Gift Discovery and deep listening: what happens when a team really listens to each other
You can just be you. What matters is who you are and how you show up.
Recently, a group of consultants from the University of Western Australia’s student consultancy spent an afternoon with us learning about what we do. Instead of simply explaining it, Dave and Elaine led the group through a session. Two hours later, the room looked pretty different to how it started.
What gifts are and how discovery works
Gifts aren’t strengths and they’re not skills either, even though they sit close by. You can be great at something and still have it wear you down. A gift is tied to purpose, so using it tends to fill you up rather than empty you.
Most professional development stops at what you’re good at on paper. This goes further, into what actually makes you come alive and that’s usually where real shifts in culture and leadership start.
The session was run in two halves. First, everyone learnt about levels of listening and what deep listening actually asks of you, drawing on Theory U from the Presencing Institute. Then it moved into Gift Discovery, built around the idea that a gift isn’t really a gift until it’s given.
Working in pairs, people talked through a set of questions meant to gently surface what they carry and want to offer the world, while their partner practises deep listening and scribes what they hear.
People usually leave with a much clearer sense of what they actually have to give and where that might show up in their work, their team or the people around them.
The shift we noticed in the room
With this group, something clearly landed. There was a hunger to keep practising deep listening with each other and to keep exploring gifts inside their own team well after the session ended.
One small moment early on said a lot about the tone we were going for. Dave and Elaine took their shoes off, purely out of comfort, and invited the group to do the same if they felt like it. There was hesitation, understandable in a room full of sharp, well-presented young consultants used to putting their best professional foot forward.
But once they kicked their shoes off too, the room softened. It was clear that what mattered here was who people actually were and how they showed up, not how they looked. A few told us afterwards that seeing each other with their guard down, shoes off and all, let them see themselves and each other a bit differently!
Some left committed to strengthening that deep listening muscle and holding space for people in a different way. One summed it up simply: “I see that I have things to offer, different to what I’d thought and more.”
Why this stays with people
The value doesn’t stay in the room. Deeper self-awareness paired with a new listening skill builds a stronger connection between people. That is what allows strong teams, better collaboration and grounded leadership to grow.
Everyone leaves with a lived experience of connection, not just another idea they heard about. For anyone early in their career or moving through a big transition, that’s a wonderful thing to be given.
If you’d like to bring your team, students or clients to Befriend for a Gift Discovery and deep listening session of your own, we’d love to host you. Reach out to Elaine, our Partnerships and Business Development lead, to start the conversation.
