It has been a while since I wrote a blog that was fully coaching focused (too busy eclectically looking at all the coaching angles that sneak into what I’m reading, events I’ve been to and odd artistic and philosophical digressions). Thanks for sticking with me!

One of the coaching skills that I’ve been asked to explore further after colleagues have had a taster in the “intro to coaching” courses that we run is a whistle stop tour through the approaches you can take in the field of “Active listening”.

There’s lots of books and talented people who have specialised in outlining different types of listening and arranging them into levels and categories in order to help coaches and managers reflect on how they interact with their staff, or clients.

As a real talker, which I may have mentioned, honing and policing my listening in my coaching practice has been perhaps the biggest challenge and the greatest boon from my coaching work. My mentor, about a decade ago, gave me the advice that his kids had been given at school. “We’re given two ears and one mouth” aka “Shhhh, Mark, shhhh”. But I think that, as I touched upon in the blog on silence (blimey, that was around a year ago https://coincidentalcoaching.com/2025/04/29/the-sounds-in-silence/ ) it was when I started to pick apart the active aspects of listening that it made more sense and made my conversations deeper and more interactive.

So, depending on which of the listening gurus you tap up there are anywhere between 3 and 10 levels of listening (and sure, you can squeeze in more if you add sub-categories). So let’s break it down a bit.

I’ve seen ignoring/pretending to listen included at the start of the scale… I think that’s a bit of a stretch and we can probably start at,

Internal listening

At this level, we’re concentrating mostly on our internal thoughts and monologue. We’re not paying much attention to what the other person is saying, and are just taking time waiting for the other person to stop talking so that we can take our turn. As interrupting feels quite rude, we’ll tend to just wait until they take a breath and then nip in. Our thoughts are pointed towards what we’re going to say next. 

Although it’s the antithesis of what you shoot for in coaching, it isn’t necessary to eliminate this entirely. Some types of noticing our own thoughts during a conversation are good and needed (both to shape what we’re going to say) but also to be able to reflect on our practice (in supervision, for example*). That said, it shouldn’t be the sole focus, and it can be quite dangerous to assume that we’ve heard or know everything that the other person is saying (if we think they’re just downloading). In much the same way as revision at the start of a course runs the risk that you miss the bits of new content (or the start of what you’re there to learn when that does kick in), it’s dangerous to assume that you know what someone is saying before they’re finished. Internal listening, particularly in the coaching space, is not really where you want to be. 

Factual listening

In factual listening we’ll tend to only listen closely when the information is different to what we already know. It’s also the approach we might take when we’re listening to debate a point, coming into a conversation in which we’re already in dispute with the other party or expecting to be. Factual listening isn’t generally very interactive, and is probably the right place to be in some fields (maybe when we’re attending a course or talk, with a large audience) when we’re seeking clarity, but it doesn’t really lend itself to conversation.

Advising listening

A short step on from factual listening could be advising listening. Typically, this is the place you go to when you are training someone, who doesn’t know the topic. Advising listening could well be the end goal of mentoring or training conversations, but the process can typically be enriched further by really getting under the skin of what the landscape looks like for the other person first. If you find you’re often talking at cross purposes with someone, this might be what underlies those issues

Attentive listening

Allowing time for the speaker to finish, inviting them to speak more. Some might call this… listening. Probably a starting point for your aims as a coach.

Active listening

Once you’ve baselined attentive listening you can delve more into the intense listening that forms the bedrock of coaching. You’re noticing not just the words, but noticing what’s going on between and around the words. Being aware of their body language, exploring what has not been said too. Using body language yourself to mirror pace and posture, seeking to get fully attuned to your coachee. Nested within this is empathetic listening. Much of what causes people to act is less to do with facts and more to do with how people feel, bottoming out someone’s emotional reaction to circumstances (frustration, anger, boredom, misaligned enthusiasm, passion) can help to work out where things are going awry (this maps also onto transactional analysis and can be a plank in your understanding of where dynamics between interactions can lie).

Generative listening

This is the ultimate aim and gold standard of listening in the coaching space. You’ve developed a rapport and trust in which the person you’re talking with is happy to change, question their personal views and preferences and look for opportunities to change in the future. It’s only possible when you’ve created the psychological safety to explore those new pathways and take risks without personalities getting in the way.

That’s six isn’t it? Plus some sub headings… I think that personally the main underpinnings I took from reading and hearing about listening levels was the importance of being genuinely curious about the other person and allowing them to run dry of their own ideas before jumping in.

I’d be interested to hear your thoughts on this. (I know I’ve got regular readers, please don’t be shy at offering your thoughts in the comments section).

Appendix

*Reflective practice – When you’re looking to develop you’ll often have set aside time to reflect on a coaching session, on what has worked and what hasn’t and to explore what aspects of your practice that you want to pay attention to. The key within this is really to ensure that you bookmark some time immediately before and shortly after the session to decide a plan of action with regards to the thing you’re looking to develop. If you get lost in self-reflection during the coaching that’s bad as you’re not fully there for the client. Also interesting to ponder from a scientific standpoint**

**https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Observer_effect_(physics)