Emily Williams

According to Bernard Ferrari in his book Power Listening: Mastering the Most Critical Business Skill of All, listening is purposeful . It also requires control as you have to steer and filter the information. Additionally, focus and engagement is needed.

As a listener, it is important to listen without filters. Common filters are sympathy, patronization, closed filter, internal dialogue. Empathetic listening is when you listen with your eyes, ears, and heart.

There are questioning traps to avoid. These are bias, leading questions, interrogation, negativity, and invasion of privacy. With leading questions, it is important to remain neutral in your phrasing.

Open-ended questions are great to get the prospective student to expand on what they are bringing to your attention. Closed-ended questions can help drive and move the conversation along.

The 4 C's are helpful when following up with a prospective student. They are: clarity, content, creativity, and confidence.

No shows should not just be immediately cancelled/not followed up with. Things happen/come up, and while they may not be ready now they may be in the future. Additionally, students may prefer texting over calling. Using the feel, felt, found method is an additional tool that can be helpful.

The communication hierarchy may have originally been designed for marriage counseling, but it is an effective tool for an admission's rep as they communicate with a prospect.

The buying process has 5 steps. Awareness, research, shop, interest, and enrollment.

When speaking on the phone, tone of voice is very important as the person cannot see your body language. Use the prospect's name about 3 times per call, and over-deliver where you can.

Challenges show that the prospect is listening to you, and is trying in their head to make things work. A challenge can be a blessing; it can be discussed and worked through.