Solution Focused Listening

Roy Marriott

In this workshop, filmed at SOLWorld 2025 in Mechelen, Roy Marriott invites us to reflect on what it means to listen in a Solution Focused way. He begins with Michael Ende’s story of Momo, the little girl whose extraordinary gift was not advice or wisdom but her capacity to listen. From this starting point, Roy weaves together story, mindfulness, and practice to explore how listening can be both deeply simple and profoundly transformative.

Participants are guided through a short meditation, noticing their own attention and the cycle of focus and wandering. This opens the way to connect listening with qualities such as kindness, curiosity, and presence. The session then moves into practice, including an innovative “fishbowl” exercise structured around Roy’s CORE model: Customer for Change, Outcomes, Resources, and Experiment. Listeners practise reflecting back words with precision, noticing how even the simplest echo can create connection, and how the act of listening can itself generate new awareness.

What emerges is an appreciation of listening not just as a coaching tool but as a way of being — attentive, respectful, and human. The workshop closes with the shared word kindness, a reminder that listening well is always both a gift to others and an act of care towards ourselves.

Listen on Soundcloud