Since I’ve been promoting the NLP Practitioner training, I’ve been talking about NLP a lot more to clients and friends. One friend asked me, ‘So what has NLP done for you, personally?’

Me: You mean, apart from providing me with a powerful toolkit to help my clients achieve the results that matter?

Friend: Yes, apart from being the foundation of everything you do professionally, what has NLP ever done for you?

Me:  Oh, you mean, personally?  For me, in my life?

Friend:  Yes, what has NLP ever done for you?

Rather than risk carrying on like a bad imitation of a Monty Python sketch, I’ve taken some time to reflect on this and here are ten things NLP has done for me.  Or, more precisely, ten things I‘ve done for me using NLP in one form or another.  It’s not a ‘top ten’, it’s just ten things.

In no particular order…

1. I’ve learned a lot about myself that I can describe in everyday language, and use to my advantage.  For example, I know what’s important to me and why.  I know what stresses me and why.  I know who I like and why.  I know how to get the best out of myself.
2. I’ve learned how to listen to other people and how to respond to other people’s emotions and troubles.  Being English, I grew up thinking that if someone got upset my job was to stop them being upset.  Now I know better.  I’ve learned how to make it safe for people to experience, explore and express their emotions.
3. I’ve discovered how I remember people’s names.  It’s something I’ve always been quite good at, (it took me four days to learn the names of all 100 people on a NLP Practitioner training programme some years ago) but having had my strategy modelled for a Master Practitioner project, I now know exactly how I do it and I teach it to other people.
4. I’ve got rid of my hang-up about driving around right-hand bends.  Having been in the car, aged 8, when my Mum was driving and was hit from the left by a car pulling out of a junction, I was left with an almost unconscious mistrust of that side of the road.  My advanced driving instructor spotted it, my NLP training eliminated it.
5. I can manage my state.  Some years ago I attended a 3-day training programme on Negotiating Skills.  It was a high-pressure environment with lots of competitive exercises and lots to learn.  In giving individual feedback at the end of the programme, the trainer told me, ‘You bring your own weather wherever you go.  Nothing seems to affect your focus and serenity’.  (I wish that was true all the time, but at least I can do it in some situations!)
6. I’ve run my own business for 21 years.  My NLP skills enabled me to manage the transition from full-time employment to self-employment in a way that didn’t feel like stepping off a cliff.  If I hadn’t been able to do that, I probably would never have set up on my own.
7. I’ve extricated myself from more than one unhappy relationship with dignity and respect on all sides.  This takes patience, mental effort and clear focus on what really matters.  Perhaps I should have been applying these skills at the start of the relationships, but at least I’ve minimised the damage on the way out.
8. I’m no longer scared of spiders.
9. I can run a workshop or training day with total confidence.  I don’t get nervous about audiences; I don’t get ‘difficult delegates’ and I (nearly) always achieve the purpose of the event.  This is the result of years of relentless practice of the NLP Trainer skills and a total determination to ‘walk my talk’.
10. I’ve learned that it’s ok to let people be wrong.  I must have been insufferable in my 20s.  I used to think that if someone was wrong I should put them right.  Through learning NLP I first realised that ‘wrong’ is completely subjective, then I figured out that it’s not my job to correct anyone.  Eventually I arrived at the conclusion that differences are good, useful, inevitable and a source of creativity.  (I may still be insufferable but if I am, it’s for different reasons now.)

I could easily have made this list 20 things, or 50.  As I started to reflect, I realised that there are literally hundreds of things I’ve achieved in my life using the NLP toolkit and approaches.  Whenever there’s a gap between where I am and where I want to be, I can use an element of NLP to help me get greater clarity, shift my attitude or break through a mental block.  It isn’t always easy, but it’s always possible.

 

If you’re curious about what NLP could do for you – or what you could do with NLP – have a look at some of the opportunities to learn with Brilliant Minds:

Introduction to NLP – 1 day

NLP Practitioner training – 20 days

Many years ago when I did the training to become a licensed user of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) it was impressed on me that the instrument is not to be used for recruitment purposes.  As there is only one licensed provider of MBTI training in the UK I’m fairly confident that everyone else who has been through the same training will have been given the same message.  And yet, there are many companies who routinely put candidates through the test and use Myers-Briggs types as part of their recruitment process. (I’ve been known to rant about this but I’m restraining myself today)

For a few years now, I have worked in partnership with Vinehouse Essential, a Recruitment Consultancy specialising in Owner-managed businesses and Entrepreneurs, where, as part of their process I interview candidates and compile their Language and Behaviour (LAB) Profile.  The evidence suggests that this is a very powerful addition to the process and contributes to a retention rate way above average.  Vinehouse have a retention rate of 82% – that is candidates who stay and are successful in the job for a year or more, compared to an industry average of around 25-30%.

On extolling the virtues of this approach, I was recently asked, “Why is it okay to use the LAB Profile in recruitment when it’s not okay to use MBTI?”

Good question

The simple answer is this:  MBTI is a personality test, whereas the LAB Profile focuses on (guess what!) language and behaviour.

To be more specific..

The MBTI is a personality test.  It assesses motivations, preferences and natural tendencies but does not assess competence.  So it may tell you that you have a preference for logical thinking but it doesn’t have any way of assessing the standard of your logical thinking.  It might highlight a preference for Extrovert experiences but can’t tell whether your interpersonal skills are any good.  You see?  It only focuses on Type and doesn’t provide any indication of how effective you are in your type.

MBTI doesn’t predict behaviour.  We are all capable of learning skills and behaviour that relate to opposite types.  In fact, in some cases we have better-developed skills in those areas that don’t come naturally because we’ve had to consciously work at them.  An Introvert can have superb interpersonal and presentation skills.  They may want to lie down in a darkened room after a long day at a conference, but as the employer, that’s not necessarily your business.

In recruitment, therefore, a person’s Type is not a very useful piece of information.  It’s not compared to any job criteria and doesn’t give an indication of competence.  Many people make the mistake of confusing preference with competence, but in fact the two are distinctly different.  You knew that! 

I have to conclude that when MBTI is used in recruitment, it’s probably because the recruiters are not making the distinction between preference and competence.  If their success in placing candidates isn’t great, it’s not the fault of the MBTI, although I suspect it sometimes gets the blame.

And another thing…

Like most personality tests (I spent part of my degree studying personality testing so I feel qualified to comment here) the test-retest reliability of the MBTI is embarrassingly low.  If you take a test today and then do it again in a few days’ time (or a few months, or years) it’s highly likely that you’ll get a different result.

Why?  Because all self-assessed questionnaire-based tests are highly sensitive to your mood. 

They’re also incredibly easy to cheat if you know what they’re measuring.  I know I could easily fill out a MBTI test that showed me to be an ESTP type, when in fact my True Type is INFJ.  That’s because I know the model.  I know what each question is aimed at and I know which answer to give to generate which type in the final report.

Which brings me to…

The point about the MBTI is it’s intended for use as a development tool.  Properly administered, the online test is the starting place for a dialogue about personality or Type with a qualified person, in which the distinction is made between Reported Type (which the questionnaire returns) and the True Type, which is the actual personality of the individual.  The True Type is discovered through dialogue.  You could argue that the questionnaire isn’t needed and a skilled practitioner can diagnose type without it, but it’s always interesting to see the person’s self-perception as well.

I’ve enjoyed using MBTI in individual coaching and in team development programmes.  It’s a very rich model and actually recognises that personality develops over time, so that your dominant traits will shift as the years progress.  That’s for another day…

Back to the LAB Profile…

So why is the LAB Profile okay to use in recruitment when the MBTI is not?  Well, the LAB Profile is not a personality test.  It profiles a person’s language and behaviour in a specific context.

In other words, the LAB Profile recognises that people behave differently in different contexts.  By focusing on the context of work, we can discover a person’s motivation triggers and behavioural preferences, which serve to help us predict the language they will both use and respond to as well as their behaviour in that specific context.

This means that by analysing tasks that are part of the job, it’s possible to create a LAB Profile for the role, against which candidates can be compared.  In the process in which I play a part, (alongside all the usual review of qualifications and experience) behavioural competence is tested through the use of task-based application procedures, designed to screen out candidates who do not enjoy or excel at that kind of task.  It takes skill to design a task to test the right traits, but it’s very powerful.

The final advantage of the LAB Profile is that the profile is compiled through expert interview.  And since the LAB Profile is still relatively unknown, the interviewees don’t tend to know what we’re focusing on and we get a very accurate profile.  In most cases, even if they did know our focus, very few people have the behavioural flexibility to fake it – and if they did, they’d probably have enough behavioural flexibility to succeed in a role that demanded something other than their natural preferences.

So that’s why it’s okay to use LAB Profile in recruitment.  In fact it’s more than okay, it’s a very powerful and useful tool for recruiters.

If you’d like to know more about how Nancy Slessinger and the team at Vinehouse can help you with your recruitment, you can contact them here: http://www.vinehouse.com/

In the 1950’s in the UK when my parents married, for a while they both worked for the same company – ICI.  My Mum had left school with the equivalent of several GCSEs and she worked as a payroll clerk.  (She was considered by some to be a little ‘racy’ because she carried on working after her marriage but that’s another story!)  My Dad had left school at 14 with no qualifications and had had a series of mainly unskilled jobs before joining the RAF to do his National Service.  At 20, he was working as an unskilled labourer.

My Dad was paid more than twice the amount my Mum earned. 

Back, then it was normal.  Women were paid much less than men and everyone was used to it.  In the 1970’s the feminist movement won their campaign for Equal Pay.  My Mum got a handsome raise and a lump sum for the back-dated increase.  (By this time my Dad had his own business).

For many people the story seemed to end there.  Women now had equal pay and equal opportunities.  Now can we all please get back to work?

Well, yes.  But over the ensuing decades that work has included concerted effort to stamp out any acknowledgement of differences between men and women.  It’s illegal to advertise for a specific gender of person to fill a particular vacancy except in some very exceptional circumstances.  It’s frowned upon to relate any characteristics of a person’s behaviour to their gender.  It’s ridiculous to think that someone might be unsuited to a job because of their gender.

And yet…

Men and women are different.  Aren’t they? 

They bring different qualities to their work.  Don’t they?

All over the world thousands of researchers are engaged in exploring the differences between men and women.  There is psychological research, anthropological research, sociological research, neurological research, behavioural and linguistic research.  If men and women weren’t different, why would all this research be happening?  Let alone attracting funding!

I have at least one shelf full of books on this subject.  Here are some of the highlights of my learning:

From Deborah Tannen author of ‘You Just Don’t Understand’, ‘That’s Not What I Meant’ and ‘You’re the Only One I Can Tell’ the insight that has stayed with me is about the underlying drivers of communication for men and women.

Warning:  this section contains sweeping generalisations and shameless stereotypes.  I’ll get more specific as we go on…

Men’s communication is driven by the desire to discover and/or negotiate STATUS.  Sometimes this is their own personal status – relative to others.  This is why the job title on business cards can be so important to some men.  In the early stages of a meeting, the exchange of business cards is part of the ritual that establishes the ‘pecking order’.  Once everyone knows who is ‘top dog’ the meeting can progress smoothly – unless someone challenges the hierarchy by stepping out of their role.

Under pressure, men find it hard to admit to experiencing difficulties because this creates a perceived loss of status.  They will also play down the severity of their friends’ problems in order to maintain their friends’ status.  And the reverse is true!

In social situations, men (when unfettered by the presence of women) will chat about sport, gadgets, cars and so on.  This is driven by the desire to establish status on a less personal level.  They debate the relative merits of one team over another, the advantages of the latest smart phone or the speed and acceleration prowess of their favourite cars.  A woman listening in might comment, ‘they don’t really talk about anything’ because she doesn’t share the drive to establish status.

Women’s communication is motivated by the desire to create CONNECTION with others.

In the initial stages of a business meeting women are more likely to ask questions of their colleagues that enable them to find some common ground.  Do we know the same people? Have we worked in the same office at some point?  Did you travel by train today?  Having made the connection, they can participate confidently in the meeting.

Women can empathise with colleagues who are facing difficulties and will be happy to talk about their own challenges if offered a sympathetic ear.  They find it frustrating when their male colleagues won’t talk about problems openly.

A group of women talking together on a social occasion will discuss experiences.  Where they went on holiday, what they did, what they enjoyed.  Others will contribute similar experiences and encourage each other to share personal details.  The conversation will loop around, sometimes returning to earlier topics or repeating previous comments.  A man listening in might comment, ‘they don’t really talk about anything’ because he doesn’t share the drive to create connection.

The next influence on my thinking is the brilliantly titled, ‘Why Men Don’t Listen and Women Can’t Read Maps’ by Alan and Barbara Pease.  In their lively digest of huge swathes of research, punctuated by anecdotes of everyday manifestations of the gender differences in question, I found the antidote to the generalisations that worry modern thinkers: 

Yes, there are masculine brain characteristics and there are feminine brain characteristics.  Crucially, the research indicates that not all the people who possess a masculine brain are male and not all the people who possess a feminine brain are female. (And here the LBGTQ community are recognised too)

So, there are women who have a more masculine communication style and there are men who have a more feminine communication style.  But, most men have masculine brains and most women have feminine brains.

And they’re different!

Which is fundamentally why men don’t listen and women can’t read maps.  But most of us would hesitate to even mention these well-known foibles in polite company.

 (Yes, I know men CAN listen and DO listen at times.  I am a woman and I can read maps – but I have to work at it.  I’m not saying these things are universally true, just that they are based in reality)

I could digress here into the extensive work of John Gray of ‘Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus’ fame, but I’ll leave you to read that at your leisure and move swiftly along to the work of Margaret Hennig and Anne Jardine.

Writing in the 1960s and 70s these two pioneers of research into women’s roles in business compared the attitudes of men and women to the idea of a job and career, to risk and to overall behaviour at work.  What they found was fascinating:

Career

For women, a career is an intensely personal goal.  It represents personal growth and self-satisfaction.  In involves contribution to others and is unrelated to the ‘job’.

For men, a career is a series of steps.  It represents advancement, a path leading upwards, recognition and reward.  A job is part of a career.

Risk

For men, risk is ‘Win-Lose’ situation.  The possibilities include both loss and gain, danger and opportunity.  It affects the future but is not usually related to the present.

For women, risk is a negative.  It represents loss, danger, injury, hurt, ruin.  It is seen as a threat and is to be avoided.  It affects the here and now, threatening what she has now and the future is disregarded.

Behaviour at work

For women, their behaviour at work is determined by their own self-concept.  There is an attitude of ‘I am who I am, take it or leave it’.  Consequently they are not alert to the signals and cues from their boss and are more vulnerable to criticism.  For women, work is for real.  They want to do business with people with whom they feel friendship but often have less self-belief than men.

For men, their behaviour at work is determined by others’ expectations.  They are alert to signals and cues from the boss and will adapt their style for self-interest.  To men, work is a game.  They find out the rules and play them.  They are thus more resilient to criticism. Friendship is an outcome of doing business, not a condition.

Overall, we can see that women put more of themselves into their work, whereas men are more likely to retain a degree of detachment.

When it comes to leadership development, most of the traditional models are based on the male approach because the tradition reaches back to times when most leaders were men.

However, times have changed.  The increase in the number of women in leadership roles has undoubtedly had an impact.  We can see the rise of typically feminine strengths being valued in leaders:

• Creating connection with others
• Natural empathy
• Great listening skills
• Authenticity
• Commitment to their work

Did anyone care about ‘authentic leadership’ when organisations were run by men?  Was it important to create connection or just to reinforce status and make sure everyone kept to their place? 

We have to go back some decades to find those times – back to when my Mum got paid less than half my Dad’s wages even though she had way more qualifications.

So the world has moved on.  It has taken time.  The first women in leadership roles were faced with the choice of either conforming to the traditional male models of how to do business or running the risk of being ignored and despised.  (And we know about the female attitude to risk!) Their lack of ability in the power games and jostling for status that characterised the traditional male cultures made it hard for men to know where they ‘fitted’ so they either ignored them or slotted them in at the bottom of the pecking order.  Women who tried to create connections with male colleagues were regarded as ‘nosy’ or flirtatious.  Men who welcomed a more heart-felt approach to business were ridiculed and side-lined.  For a while.

Gradually, the two models began to intersect and to work together.  Gradually the best of each was allowed to flourish.  Gradually we created business cultures where men and women can work side-by-side and can take advantage of similar opportunities.  (No, it’s not perfect, but it’s real progress)

And now, the new generation of ‘millennials’ is bringing a different attitude to work.  One, I think that owes less to the traditional masculine models and more to the blend of both male and female models.

Members of this new generation have their own agenda.  They won’t work to rules they don’t agree with and their primary loyalty is to their own well-being.  They don’t respect job titles, but they do respect you if you are good at your job.  They want job satisfaction now, not in twenty years’ time when they’re too exhausted to enjoy it.  They want quality of life, across all areas of life, not just outside of work.

And my question is this:  if we’re all perfectly comfortable discussing the different attitudes of generations without accusing each other of ‘ageism’ offences, isn’t is time we got over ourselves and starting using our awareness of the different attitudes of men and women without accusing each other of being ‘sexist’?

I really believe that organisations who ignore gender differences completely are missing a trick and that if it were acceptable to talk about these matters we would see greatly improved leadership in many places.  Authentic leadership, that is!

 

 

Stress is a highly personal thing. The situation that has your heart racing and your mind in overwhelm doesn’t produce the same effect on everyone. Other people’s stresses and difficulties might sometimes look trivial to you.

You may already know stress is primarily a physical response. When stressed, the body thinks it is under attack and switches to 'fight or flight' mode, releasing a complex mix of hormones and chemicals such as adrenaline, cortisol and norepinephrine to prepare the body for physical action

In the modern world, this can become a big problem because the causes of stress don’t always require physical action and so the adrenaline, cortisol and norepinephrine accumulate in the body, making you feel more and more uncomfortable.

So what causes the stress? In many situations it’s the perceived threat to our well-being.  According to David Rock’s SCARF model, any threat to

• Status
• Certainty
• Autonomy
• Relatedness
• Fairness

will cause the body to respond. For example if your job is placed ‘at risk’ and there’s a danger you might be out of work soon that hits at least four of the five areas and can create intense stress.  But that’s perceived threat.

The other major source of stress is actual harm to our wellbeing. And this is where the link to sensory preferences can be observed.

If you’ve studied even a small amount of NLP, you’ll have come across the notion of Representational Systems that correspond to our major senses. It’s been noted that most people have unconscious preferences for the use of one or more Rep Systems over the others and these preferences influence everyday behaviour.

If you have a strong Visual preference then how things look will matter to you. A high Auditory preference means you care about how things sound. If how you feel is more important to you, that indicates a mainly Kinaesthetic preference. This suggests you take in more information via your preferred sense and are more aware of experiences received in that way.

Which means that loud or harsh background noise can be stressful for someone with a high auditory preference – especially if they cannot control it (loss of Autonomy).

Untidy or dirty surroundings can be highly stressful for someone with a Visual preference. They’re not being rude when they straighten up the picture on your wall, they just can’t bear to look at it askew! Bright or clashing colours can be equally stressful for someone with this preference.

For someone with a Kinaesthetic preference, being too warm or cold can spark a stress response. An uncomfortable chair can be as distressing as an uncomfortable atmosphere. And again, the experience can be multiplied by the perceived threat of not being able to control the environment.

This suggests that in order to create a place in which to relax, it can be helpful to know your own preferences and to manage those aspects of the environment carefully. In this way, we can protect ourselves from at least one source of stress.

A few months ago I had lunch with a group of senior HR professionals and we discussed the idea of Talent Management.  One of the most striking insights to emerge from that conversation was the realisation that there is no unique, universal definition of Talent Management and that it means different things in different organisations and is conducted differently in different organisations.

(No, this isn’t an article about Talent Management, bear with me)

So I was musing on this during my journey home and I was reminded of lots of other words and titles that mean different things to different people.

Coaching
Mentoring
Teamwork or ‘being a team player’
Respect

Shall I go on?

Leadership
Communication
Working hard
Feedback

All of these are familiar, everyday words and phrases. We all think we know what they mean but the truth is we only really know what they mean to each of us personally.  To another person they may mean something subtly different or something wildly different. The only thing you can reasonably expect is that they mean something different.

This obviously creates the potential for a lot of misunderstanding, wasted effort and frustration.  Indeed, in many organisations it’s not just the potential that is created!

How many times have you worked on a task for someone else, clear in your own mind about what was required, only to find that the other person had something entirely different in mind?

The key to unlocking this is to go into more detail.  But not just any detail.  Specifically, what you need are the complex equivalences.

Complex equivalence is the technical name for the relationship between a sensory experience and the linguistic label (name) we give it. Complex equivalences are not exclusive so the same name may be given to two different sensory experiences AND the same experience may be given more than one label.

Imagine your slightly maverick colleague, at the end of presenting his latest plans, looks around the room and smiles broadly. (That’s the sensory experience, you see his smile). Maybe you think, “He looks pleased with the response to his ideas” (that’s your label for what you see) and at the same moment your boss looks at your colleague and says, “I know that smile; you’re up to something!” (Your boss has a completely different label for that smile).

In the same way, I would say I’m not really a team player. I prefer to work on my own, I like to figure things out for myself and I enjoy peace and quiet in my office. Of course, I have a team I work with for some of the time, but I tend to be leading the team and providing the direction.

That’s what I mean when I say “I’m not really a team player”.

By contrast, I was in conversation with a client about a member of her team and she remarked, “He’s not really a team player”.

“Is that a problem?” I asked

“Of course it’s a problem. We have no room here for people who withhold information from their colleagues and take every opportunity to steal the credit for the team’s success!”

That’s a totally different complex equivalence on what ‘not really a team player’ means.

Respect. That’s an interesting one. Take a moment and ask yourself, “What would someone do, that I could see or hear or feel, that would let me know they have respect for me?”

Or the opposite, “What would someone do, that I could see or hear or feel that would make me think they did not respect me?”

Even better, ask your friends and colleagues. Be prepared to listen and be interested and to refrain from judging their responses, because I promise you, there’ll be some surprises.

Now, back to the task you’re working on for a colleague or senior stakeholder. Are you really sure you know what they want or are you supplying your own complex equivalences to their labels? Here are some useful ways to check:

“It would be easy for me to assume I know what you mean by ‘_______’, but just to absolutely clear, would you describe to me what that might look/sound like?”

“______ is a somewhat subjective thing. Would you tell me how you think it applies in this particular situation?”

“I know that word can be used to mean a wide range of things. Would you tell me a bit more about what it means to you?”

…and so on. I’m sure you can create your own. The final thig to be aware of, is that these complex equivalences are often buried deep down, out of conscious awareness. Most people don’t think about them – that’s what the label if for – to save us having to ralt a long list of sensory experiences. So when you ask a question like those above, you’re asking a lot. You need to be respectful (what does THAT mean?), patient and interested. Above all, you need to be willing to accept that the answer you get may be something totally different to your own opinion. 

Remember: Different is not a complex equivalence for wrong.