美国著名的“玛丽•凯化妆品公司”创始人玛丽•凯说：“一位优秀的管理人员应该多听少讲，也许这就是上天为何赐予我们两只耳朵、一张嘴巴的缘故吧。”
Mary Kane (音译),the founder of the famous American company Mary Kane Cosmetics Company,once said: ‘A good management officer should listen more and talk less. Maybe that why God gave us two ears and just one mouth.’
倾听是通向心灵的道路，是人际沟通与交流的基石。倾听能够使人们与周围的人保持接触，失去倾听能力也就意味着失去与他人共同工作、生活、休闲的可能。一般来讲，人们很少只为消遣而倾听，而多是为了以下目标而倾听：获得事实、数据或别人的想法；理解他人的思想、情感和信仰；对听到的信息进行选择；肯定说话人的价值。有人说：“会倾听的人到处都受欢迎”。是的，在人际交往中，倾听有着十分重要的意义和作用。
Attentive listening is the door to the heart,the cornerstone of interpersonal communications. Attentive listening enables people to keep in touch with others. Losing the ability to listen attentively means losing the chance to work, live, and have fun with other people. Generally, people rarely listen attentively for entertainment. Instead, they listen attentively for the following purposes: to obtain facts, data and other peoples’ opinions, to understand the thoughts, emotions and beliefs of other people, to select the information being sent across, and to acknowledge the value of the speaker. Someone once said: ‘People who are attentive listeners are popular everywhere.’That’s right. Attentive listening has significant importance and functions in communications.
（一） 倾听可获得重要信息
Attentive listening for important information
倾听可以得到重要的信息。事实上，交谈中包含着很多有价值的消息，有时它们常常是说话人一时的灵感，而其自己又没意识到，对听者来说却是启发。“听君一席话，胜读十年书”，一个随时都在认真倾听他人讲话的人，在与别人的交谈中就可能成为一个信息的富翁。通过倾听，不仅可以了解对方要传达的消息，感受到对方的感情，同时还能够据此推断对方的性格、目的和诚恳程度。
Attentive listening helps you obtain important information. In fact,there is a lot of valuable information contained in conversations. Sometimes it is just an inspiration of the speaker that escapes the notice of the speaker but proves invaluable for the listener. As the saying goes, ‘Listening to a wise person is more worthy than reading books.’ Someone who listens attentively at all times can accumulate a wealth of information in conversations. Through attentive listening, one can obtain the message that the speaker is trying to convey, feel the emotions that the speaker is feeling, and detect the personality, purpose and sincerity of the speaker. 不仅如此，通过耐心地倾听，还可以减少对方的防范意识，得到对方的认同，甚至使对方产生找到同伴和知音的感觉，从而加深彼此之间的了解。在一些特殊的情境下，如你对别人谈论的话题一无所知，或未曾考虑，或对别人提出的问题不便于直接回答，这时最好的办法是认真倾听，并保持沉默。Moreover, attentive listening can let the speaker to lower his/her guard, to obtain his/her acknowledgement, or even let him/her feel as if you are his/her soul mate, hence deepening the understanding between you and the speaker. Under particular circumstances, such as when you know nothing about the topic being discussed, you have not thought about the topic,or you find it hard to answer someone’s question directly, the best way is to keep listening attentively and keep quiet.
另外，倾听还可以弥补自己的不足，当自己对某些问题了解不多或难以作出决定时，最好先倾听一下别人的意见和想法，并通过对别人意见的归纳和总结从而提出自己的看法。在倾听中可以通过适时提问澄清不明之处，或是启发对方提供更完整的资料。倾听可以训练我们以己推人的心态，锻炼我们的思考力、想象力和客观分析能力。
In addition, attentive listening can help you improve. When you do not know enough about a topic or when you find it hard to make a decision, you should listen to other people’s opinions and come up with your own ideas after summarizing others’ ideas. During attentive listening, you can ask questions at the appropriate time to clear any doubts or to request for more complete information. Attentive listening can help us to put ourselves into other people’s shoes, train our thinking skills, imagination, as well as objective analytical skills.
（二） 倾听能够产生激励作用
Attentive listening to inspire
善于倾听的人能及时发现他人的长处，并使其发挥作用。倾听本身也是一种激励方式，能提高说话者的自信心和自尊心，加深彼此之间的理解和感情，因而也就激发了对方的谈话热情与沟通诚意。在很多情况下，倾听者的目的就是倾诉即“一吐为快”，而并没有更多的要求，甚至有些时候，只要你倾听了倾诉者的倾诉，问题也就解决了。日本、英美一些企业的管理人员常常在工作之余与下属一起喝咖啡，其目的也正在于给下属一个自由倾诉的机会。
Attentive listeners are able to find out the strengths of others and make use of them. Attentive listening itself is a way to inspire, to help boost the confidence and dignity of the speaker, to deepen mutual understanding and feelings, and hence to stimulate the speaker’s passion and sincerity. In many circumstances, the purpose of the attentive listener is just to listen to what the speaker has to say. Sometimes, the problem is already solved once you have listened to what the speaker has to say. The managers in some Japanese and Western firms often have coffee with their subordinates after work, the purpose being to give their subordinates a change to talk freely.
（三） 倾听能够给人留下良好的印象
Attentive listening to leave good impressions
一般来说，人们都喜欢发表自己的意见，如果你愿意给他们一个机会，他们会觉得你和蔼可亲、值得信赖。戴尔•卡耐基曾举过一个例子：在一个宴会上，他坐在一位植物学家旁边，专注地听着植物学家跟他谈论各种有关植物的趣事，几乎没有说什么话，但分手时那位植物学家却对别人说，卡耐基先生是一个最有意思的谈话家。可见，学会倾听，实际上已踏上了成功之路。
Generally, people like to express themselves. If you are willing to give them a chance to talk, they will think that you are easygoing and trustworthy. Dale Carniege once used an example. During a dinner party, he sat near a botanist and listened attentively to the botanist, who talked about funny stories of plants. He seldom talked, but in the end, the botanist told others that Mr Carniege is an interesting speaker. Hence it is shown that once you master attentive listening, you are already on the fast track to success.
（四） 倾听能激发对方的谈话欲望
Attentive listening to stimulate the desire to talk
谈话是人与人之间沟通的重要途径，它能帮助人们解决问题，创造新点子，发现新方向；让人们觉得不再孤单，比较有自信，比较受赏识，比较有价值。因此，在谈话过程中，如一方能够主动倾听，让对方觉得自己的话有价值。就能让他说出更多更有用的信息。并且，倾听不仅能够激发对方的谈话欲望，而且能够启迪对方产生更多或更深入的见解，从而使谈话双方均受益匪浅。
Conversations are an important way of communications. They help people solve problems, come up with new ideas, discover new directions. They make people feel no longer alone, more confident, more appreciated, and more valuable. Thus, during conversations, if one of the parties can listen attentively to make the other party feel that what he says is of value, then the speaker would reveal more useful information. Moreover, attentive listening not only inspires the speaker to talk more, it also inspires them to come up with more or deeper thoughts, hence bringing mutual benefits to both the listener and the speaker.
自己翻译的，大意没错，希望答案对你有用。