Ola Aiyegbayo

“I am investigating the Kennedy assassination.” “Are you an investigator now?” she asked with a broad smile. The last time we dined, my profession was a failed movie producer. “Not yet, but I am learning how.” “And how do you do that?” It was a question I had been wrestling with since I had begun my interviews. For my first interview, I prepared 10

The skilful bookshop owner and the gifted editor have lessons for our professional lives as well as our pleasures. Can you make connections other people cannot? Can you identify a helpful analogy? Will you bring an outsider’s perspective? Can you reconfigure existing information in a new and original way? Can you take one position while still inhab

People will always hear what you haven’t said. Or they will hear the minor points and miss the major ones.

Being a good listener is one of the most important and enchanting life skills anyone can have. Yet few of us know how to do it, not because we are evil but because no one has taught us how and – a related point – few have listened sufficiently well to us. So we come to social life greedy to speak rather than listen, hungry to meet others but reluct

Well, ample research shows that experiences (vacations, restaurant meals, sporting events, concerts, courses, learning a new skill) tend to induce more joy than new possessions (cars, houses, tablets, clothing, furniture, televisions, dishwashers).

The questions you ask are signifiers that you are listening. Try to construct each question as a follow-up to a previous answer.

Dig deeper by asking quick follow-up questions. Golden information comes the deeper into a conversation you go.

The purpose of listening

is not to reply,

but to hear what is not being said