NLP Essentials: Rapport

I was speaking to a fellow coach on the importance of rapport and trust in a coaching conversation. Let me sum up the whole conversation in a simple manner: rapport in a conversation, is like oxygen in the air. If it is absent, the conversation is dead.

Look at all the different situations in life where rapport is essential:

• A teacher and student in a classroom
• A child and parent at home
• A manager and a team member going through a difficult professional/personal situation
• A doctor and a patient
• A passenger and a cab driver
• A restaurant waiter and a guest
• Airline crew and passengers
• A coach and players on a sports team
• An audience and a theatre performer
• A startup founder and potential investors
• You, and your next client

You can add many more situations that are inter-personal individually or as a group, and the single most crucial element that can make for a conversation that is smooth and seamless, is rapport.

We have all been in conversations where rapport is missing. Rapport is the ability to engage with another person in a manner that we get a resonating response. Where the interaction seems to originate from one person, but soon melts into a dance like flow of communication where one leads the other.

Rapport is the removal of difference or dissonance in an interaction, in a relationship or in a conversation. I often find that rapport is reduced to small talk, and people often prepare for a conversation with a mindset that they will spend the first 5-10mins creating rapport and then going on with the conversation. Done that way, it can easily come across as fake and manufactured. But done with a genuine interest in the other person, and by keeping our own world aside as we focus on the other, and rapport can be a beautiful enabler.

A lot of emphasis is given to creating rapport, but we hardly hear about having rapport with oneself. It is an odd thing that we strive to create rapport with the person out there, but not with the person who we are, within.

In my view, the main element that people miss in rapport is to ground and center themselves into a space where they accept themselves, and then work outwards. In creating rapport with our own self, acceptance is, of what is present here and now. To illustrate this, think of someone who sits facing you and is constantly distracted by the phone or by what is happening in the surroundings. Would you feel connected with that person? Would you be able to hold your composure as notice them disengaged? Probably not! And if that is so for a conversation with another, imagine how you could create rapport with someone else, if your mind drifts and shifts in and out of the present moment.

How does one access rapport with oneself and another?

• Self Check-In: Start with checking in with yourself (what are you feeling, how are you breathing, how are your shoulders, hands and feet, notice the thoughts running in your head) – don’t suppress what you notice, just accept it as “Ah! So that’s what is going on with me!”
• Settling In: You will notice a sense of slowing down as you become fully aware of your presence. (There is no magic 5mins or 10mins time for this. If you practice this repeatedly, you will observe how long it takes for you, and you can start keeping that much time aside to do this for yourself)
• Focus on the other: Once you are settled, then begins the focus on the other person. Park your ideas, notions and thoughts aside, and focus 100% on the person in front of you.
• Be with them: Experience their presence fully, like you did with yourself. You’re giving yourself room to equalise at their frequency or wavelength or vibe, as we say nowadays!
• Maintain state: One crucial thing is to not do this just at the start, but to maintain this settled focus on your state and the other person, throughout the interaction. Treat this settled focus like it is the oxygen of the conversation.

There are many techniques to build rapport in NLP, but this is the essence to start with. One interesting thing you will notice is, unconsciously, this is also what works when we are in the presence of animals. Next time, notice what happens when you visit someone’s home and a pet comes over to assess you. That initial tug and pull that happens, is the attempt to build rapport and finding a way to connect.

Focusing on building rapport with our own self is crucial in building rapport with others. If you begin with this, then the following things get addressed:

• Overcoming different kinds of fears
• Handling uncertainty
• Navigating changes with ease
• Dealing with different people and their personality
• Thinking straight in pressure situations
• Overcoming sense of overwhelm
• Keeping stress and burnout away
• Meeting new people and making connections
• Being at ease with expressing own ideas

People will remember you for how you made them feel during the conversation. What you said, comes second. And if you want to leave a memorable impact on others, then try to start with rapport! There is nothing magical or mystical about developing rapport with another. It is a skill that can be practiced, learnt and acquired. Practice is the key, of course!

There are many other aspects to rapport – a whole day can be spent, and it can still be less, such is the exciting nature of this practice!

The next time you find yourself in any of the situations mentioned above, try this simple process, and notice what it does to your frame of mind in that situation, as well as to the quality of interaction with the other person(s).