For about 10 years in the early 2000’s I moonlighted from corporate America as a Comedy Stage Hypnotist. It was an absolute blast. I got to meet and entertain so many amazing people. I learned some valuable lessons along the way. In preparation for that stint, I studied Psychology, Hypnotherapy, NLP (NeuroLinguistic Programming,) and obviously Comedy/Public Speaking. An important skill in that environment is to be able to very quickly build rapport with anyone to gain trust. This article will highlight some key shortcuts or hacks I learned along the way about building rapport quickly and where I found it most useful in leading others.
Websters dictionary defines rapport as, “a friendly, harmonious relationship especially : a relationship characterized by agreement, mutual understanding, or empathy that makes communication possible or easy.” This is true and it typically takes a long time for one to build rapport and true trust. The following are some shortcuts to significantly (and in most cases very drastically) reduce the time to achieve rapport with some one you’ve just met.
Appearance – This one is pretty basic. If everyone is in tuxes and you show up in shorts and a t-shirt, you’ll obviously not fit in and to get others to feel as though you are just like them you’d certainly be fighting an uphill battle.
Consider it this way, say you were a typical American and someone dropped you off in a remote jungle village. No one there dressed or looked like you, no one spoke like you, they had different behaviors. You’d be in shock and feel completely out of place. Now imagine you saw someone walking toward you from a ways off who was dressed in a pair of jeans and a ball cap from a sports team you knew. By all appearances, the stranger was also an American. You’d instantly feel some sort of a connection with this stranger. I’d guess they would feel the same with you, as well.
Whenever possible, adjust your appearance to match the person or group you want to build rapport with. While you should never judge a book by the cover, understand that unconsciously we assume people who look like us are like us and we are more willing to trust them.
Communication – Communication is always extremely important in building any relationship. Ensuring that your message is getting across, expectations are set correctly, etc.. When considering communication in regards to building rapport, presenting information in a person’s desired format of receiving that information creates a perceived trust in the messaging in general. This in turn builds a trust in the message just based on delivery. I’ll dive in a little to make it clear.
NLP (NeuroLinguistic Programming) teaches that everyone has a primary representational system or sensory modalities. That essentially means the way a person prefers to receive information or how they most quickly absorb information. Those representational systems are as follows:
Visual – Prefer to see things to understand them quickest. Typically use ‘sight/visual’ words when speaking (i.e. ‘I see what you mean.’ , ‘Look at that.’)
Auditory – Prefer to hear things to understand them quicker. Typically use ‘auditory/hearing’ words when speaking (i.e. ‘I hear ya.’ , ‘That sounds good.’)
Kinesthetic – Prefer to learn and understand things with a more hands on approach. Typically will use ‘Kinesthetic/Feel’ words when speaking (i.e. ‘I feel ya.’ , ‘That really touched me.’)
The other two are Gustatory (taste) and Olfactory (smell) and are less important for these purposes.
These sensory modalities transfer outside stimuli (information) to our brain. They also encode and transfer that information into our long term memory. When one hears information presented in their preferred style, they are much more likely to believe the messaging, believe it is tailored for them, and feel more connected to the deliverer of that information.
So as one speaks, listen to the words they use. If they speak in Visual, adapt your message to their style. It is easy to pick up their style within a couple of sentences and it is extremely easy to spatter your messaging with their preferred style. You’ll be amazed at the results. They’ll subconsciously feel a connection to you.
Mirroring/Matching – The final technique in gaining quick rapport is also from the NLP bag of tricks. Most of our communication is non-verbal (90+%.) Matching and mirroring are another technique to get a person you are speaking with to instantly (subconsciously) have more trust in you and feel a stronger connection.
Mirroring – Mirroring is just as it sounds. When you mirror a person you adjust your physiological condition to mirror those. If they tilt their head left, you would tilt yours right as if they were watching you in a mirror. Become their reflection. Mimic their body language, their tonality, and their attitude. You can mirror their breathing (watch their shoulders,) mirror their blinking rate, or mirror their speech speed and volume. Regardless of your words, this gives a ‘gut’ feeling (subconscious) that you are similar and as a result trustworthy.
Matching – Very similar to mirroring, except you match the other person generally. You’d also slightly delay your matching. So if the person you are speaking to crosses their right leg over their left, you may do the same a second or two later. If a person is tapping their foot at a certain rate, match that rate by tapping your finger. You can also do the same with breathing, blink rate, etc. Either mirror it directly or match it with a similar physiological movement. Again, this will subconsciously give the other person a feeling of connection and make you appear more trust worthy.
Matching and Mirroring are to be used with caution. You never want to use them obviously. They should be used subtly as to not allow the person you are speaking with to be aware consciously of what is going on. If they become aware of what you are doing, you will ruin any rapport you have developed.
So if you are dressed in a similar manner (not over or under,) you’ll seem a little more like them. When taking to them you figure out the person’s primary representation style (sensory modality) and adjust your communication to be their preferred method of receiving information, they’ll be even a little more receptive to you. And finally, in continuing your discussion you can begin to subtly mirror and/or match their physiology, tonality, and attitude. You will have almost an unfair advantage. They’ll feel they just ‘click’ with you and won’t be sure why. You’ll be at a level of rapport that often takes many conversations over long periods of time to achieve and you can do it fairly easily in minutes.
I have briefly covered just a couple concepts from NLP. If you want to learn a ton more about NLP and how you can use it in leadership and in business in general, stay tuned for an upcoming deeper dive into it in a (near) future post.
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