 Rapport and NLP
“Rapport” is a term in common usage; we often think we “have good rapport” with a person when we get on well with them and share common views and interests. Thus we could easily consider ourselves to have a good rapport with family and friends. The basis of rapport in NLP is to capture the behaviour patterns used with someone you know and get on well with and replicate these with acquaintances and strangers – even with people with whom you disagree. In this way you can dramatically improve the effectiveness of your communication and develop good relationships with everyone, not just those you instinctively like.
Real rapport comes through an appreciation that not everyone sees the world in the same way, an understanding of these different views and the ability to communicate with a person in the same way they communicate. NLP teaches techniques known as “mirroring”, “matching”, “pacing”, and “leading” and once mastered, these are the tools that will allow you to build rapport with anyone.
Mirroring & Matching in NLP
Have you ever noticed how, when you spend some time with a person with whom you get on well, you find yourself picking up certain phrases that they regularly use or using similar gestures? In doing so you are unconsciously “mirroring” your friend’s speech and movement. Consciously adopting a similar posture to the person to whom you are speaking or speaking in a similar tone of voice are examples of mirroring, the technique at the heart of rapport building in NLP. Matching is a similar process with a difference of timing. Someone may use a particular hand gesture when making a point; you wouldn’t make the same gesture simultaneously, but may use it to emphasise your own point later in the conversation.
Pacing & Leading in NLP
When you need to change the way a person sees a subject, for example in a teaching situation or a sales environment, the NLP techniques of pacing and leading follow on from mirroring and matching. Having used mirroring and matching to establish rapport, making subtle changes in your own behaviour can lead the other person to match and mirror you and be more susceptible to your arguments. You can “pace” the changes based on what you have learned about how the other person sees the world and the ways in which they communicate.
The ability to establish rapport is arguably one of the most important skills in NLP, and one which gives everyone who masters it an advantage in all kinds of interactions with others, from dealing with a surly shop assistant to clinching an important deal.
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