Listening tours are useful for:
- building trust
- finding widespread but subtle pain points
- connecting with front-line knowledge
- diagnosing cross-boundary problems
- finding ambiguous issues (uncertain causation, but certain a problem exists)
- when teams or departments hit a plateau
Listening tours are not useful with change management since you do not want to introduce ambiguity or a sense of uncertainty on your part1.
1. Schillinger, C. Listening Tours: Not just for new leaders. https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/listening-tours-just-new-leaders-chris-schillinger-3qkgf/ (2023).