Building Rapport Without Patronising

Posted by John on Oct 15, 2011 in build self-confidence | 0 comments

I was recently looking over some course material for a two day workshop on ‘Leadership’.

Under the ‘what you will learn’ section they had, amongst other things, the following items listed:

You will learn

• How to evaluate workplace relationships for maximum productivity
• How to lead with integrity and earn the respect of your co-workers while getting the job done
• How to influence the most persuasive person in your organisation
• How to align a team towards a common direction
• How to motivate the unmotivated
• The 5 steps that successful leaders use to develop other people
• How to achieve results through relationships

All very important competences of course. However, the title of the workshop was ‘The Leader within You’ and irrespective of the title, from surveying the rest of the material, it quite plainly focused on the fact that this was new learning.

Open any sales manual and you’ll come across references to the importance of ‘building rapport’ with prospects and clients. Dictionaries refer to this as ‘sympathising or being in tune with the other person’. The manuals often suggest that this involves new learning for the sales person, in much the same way as it did on the leadership workshop. It can also be seen to have a direct correlation to the level of self-confidence that the sales person possesses.

I remember taking a cold call from a salesman last year. “Hello John, how are you today, did you have a good weekend?” His manual had told him to build rapport early on, before proceeding with his presentation. I didn’t know him and quite frankly took exception to a complete stranger being so familiar and patronising. I cut the call short.

What happens when you walk into a room full of strangers? Unless you are intending to spend the rest of the evening alone, sooner or later you’ll gravitate to a particular individual (or group of individuals). To the proverbial ‘fly on the wall’ it may well look as if you’ve known each other for years, since you are getting on so well.

From the neuro linguistic (NLP) point of view you’d be demonstrating rapport with the other person by matching or mirroring their gestures or postures and even matching their rate of breathing. How do you do that? Well, unless you’ve studied and applied some of these techniques intentionally, you will be quite unaware that you are doing it.

As human beings we have a natural ability to build rapport. I appreciate there are tools and techniques for analysing this and building on it so that we can do it more effectively. I use them with my own clients. Never-the less by working with what’s there, by just being yourself and trusting yourself and being genuinely interested in the other person, you’ll build rapport without being patronising.