PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT ACTION PLAN & NEXT STEPS

OBJECTIVE: To become an Active Listener. This new competence cannot to be achieved within a set time frame. It will need to be developed and cultivated within my professional environment, such as meetings with customers or staffs or on a personal level, with my wife. What benefits will you gain by changing this behaviour or attitude, or acquiring this new competence? Becoming an active listener is both a Personal and Professional competence which will ultimately improve my communication skills, i.e. how I react further to information I have.
Becoming a good listener will help me in overcoming a very bad habit I have developed over the years, i.e. an impulsive behaviour, knee-jerk responses, ultimately culminating in anger outburst. What do you think will be the key obstacles you will face when trying to change this behaviour or attitude, or acquire this new competence?

The key obstacle will be primarily to overcome a habit. It’s an innate behaviour acquired, which will have to be dominated or controlled. But it also a defensive response that I have somehow acquired with experience at work or personal life as well when I feel cornered or being attacked.
Another obstacle, in my case is being of a defensive nature, I tend to formulate replies and in the process, miss out on the conversation ongoing.
Distraction is another obstacle. Amidst an important meeting or discussion, I tend to get Easily Distracted if somewhere during the discussion, an irrelevant subject is being discussed, I completely shut myself out of the conversation since it is of no interest and I tend to let this go, without focusing or bringing back on the subject at hand. Having a closed mind, with pre-formulated beliefs, ideas, values, and opinions is another obstacle. Empathising instead of “pretending to empathise” is