Neuro-Linguistic Programming

['chelle]

Has anyone heard of this?

My local Chamber of Commerce runs courses for local business owners, and they are doing a course in this that sounds extremely interesting.

Apparently its a bit like mind games. You learn how to influence someones decisions by making subliminal suggestions to them, and the desired outcome is that the subject makes a decision which they feel was a completely independent decision free from influence, yet you have steered them towards this decision with neuro linguistic programming (think Derren Brown!)

Apparently sales people use it, but you can use it for almost any aspect of business. I was thinking of going on the course to see if I can enhance my retail sales!

So, has anyone heard of it? Has anyone done any training in it, if so can you offer any opinions??

 

[Gilly T]

Oh yes.. politicians are good at this!!! ha ha

No seriously, a lot of company directors/managers etc., are into this. I've seen it in action. Amazing to watch. It's weird, like blooming hypnotism in some cases. A lot of trainers use this also, not to persuade but to influence behaviour. If you have say a distracting influence some trainers use NLP to change their behaviour. I think it's great but never been on anything.. couldn't afford it.

 

[glenda]

really interested tell me more please

 

[Gilly T]

Not sure if I'm supposed to do this or not (apologies - it is a professional website) but here's a link for CIPD, gives a bit of an insight into it. Terminology is a bit confusing but basically NLP is about influencing yourself, thinking about what your normal behaviour would be, what you want to achieve, how you can get it and how you should adapt your behaviour. I think that's kind of the gist of it... but please don't take my word for it. Go have a read about it.

It also says it's possible to practice the principles of NLP from reading a book!! Some good advice about if you are thinking of going on a course, what to look for.

CIPD - NLP at work

hth x

 

[Susie H]

if its free why not? education is never a bad thing:lol:

 

[Gilly T]

Absolutely! Any learning is good in my book whether it's self learning or in a class! Free is excellent! Makes excellent sense as to why it is a good technique for business owners.. you can influence your customers!!

You will have a manicure... look into my eyes! :green:

 

[Gilly T]

if its free why not? education is never a bad thing:lol:

Excellent signature btw!! Mr Elliot rocks!

 

[hippy-chick]

I would liken NLP to Paul McKenna rather than Darren Brown.
It is excellent for phobias, addictions, etc. Its also a good lesson on body language, for example by looking at someones eyes when you ask questions, you can see if they are telling the truth or making it up!

You can also add tapping to the treatment, a series of meridian points that you tap in sequence to help lower your anxiety levels and reprogramme your brain not to become anxious with certain situations. I actually saw this done when my friend was about to give a talk at a conference in December. Her anxiety levels went from a 9 to a 4, so the tapping was repeated and it went down to a 0, this took a matter of 4 minutes to do! amazing.:!:

I am supposed to be going on a course this summer, my (same) friend is training in hypnotherapy and she has persuaded her tutor to come and do a summer school with us. think its going to be about £600 but thats what biz link is for.

 

[Gilly T]

Doesn't Paul McKenna actually do a sort of 'master class' in NLP or something? Think I got one of his diaries last year or something

 

[Ruth Mills]

Yeah, a boss of a firm I used to work for was heavily in to it. A lot of it involves things like consicous analysis of body language etc. Quite interesting stuff.

 

[Kim Lawless]

I studied NLP when I trained as a Life Coach. It's ok but a bit 90's now. So many people know about it that it's not that effective anymore. I don't use it although it's very easy to do. xxx

 

[Kim Lawless]

Here's a simple example. Say you want to sell something and you customer wasn't sure whether to by or not. NLP would be something like 'So when would now be a good time for you to buy this?' You've planted the word NOW into their brain.

 

[Gilly T]

That's the problem with it. Once you know that's what someone is into(Director at a company I worked for) any prospect of open mindedness goes out the window. He was talking to staff about a re-organisation and possibly redundances and I didn't feel I could trust what he was saying at all whereas if he didn't practice it I might have trusted him a little. I felt like I was being manipulated.. weird.

I think for using it to influence how your business progresses could be interesting as I don't think it's quite the same thing... definitely worth investigating.. hmm

 

['chelle]

I'm going to go on the Chamber of Commerce course and find out more. I agree that you would need to keep it to yourself. I wont be telling any clients as none of them will buy anything more from mein case I'm tricking them!

Specifically I'd like to use it to increase retail sales, but also to "encourage" people to try other treatments, eg get my enhancement customers to also try a manicure with massage, that sort of thing.

 

['chelle]

I would liken NLP to Paul McKenna rather than Darren Brown.

Paul Mackenna definitely is an NLP bloke, but actually Derren Brown very much operates using this practice. If you get a chance, try and see his live show. What he does looks like stage magic, but at the end of the show he shows you how he engineered the results, its amazing!

 

[Gilly T]

I think it's a great idea to go and learn a bit more about it, especially for the benefit of the business. How can you go wrong?

I'd love to know how you get on and what you think of it.

 

[hippy-chick]

you will have to go on it now!!!
how you going to fit it all in?

 

[mikem]

There is a lot of negative press about NLP which in the end comes down to the intention behind it, or what NLP would call the 'ecology'.

I've practsed NLP for 43 years now (we all do it all of the time) and known about it in depth for about 5 years. There are many decriptions of NLP and I haven't found one I really like yet. 'User manual for the brain' is a good one as is the 'science of excellence'.

As therapists, all Geeks will be good at the core skill of NLP - 'rapport'. that's why your clients come back. What NLP teaches you is why you are good at it and how you could be better at it. It does similar things with the use of language, anchoring and loads of other things that we all do unconsciously all of the time.

I had an interesting discussion once where someone believed it was ok to manipulate someone in a negative way (for them) unconsciously, but it was not ok to manipulate someone in a positive way consciously. ' Well i didn't mean to make them feel small so it's not my fault'.......

So one can build on's NLP skills to a point where you can influence anyone to do virtually anything......once. If it isn't in their interests they'll never trust you again.

If you use the same skills with an 'ecological' attitude to help them achieve their goals, they will keep coming back.

You can spend a lot of money on NLP training. If you are interested I would train with a company that train over a decent elapsed time ( for example a practitioner course would have around 18 days training over 5 - 6 months). This allows for plenty of practice in class and between to consolidate skills.

The good thing is that the first session on a practitioner covers the basics of rapport and sensory acuity and should cost less than £300 for 3 days.

I believe that everyone would benefit from training as it gives you a fundamental understanding about people that can make life so much easier. That fundamental is that we all have a map of the world, each map is unique and it's ok to think differently. In NLP there is no right or wrong, just your behaviours and the reactions/outcomes you get. In simple terms if you don't like the outcomes you get, change the behaviours.

I'm sure you'll have sensed by now that I love the subject and would be happy to tell anyone more about it. I use it, along with a bit of common sense and some humour to do coaching as my only therapeutic contribution to our salon.

Regards

Mike

 

[Gilly T]

Do you know if there's a link between NLP and Cognetive Behavioural Therapy or am I way off track?

I worked for a place where the occupational therapy services provide this service to individuals who may suffer from say stress/depression. Is it a similar thing...

 

[mikem]

Do you know if there's a link between NLP and Cognetive Behavioural Therapy or am I way off track?

I worked for a place where the occupational therapy services provide this service to individuals who may suffer from say stress/depression. Is it a similar thing...

I don't know a lot about CBT (always makes me laugh as the acronym is the same as Computer based Training), but it seems to be about facing your fears and overcoming them. If there are any CBT practitioners are around I'd be grateful if you'd correct me if I've got it wrongs.

If this is that case the two are poles apart. NLP would say that if it was really scarey the first time why would you put the client through it again and again. NLP would tend not to make the client relive something bad, particularly if they associate into the state (get the feelings they had at the time). There are a number of techniques in the NLP bag that would tend to give you some tools and resources that you would apply to the situation so that it would no longer be scarey.

One of the presuppositions (something believed to hold true for everything all of the time) is that we all have all the resources we need to handle whatever happens to us. A lot of therapeutic work in NLP is about making the client aware of the resources that they have, which makes it very empowering for the client.

I would liken CBT to Gillian McKeith and NLP to Gok Wan. They both work well with different personality types and both have their place.

Hope that helps.

Regards

Mike