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Document 1 of 1 The Secret of Active Listening Author: Madrigal, Demetrius; McClain, Bryan ProQuest document link Abstract: "Hostage negotiation is nothing more than a conversation under stress with people's lives at stake,and active listening is the foundation on which that conversation is based," said Dominick J. Misino, a formerNYPD hostage negotiator and founder of the International Association of Hostage Negotiators (IAHN). Whenapplied in the law enforcement community, these techniques will help negotiators gather accurate information,establish rapport and get the hostage taker to reveal personal information. The hands-on scenario and role-playing provided the best training to date, said detective Mindy Zen, hostage negotiation team leader forMorgan Hill, CA Police. Full text: The art of hostage negotiation does not focus on one particular moment. The most successfulnegotiations are built from solid understanding of the hostage taker and the development of mutual trustbetween negotiator and taker. Many negotiators have found that the most effective way to accomplish this is to listen actively to the hostagetaker as he tells his story, absorbing and processing not only content, but also emotion and subtext. This deeperunderstanding can give negotiators better leverage to persuade the hostage taker to give up and walk out. Seasoned negotiators say active listening is the most powerful tool available to build rapport with hostagetakers, and it significantly increases the chance of successful negotiations. "Hostage negotiation is nothing more than a conversation under stress with people's lives at stake, and activelistening is the foundation on which that conversation is based," said Dominick J. Misino, a former NYPDhostage negotiator and founder of the International Association of Hostage Negotiators (IAHN). Since the mid-1950s, active listening has been widely accepted and practiced in the field of psychotherapy. It isa skill used to build bonds with clients whose experiences can range from post traumatic stress disorder tomarriage problems to career development. However, it has yet to be widely used in the law enforcementcommunity, though its effects in other areas have been accepted. When applied in the law enforcementcommunity, these techniques will help negotiators gather accurate information, establish rapport and get thehostage taker to reveal personal information. Negotiation trainers have begun adding active listening training into their curriculum. However, because of timeconstraints, trainers do not always have the ability to thoroughly educate participants on each technique. Inresponse to this need, ActiveComm has developed a training workshop focusing on applying techniques of thisconcept. Endorsed by IAHN, ActiveComm has developed a fully hands-on course entitled, Applied ActiveListening for Hostage Negotiators. The course has already been shown to be effective. "ActiveComm's Applied Active Listening for HostageNegotiators course proved to be invaluable to our team. The hands-on scenario and role-playing provided thebest training to date," said detective Mindy Zen, hostage negotiation team leader for Morgan Hill, CA Police."Bryan, Demetrius and Jason are experts in their field, providing current and accurate information on anegotiations front. We strongly recommend Active Listening for Hostage negotiators by ActiveComm for allnegotiators." Active Listening Techniques There are key strategies to making active listening effective. Establishing rapport between the negotiator andhostage taker is crucial. This is done through active listening skills that show that the negotiator is interested inthe person. Adding trust, empathy and honest communication to a negotiator-taker relationship leads tosuccessful negotiations. Trust helps the hostage taker believe the negotiator, who promises he won't be hurt if

he comes out. Empathy will make him feel like he has something to live for and he can make the best of a bad situation. Andhonest communication will help negotiators obtain situational information to help keep fellow officers fromgetting hurt should the negotiation take a turn toward a tactical resolution. Building this relationship does not merely entail repeating a series of techniques; it requires the strategicapplication of the proper technique to the proper situation in order to accomplish the goal. With this in mind, it isimportant to know not only active listening techniques but also when and which technique to use. Typically, active listening is used most at the beginning of the negotiation, when the hostage taker doesn't wantto talk to you. It will help the person feel that he made the right choice by opening communication. It is importantin these situations to maintain active listening and be careful not to slip back into command presence. Evenexperienced negotiators can get emotional and slip back into that role, thus changing the tone of theconversation and possibly jeopardizing a negotiation. However, if you are in a tactical situation in which you require immediate control of the subject as a matter ofsafety, it is not an appropriate time to use active listening. You must use command presence to instruct thesubject to perform the actions you require immediately and convey that force will be used if he does not comply. Also, when you feel that you have built a strong rapport and the hostage taker is thinking about coming out, itmight be better to use influencing skills to talk the person out rather than to continue to build a relationship. It is for this reason that another major area of focus for active listening is maintaining communicationawareness. It consists simply of being aware of the emotions of the hostage taker based on voice tone, speechrate and content to name a few. Other important components include your emotions as the negotiator and howyou present yourself to the hostage taker. It's not uncommon for a negotiator to become angry or frustrated without realizing it. And it is very common for anegotiator to miscommunicate messages, saying something that he didn't mean or saying it in a way that couldbe misinterpreted. Strong communication awareness helps keep him in control of the negotiation and avoidmistakes that could be costly. Emotional Labeling Communication awareness is essential for knowing which active listening technique to apply. This skill requiresyou to read the situation, determine your status in the negotiation and choose the technique that will be mosteffective. For example, the skills of emotional labeling and empathy are arguably the most powerful activelistening skills to building rapport. Emotional labeling, i.e., naming the emotion that the person is feeling, is a facet in creating trust. By saying tothe hostage taker, "You sound like you're upset," it can name his feelings without making him angry oruncomfortable. If you get a "yes" you can follow up with an empathic statement such as, "You know, if I were inyour shoes, I'd probably be upset, too." If you get a "no" you can easily change the subject without havingdelved too deeply into the person's emotions. Emotional labeling combined with empathy is the one-two punch for hostage negotiators. It communicates tothe hostage taker, "I know that this is how you are feeling, and it is OK to feel that way." The best time to useemotional labeling or empathy is when you have already established a bond and the subject has begun to openup and reveal personal information. Typically, if you can use emotional labeling and empathy successfully, it willlock in rapport and increase the level of trust. However, if used too soon, it may appear insincere. Overall, learning to use the skills of active listening is not that difficult. Most of the techniques are used ineveryday communication. But because of the intensity of a hostage or barricade situation, it is important toleverage those techniques in order to apply them most effectively. This is why ActiveComm strongly encouragestraining over teaching in addition to recurrent training. By training properly on a regular basis, active listening willbecome an automatic and natural part of your communication toolbox.

The key to any skill is learning it properly, and that requires proper training. ActiveComm places an emphasis onhands-on training (rather than lectures and more traditional styles of teaching), which gives participants time topractice the tools needed for successful negotiation. Repetition of these skills helps cement the action withouthaving to consciously think through them. Though active listening can be compared with normal communication, the situations in which it is used areheightened with the stressors of ensuring public safety, officer safety, and aiming for peaceful resolution. Activelistening, like many communication skills, tends to work best when it is automatic. When time is spent thinkingabout what to say next, it detracts from the capacity to fully grasp the emotional and tactical clues that willinform decision-making. If communication sounds forced or planned, it may be perceived as suspicious. Moreover, negotiation andactions may move too quickly to plan your next move; emphasis should be placed on what the other person iscommunicating, rather than what you are going to say next. This should be your goal any time that you aretraining: to be able to perform the skill without thinking. Another important requirement in training is frequency. Every officer undergoes recurrent training in firearmsand practices regularly between training. The same is necessary with active listening and hostage negotiationskills. A negotiator should practice regularly with his or her team in order to build cohesion and improve skills. Atthe very least, practice must be undertaken in order to keep skills from degrading. ActiveComm's training course not only prepares negotiators to effortlessly use active listening skills, but it alsoprovides officers with excellent practice methods and guidelines. These include tips for practicing in a team orindividually. Regular practice will increase comfort levels in a negotiation and enhance the ability to extractinformation from the subject, keep them calm, and get them to surrender. For any negotiator who wishes to learn to use active listening more effectively, one important training strategy islistening to audio clips of experienced negotiators. Observe how that negotiator uses active listening; it istypically so smooth that you will miss it half of the time. When used correctly, active listening sounds completelynatural and spontaneous. Through the application of the techniques discussed above, combined with recurring individual and teampractice, active listening will become an integral part of your everyday communication. More important,increasing comfort and awareness in high-pressure negotiations will help keep you and your team safe andincrease the chances of a successful negotiation. Sidebar Active listening means just that...intense concentration on what is actually being said. Sidebar www.activecomm.net Sidebar Whether using a throw phone or face to face, the key to negotiation is rapport that comes from listening. Sidebar Entry teams and sniper teams train regularly. So should negotiators. Sidebar Where you are on the timeline may influence which active listening technique to use. Sidebar To post your comments on this story, please visit www.trmagonline.com AuthorAffiliation Bryan U. McClain and Demetrius O. Madrigal are partners in ActiveComm, a San Jose, CA-based negotiationintelligence consulting firm. McClain served with the NASA Disaster Assistance and Rescue Team (DART), anall-hazard federal emergency response and recovery team. He is an associate director of the IAHN. Madrigalhas conducted extensive research in crisis communication and psychotherapy process through San Jose State

University and NASA Ames Research Center. ActiveComm can be reached at info@activecomm.net. Subject: Listening; Hostage negotiations; Skills; Empathy; Personal information; Publication title: Tactical Response Volume: 5 Issue: 2 Pages: 38,40,42-43 Number of pages: 4 Publication year: 2007 Publication date: Mar/Apr 2007 Year: 2007 Section: CNT Publisher: Hendon Publishing Company Place of publication: Deerfield Country of publication: United States Publication subject: Criminology And Law Enforcement ISSN: 15438856 Source type: Magazines Language of publication: English Document type: Feature Document feature: Photographs ProQuest document ID: 221821992 Document URL: http://search.proquest.com/docview/221821992?accountid=15533 Copyright: Copyright Hendon Publishing Company Mar/Apr 2007 Last updated: 2013-05-09 Database: ProQuest Central

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