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How to Gain Rapport With Anyone
Alvin Donovan
Rapport is the way to easily and naturally eliminate perceived
differences between yourself and the other person.
Benefits of this article:
* establish rapport in 30 seconds or less with anyone.
* build trust into every communication.
* send subliminal messages of likeness.
* improve your range of responsiveness.
* achieve personal and professional flexibility.
* establish deep bonds of trust - quickly.
* covertly calibrate that you have rapport.
* know when you have made your point so you can avoid "over
influencing".
* covertly calibrate when a person changes states.
* using your senses to develop understanding of others.
* establishing meaningful communication.
* improving your responsiveness range.
* build trust into your communication.
* verifying the current level of rapport.
* getting clients to focus on you.
Would it be helpful to have a way to get people to naturally
like you? To have clients immediately bond with you? Would
it be helpful to be able to speak with your clients in such
a way that your message is irresistible?
How can I easily and naturally do this?
People like most those who are most like them. The conscious
mind is that part of your being that can best be defined by
saying what it does. It enables you to shift your attention
from one thing to another. Therefore, what you are aware of
is that part of you that would be called your conscious mind.
Your unconscious mind is that part of you that contains your
long term memories.
It is also is in charge of automatic behavior - that is -
reflex action. In a study of communication at the University
of Pennsylvania in 1970 ("Kinesics and Communication," R.
Birdwhistle, University of Pennsylvania, 1970) the researchers
determined that in communication, only seven percent of what
we communicate is the result of words that we say, or of the
content of our communication.
Thirty eight percent is a result of our vocal behavior, which
includes tone of voice, timbre, tempo and volume.
Fifty-five percent is a result of our nonverbal communication,
i.e. our body posture, breathing, skin color and our movement.
So you can understand that "competent" persuaders spend most
of their time concerned with what they say and very little
about how they say it. By the way, do you consider yourself
competent? Do you know what they call the guy who graduated
last in his class at medical school? Doctor!
Someone who is competent is someone who has the minimum requirements.
Someone who is adequate. If you are going in for brain surgery
do you want the guy who is competent but the last in his class
or do you want to find the best that you can?
Maybe you would even want to have someone who is world class
excellent?
You will believe more in your product and that will be communicated
through your demeanor, attitude and elegance with which you
persuade others to realize that yours is the best choice for
them.
Clients prefer to deal with the best service or product. Have
you ever heard of anyone asking who the worst x in the business
is? Of course not.
So anyway, you can understand that competent persuaders probably
spend their time focused on what they are saying, the content
of the message.
How do "world class excellence" persuaders elegantly persuade
others? They spend most of their time concerned with how they
say their message.
Personal training tip
This is very important information that we can already immediately
use. People who are already in rapport were studied using
videocameras. It was discovered that these people were mirroring
each others posture, inflection, breathing rate and so on.
Notice yourself, go into a cafe, restaurant or bar. Observe
a pair of lovers, a group of businessmen whatever. Soon you
will notice that they are mirroring each other's posture.
If one is sitting forward, so is the other. If one is sitting
back so is the other one. This is an unconscious pattern that
people in rapport use to understand and relate to each other.
So what we are going to learn to do is to do the behaviors
associated with rapport to cause the other person to have
rapport with you:
Rapport on the physiological level - Mirror everything
the other person is doing, the more deeply you mirror
the more deeply you become in rapport. It should be like the
other person is looking in the mirror.
Mirror completely:
Whole body- the person's stance or overall position.
Body parts- any consistent behavioral shrugs, gestures, head
nods, or any other types of shifts in their behavior.
Breathing- depth and/or speed and/or displacement. (The most
powerful form.)
Voice- tonality, tempo, volume, intensity and intonation patterns.
Because when you mirror the person's physiology, voice and
speak at their rate of breathing your message becomes irresistible
because it is like their own unconscious (their own inner
voice) is speaking to them.
The rate at which you breathe causes your mind to cycle at
a certain rate. So your breathing rate is the "speed" at which
your mind is "running". When you are breathing at the same
rate as the other person you will be on the same wavelength.
Remember, the first step of rapport is to meet them where
they are. So when you breathe at the same rate they are, your
mind is running at the same rate as theirs.
You will discover that when you do this well, the other person
will not want to end the phone conversation or meeting and
will be hanging on your every word.
Also, people understand best what you are saying at the rate
at which they speak.
If you talk fast you will more easily understand someone who
speaks faster whereas if you talk slowly you will more readily
understand someone speaking slower.
Someone who speaks fast will be a bit bored with the pace
of a slow talker. A slow talker will find someone who speaks
fast difficult to understand. The rate at which you speak
is the rate at which you think and therefore the rate at which
you best understand others.
The key to mirroring someone's breath is to look at them and/or
to listen to them. If you are looking at them, try looking
at them from a head on angle or a 45-degree angle. Notice
the rise and fall of their shoulders against the wall behind
them. Watch their nostrils open as they inhale and close as
they exhale. Also, presumably when someone is talking they
are exhaling and when they stop they are inhaling.
The most powerful form of mirroring:
Breathing- depth and/or speed and/or displacement.
Personal training tip- Why mirror?
Because when you mirror the person's physiology, voice and
speak at their rate of breathing your message becomes irresistible
because it is like their own unconscious is speaking to them.
Also, people understand best what you are saying at the rate
at which they speak.
Personal training tip-
a) How it easily and naturally works in daily practice:
Pace (mirror) everything with a three beat time lag to start,
rapidly narrow the time lag to zero, then lead to see if in
accord. So, the other person leans forward, you wait 3 beats
and lean forward. Next you mirror the person and follow 2
beats to mirror. Narrow the time lag to 1 beat and next you
are doing what they are doing as they are doing it.
Think about the normal business meeting. The people greet
each other and normally make 60 seconds to 3 minutes of small
talk to make rapport. Then one of the persons makes an indication
the small talk is over, both parties shift physical posture
and one person will begin the business part of the meeting.
So, you pace everything the other person does when you first
meet and continue to do so through the first few minutes.
Then will come a time for you to change the subject, move
your posture and begin your presentation. See if they follow
you. If they follow you, then lead them to your outcome.
If not, simply go back and get them. Go back to pacing until
you get them one way or another. In fact, the encounters you
have can become elegant dances of pacing and leading throughout.
b) Pacing and leading:
Everyone seems to like the use of the words pacing and leading
so we use them here. The definition of pacing is talking about
or doing things that are verifiable and true in a person's
ongoing sensory experience.
The definition of leading is: doing something other than the
other person is doing.
Therefore, one of the many tests for rapport is: lead by doing
something other than what the other person is doing and if
they follow you then you have it.
If they don't, go back to pacing.
Remember- You are already always either pacing or leading.
You might think this is something new and strange to do on
a daily business. This is something that all humans already
unconsciously do with each other. You will find that now that
you are conscious of this behavior you can use it to your
advantage to more rapidly achieve your outcomes.
c) Strength instrument calibration: Sensory acuity
In order for you to become completely successful, you need
to continually calibrate your sensory acuity so that you immediately
tune yourself to the non-verbal signals that indicate a particular
state or a change in the person's state.
Begin immediately to truly always notice: Skin color change-
lighter or darker, Skin muscle tone change- shiny or dull,
Lower lip changes- expand (lines not visible) or contract
(lines visible), Breathing changes- location, speed, shallow/deep.
The key is to take a mental picture or movie of these and
continually compare that picture to what you see in front
of you now from moment to moment.
Alvin Donovan, founder of the investment bank www.KiwiGrowthPartners.com,
is the co-author of Make More Money NOW and has also
been a consultant/faculty member for several of the world's
largest management institutes.
Article Source: http://www.upublish.info
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