Walmart founder) famously said \u201cIf you don\u2019t listen to your customers, someone else will.\u201d Too often we speak with customers without the intent to hear. We want to \u2018tell\u2019. The best sales people ask questions and then shut up. It is not by accident that listen and silent have the same letters.<br \/>\nOften business owners ask me what I think of an idea for a new product. My advice is always the same. ASK your customers. They can validate your idea. Or not. We don\u2019t often ask questions that we do not want to hear the answer to. Or more accurately, hear what we consider to be the wrong answer. Listening is the core or learning. We never learn when we are talking. <!--more--><br \/>\nMuch is written about listening, but it is an artform rarely practiced. Raquel Welch said that \u201cYou cannot fake listening. It shows.\u201d When we ask questions and then do not listen, we show our disrespect for the opinion of others. And then we accuse the other person of not understanding. We do not listen to our customers because we know our business better than they do. Yet it\u2019s their money that determines if we are right.<br \/>\nWe don\u2019t listen to our kids because we are wiser than they are. We know the right answer. If you have children, you have all too often heard the refrain, \u201cYou never listen to me!\u201d And we hear it loudly and with complete disgust. Our business friends probably make the assessment with less drama. But they walk away with the same thought.<br \/>\nAnd, since we are the boss, we don\u2019t listen to our employees. Not long ago, a client came to me with a quality problem. They were cross shipping products to their customers. \u2018How do I figure this out?\u2019 he asked. I suggested that he ask his shipping team. Sure enough, the newest employee understood why it was happening. They solved the problem in one week by applying his suggested fix. One week!<br \/>\nWe think we listen, but too often we do not. Here is the test you can use on yourself to see if you are listening. If you can give your response in the conversation immediately when the other person stopped talking, you are not listening. True listening means that we need a few seconds to process what they said and formulate a response. The silence does not show you are dumb. It shows that you intelligently heard them and only then formulated a response. Stephen Covey (7 Habits) said it best. \u201cMost people do not listen with the intent to understand; they listen with the intent to reply.\u201d<br \/>\nYou have two ears and only one mouth. Use them proportionally.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By michael cruz Sam Walton (Walmart founder) famously said \u201cIf you don\u2019t listen to your customers, someone else will.\u201d Too often we speak with customers without the intent to hear. We want to \u2018tell\u2019. The best sales people ask questions and then shut up. It is not by accident that listen and silent have the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":196,"featured_media":31941,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\r\n<title>Business Report: Now Hear This! - Glens Falls Business Journal<\/title>\r\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\r\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.glensfalls.com\/glensfallsbusinessjournal\/2019\/11\/business-report-now-hear-this\/\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Business Report: Now Hear This! - Glens Falls Business Journal\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"By michael cruz Sam Walton (Walmart founder) famously said \u201cIf you don\u2019t listen to your customers, someone else will.\u201d Too often we speak with customers without the intent to hear. We want to \u2018tell\u2019. The best sales people ask questions and then shut up. It is not by accident that listen and silent have the [&hellip;]\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.glensfalls.com\/glensfallsbusinessjournal\/2019\/11\/business-report-now-hear-this\/\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Glens Falls Business Journal\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2019-11-14T21:40:06+00:00\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2019-11-15T18:28:08+00:00\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.glensfalls.com\/glensfallsbusinessjournal\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/109\/2019\/05\/cruz-c.jpg\" \/>\r\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"432\" \/>\r\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"648\" \/>\r\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\r\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"jessewinters\" \/>\r\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\r\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"jessewinters\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\r\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.glensfalls.com\/glensfallsbusinessjournal\/2019\/11\/business-report-now-hear-this\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.glensfalls.com\/glensfallsbusinessjournal\/2019\/11\/business-report-now-hear-this\/\",\"name\":\"Business Report: Now Hear This! - Glens Falls Business Journal\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.glensfalls.com\/glensfallsbusinessjournal\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2019-11-14T21:40:06+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2019-11-15T18:28:08+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.glensfalls.com\/glensfallsbusinessjournal\/#\/schema\/person\/b937a48daf87d7a8bd713a73b5d6a1ae\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.glensfalls.com\/glensfallsbusinessjournal\/2019\/11\/business-report-now-hear-this\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.glensfalls.com\/glensfallsbusinessjournal\/2019\/11\/business-report-now-hear-this\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.glensfalls.com\/glensfallsbusinessjournal\/2019\/11\/business-report-now-hear-this\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.glensfalls.com\/glensfallsbusinessjournal\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Business Report: Now Hear This!\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.glensfalls.com\/glensfallsbusinessjournal\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.glensfalls.com\/glensfallsbusinessjournal\/\",\"name\":\"Glens Falls Business Journal\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.glensfalls.com\/glensfallsbusinessjournal\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.glensfalls.com\/glensfallsbusinessjournal\/#\/schema\/person\/b937a48daf87d7a8bd713a73b5d6a1ae\",\"name\":\"jessewinters\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.glensfalls.com\/glensfallsbusinessjournal\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/b496e0843f9d888b12500994b6a8562b?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/b496e0843f9d888b12500994b6a8562b?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"jessewinters\"},\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.glensfalls.com\/glensfallsbusinessjournal\/author\/jessewinters\/\"}]}<\/script>\r\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Business Report: Now Hear This! - Glens Falls Business Journal","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.glensfalls.com\/glensfallsbusinessjournal\/2019\/11\/business-report-now-hear-this\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Business Report: Now Hear This! - Glens Falls Business Journal","og_description":"By michael cruz Sam Walton (Walmart founder) famously said \u201cIf you don\u2019t listen to your customers, someone else will.\u201d Too often we speak with customers without the intent to hear. 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