Connectional Listening

Meaningful Communication rooted in Connection

Connectional Listening centers on engaging with presence, receptivity, and compassion while suspending judgment and the urge to solve. Shaped by tested practices and “StoryListening” research, this dynamic workshop equips participants with an effective methodology designed to enhance trust and deepen understanding. Participants will learn to skillfully facilitate conversations that encourage speakers to access internal strength and external resources.

This full-day workshop is ideal for hospitals, hospices, medical schools, colleges of nursing, and organizations that support clinicians and caregivers as well as businesses dedicated to building a healthy workplace culture.

Workshop Topics

  • Connectional Listening Skills: Guiding principles and applications
  • Individualized Humility: Honoring perspectives, identities, and cultures through respectful inquiry
  • Secondary Stress: Recognizing and managing empathic strain
  • Self-Sustenance: Building internal reserves and bandwidth
  • Mutually Generative Support: Fostering healing and growth

Participants will learn how to:

  1. Cultivate an attentive, non-anxious presence
  2. Embody a stance of engaged neutrality, acceptance, and non-agenda
  3. Honor silence as a meaningful part of communication
  4. Validate experiences through receptive, responsive listening
  5. Acknowledge both universal and unique experiences
  6. Offer support that is non-directive yet resourceful

DETAILED LEARNING OBJECTIVES

Kind Words

Excellent. Lots of great concepts that can be used in all aspects of healthcare! Role playing added a lot.

The format was a nice balance of didactic and group participation. Reinforced my current clinical practice.

I appreciated the integrated nature of the workshop. It pulled from various philosophies, world religions, and practitioner/clinicians to create holistic guidance for this type of interaction.

I feel better equipped to listen to my patients and prepare myself for navigating difficult conversations.

I feel much more confident and grounded in my ability to listen to people and ‘be with’ them without an agenda.

It took a very intimidating topic and broke it down into manageable pieces.

Participants Appreciate:

  • Informative demonstrations
  • Clarifying practice sessions
  • Comprehensive slides and helpful handouts
  • The balance between presentation and participation
  • Actionable strategies
plan a transformative workshop for your organization, university, or community

Reach out to discuss costs and scheduling. Internal budgets/grants focused on employee/student retention and wellness, effective communication, workplace culture, patient/client satisfaction, hospital CAHPS scores, and care home quality measures are particularly applicable. Detailed learning objectives for continuing education.

Schedule this immersive event and learn how to:

  • Create invitational spaces for sharing–even when information must be gathered or delivered in clinical conversations
  • Hone listening skills with effective practices
  • Sustain emotional wellness and care capacity

Your Instructor

Francesca Lynn Arnoldy is an experienced educator, speaker, and community doula. She is a published researcher with the Vermont Conversation Lab as well as the author of Cultivating the Doula Heart, Map of Memory Lane, and The Death Doula’s Guide to Living Fully and Dying Prepared. Francesca runs The Death Literacy Educator Course & Community, an online program that trains and supports community guides. She was the original developer of the end-of-life doula programs at the University of Vermont. A trusted thought leader, she has been featured in articles by The New York Times, Fast Company, Newsweek, The Verge, and AARP. Francesca regularly presents on life-and-death topics with hopes of encouraging people to support one another through times of intensity.

Related Publications and Press:

  • Arnoldy F, Garrido M, Wong A, Pratt S, Braddish T, Brown G, Reblin M, Rizzo DM, Gramling R. “Protocol for a Scalable StoryListening Intervention for Grief-Related Loneliness During COVID-19.” Palliative Medicine Reports. Aug 2023.
  • Reblin M, Wong A, Arnoldy F, Pratt S, Dewoolkar A, Gramling R, Rizzo DM. “The StoryListening Project: Feasibility and Acceptability of a Remotely Delivered Intervention to Alleviate Grief during the COVID-19 Pandemic.” Journal of Palliative Medicine. Sept 2022.
  • Gramling R, Javed A, Durieux BN, Clarfeld LA, Matt JE, Rizzo DM, Wong A, Braddish T, Gramling CJ, Wills J, Arnoldy F, Straton J, Cheney N, Eppstein MJ, Gramling D. “Conversational Stories & Self Organizing Maps: Innovations for the Scalable Study of Uncertainty in Healthcare Communication.” Patient Educ Couns. Nov 2021.

Vermont Conversation Lab Hosts SOCKS StoryListening Workshop