watch tHe skies

Whenever I decide to review a book I always have a quick google to see what others are saying about it. I don’t mean reading the reviews on Amazon - people who review on Amazon either love a book or hate a book, I rarely see objective reviews on there. That isn’t to say that my reviews are objective, in fact they are highly subjective. After all we all read for a reason, and my reason is very specific when I tackle a tome such as this. “What does this book tell me about being a better xxxxxx (customise to suit)”. In the case of this book I was interested in empathy. I was hoping to understand what makes some people “people persons” and other people not that people-friendly.  From that I wanted to know how I could improve my own people skills, and hence improve team performance, and make working with me in whatever role I adopt an enjoyable and rewarding experience. I digress. If you want to read an objective, in-depth review of this book, go here.

Back to my thoughts. Interestingly before I read the book, based on a primitive understanding and assumption of what emotional intelligence was, I believed myself to be fairly emotionally thick. Not a good characteristic for a coach.

Fortunately this book caused me to reassess my own view. The EQ concept argues that IQ, or conventional intelligence, is too narrow; that there are wider areas of emotional intelligence that dictate and enable how successful we are. Success requires more than IQ, which has tended to be the traditional measure of intelligence, ignoring eseential behavioural and character elements. We’ve all met people who are academically brilliant and yet are socially and inter-personally inept. And we know that despite possessing a high IQ rating, success does not automatically follow. The essential premise of EQ is: to be successful requires the effective awareness, control and management of one’s own emotions, and those of other people. (more…)

Helping people to make change, lasting change that really improves the quality of their lives, requires a great deal of trust and rapport between client and coach. After all, much of the work is done at an unconscious level, even without hypnosis. So being able to develop that trust quickly is very important. (There’s more on rapport specifically here.) Trust also develops when the client believes the coach to be competent and experienced, and a great way to demonstrate that is to be able to tell the client things about themselves that imply a “seen this before” experience in the coach. This maybe the case, or it may be a generalisation, or it might actually be cold reading.

So what is cold reading? Well Ian Rowland in his book describes it thus, “Cold reading is a deceptive psychological strategy. Among other things, it can be used by someone who is not psychic to give what seem to be a very convincing psychic readings. Cold reading is neither one single technique, nor one single procedure. It is better to think of ‘cold reading’ as the collective term for a set of techniques which can be used in different contexts to achieve different goals.”

Effectively it is a method of using ambiguity based on high probability statistics combined with elaborate wording and plenty of bravado on the part of the cold reader to handle any objections that come his way during the process.

Now I’m not going to say that this is what Psychics use. I neither know the answer to that question or feel the need to pursue an answer. I can, however, say with some conviction that i’m not pyschic. So cold reading could come in handy for me, and for many of you out there who want to communicate more effectively, persuade, influence or whatever you want to call it.

And should you be so inclined, Ian Rowland’s book would be a good place to start. He provides numerous example tools and techniques that can be used to deliver convincing “psychic” readings that would have many people threatening to burn you at the stake. The information is delivered in a matter of fact way, with examples of what works and what doesn’t, and methods to elaborate and really go to town with this stuff. The tone of the book and his view on the ‘psychic’ aspect is explained neatly by this quote, “I am not remotely interested in trying to ‘explain things away’, and nor is any other sceptic I have ever met. For me, being sceptical boils down to one thing: I like to believe in things that are true, and to avoid believing in things which turn out to be complete rubbish.’

He goes on to explain the “Cream principle” - offering a little information to get a reaction, and then gradually upping the ante as the client reacts and provides valuable feeback, both verbally and non-verbally, to the skilled observer, as well as the beauty of being ambiguous with time - whether you have this skill or the potential to have it, etc., etc..

I was surprised (though I shouldn’t really have been) to read that the process of cold reading effectively mirrors that of a coaching scenario which can, of course be generalised in to good practice for any communication, from advertising to a sales call.

He then provides some transcripts of cold readings that he has done, which allow you to spot the various techniques and phrases in his book, within the wider context of an actual dialogue. This is followed by tactics to block the cold reader from working on you, and finishing with his views on the practical applications of cold reading in the real world, such as selling and romance.

All in all I found this to be a fascinating book with many applications. It’s not one to read cover to cover, but to flick through, to try stuff out and return to at some later date to learn something new.

And of course I couldn’t possibly post this without providing you with my own psychic reading for your pleasure. So keep reading if you would like me to tell you something about yourself, and I’d love to know how accurate it is! (more…)

I’ve had a lot of emails over time regarding which is the best book to read to start learning about NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming). For those of you that haven’t emailed, me, have you ever wanted to:

• Communicate with others more effectively?
• Be more persuasive?
• Overcome challenges at work and at home?
• Increase your confidence?
• Get rid of obsessions, compulsions or phobias?
• Break bad habits?

Well all of these are caused in part by how we experience the world, and NLP offers amazing insights in to those perceptions that open up fascinating doors in to how we work, and how we can change. So if any of the above are of interest to you, it is probably worth asking me what the best way to learn a little more about how you can change for the better, isn’t it?

Tough question to answer. Still, just for you I’m going to answer it.

Bear in mind, I’m no expert. And so the books I’m going to recommend are those that I think are the easiest to get in to. I would like to point out though that the best way to introduce yourself to NLP is to do it. Find yourself an introductory course and attend. NLP is at its core about how we experience the world, and the easiest way to learn it is to experience that experiencing, if you know what I mean. You should be able to get a mind-blowing experience from a decent 1 day course, such as Salad’s NLP in a Nutshell, so you don’t need to splash out two grand to decide whether it is for you.

And so on to the books. (more…)

Building an effective team is tough… it would be a lot simpler if people weren’t so darn complicated! Patrick Lencioni provides some useful insight in to the causes of team dysfunction in his leadership fable The Five Dysfunctions Of A Team.

Rather than tell the reader the solution in a textbook manner, Lencioni frames his model for team performance within a short story. Here, we encounter a Silicon Valley organisation in the last throes of life. Previously a vibrant and growing organisation, they have fallen behind their competitors and the exec team are only that in name.

Enter Kathryn, newly appointed CEO and experienced leader, who sets about bringing the execs together in to a coherent team that return the organisation to its former power, and take it onward. (more…)

With the amount of business miles I’m doing growing considerably in recent months (don’t worry, I’ll make it carbon neutral next April), I’ve had less time to spend absorbing the written word.

So I’ve been buying the odd audio book for the car, and this has grown to regularly consuming a book a week in transit, which is great. Of course I still pick up the printed copy cheapo like so I can make some notes, it just means that by the time I’ve listened to it, photoread it and made notes, I know that book back to front. Why listen to it if I photoread it later? Well think of it as a preview exercise that I can do with my hands on the wheel!

And so I’ve been looking around and decided to take the plunge and join Audible.

Audible is an audiobook website that gives you the option to buy one-off audio books for a fair discount, or join them as a monthly member where you get one or two credits per month to download whatever you want, irrespective of individual price.

So if you want to source good audiobooks for a knock-down price this is the place. And if you plan to listen to a lot of audiobooks, then you, like me are likely to get a bit of a bargain.

So as part of my joining introductory offer (£7.99 a month) I got:

Emotional Intelligence (Unabridged) by Daniel Goleman, a book about how the emotional mind works, and why we are wired to respond to it quicker than the rational mind. Understanding this will help you to be more empathic towards people, understand their reactions and therefore help to better manage and motivate people that work for you or you spend time with. £16 for 15 hours of audio if you buy it on its own, so I’ve already saved a bundle!

Success Mastery Academy - Brian Tracy
Brian Tracy’s programs are absolutely fantastic, yet up till now I’ve only been able to afford the small programs. This one is for sale at £200 on his website, and yet I got it for free. A complete transcript of a 2 day seminar, with workbook, this is as close to being coached by Brian Tracy as most of us can get, over 15 hours of audio for free.

A pretty good bargain I think. My temptation is to go ahead and subscribe to the 2 audiobooks a month (£14.99) programme, however I think that I will certainly be able to sustain 1 a month and I can always upgrade if I am ploughing through. As I already have a wishlist of 6 or so books, this looks like a good way for me to make the most of otherwise wasted time.

Incidentally Audible books work on all mp3 players, and you can burn the tracks to CD if you live in the dark ages!

This last week or so I’ve been reading Tony Buzan’s “Use your memory”. Buzan, creator of the World Memory Championships, speed reading competitions and much, much more, shares many techniques on how to make best use of our brain’s amazing ability to remember stuff.

At a basic level, the theory for improving your memory is based on Gardner’s Theory of multiple intelligences. That is, to engage your imagination in the creation of a list. The more vivid the imagination, the easier it is to recall. The book gives a lovely example in the first couple of chapters which is so impressive, that to this date I can still remember a list of 10 shopping items in the book that are completely unremarkable. And that is without using any of the systems that are given later on.

This isn’t really a book to read cover to cover. This is because it is essentially a toolbox of memory techniques and exercises to move on to progressively as you master each one. The techniques are very powerful. After about a quarter of the book you will find remembering a list of 100 items fairly easy, and by halfway through the book a thousand is achievable. Moving on from that you can learn some cool tricks to memorise a pack of cards and pull off quite astounding feats of memory that could earn you good money in wagers at a BBQ this summer. (more…)

Since my last photoreading post I’ve been very busy photoreading as much as I possibly can. Unfortunately getting in to state is still something that takes me a few minutes so I can’t switch it on and photoread everything in sight. However I am getting some photoreading in every day - not the 3 books a day but not at all bad. I did manage to photoread and process a John Adair book “Not Bosses but Leaders” on the train in a couple of hours last week, which was very impressive. You can check out my mind map here to see what you think of the content I extracted in a very short period indeed.

The most profound experience I had during that exercise was wondering what page was the most important for my purpose for reading the book (which was to understand what the key characteristics of a good leader are in Adair’s opinion), I immediately got a number in my head, and when I turned to that page, there it was, a summary of the key characteristics, on a page that I hadn’t even read consciously. (more…)

A big thanks to Kate, who found me a copy of Bandler & Grinder’s Frogs Into Princes for a paltry £12 including package. Finally I can ditch my knackered old photocopy and enjoy the book for real.

Now if I can just find Structure of Magic I&II, Reframing and Trance-Formations to go with it I’ll have my own personal NLP reference library!

With the fourth edition of the Photoreading Whole Mind System book coming out soon, Paul Scheele is offering free teleseminars on activation for those of you who photoread this blog. If you sign up at http://www.LearningStrategies.com/Free.asp you will also receive a PDF of the considerably expanded activation section absolutely free, and it’s not often that Learning Strategies give free stuff away now is it?

Fourth edition of the book is due out next month.

Picture it. Ebay. 1 minute to go and Frogs Into Princes is sitting at a very attractive £14, so I prepared to bid. And yet, across the gulf of the web, wallets immeasurably superior to mine regarded this book with envious eyes, and quickly, and boldly, they drew their plans against me…

My bid for £20 was overshadowed by a the winning bidder getting it for £40….! Forty quid for a second hand transcript of a 1970s lecture on neuro-linguistic programming..! And so I am still bookless AND i’ve wasted a week watching an auction on ebay… Grrr.

On the plus side I’ve found a great forum for discussing all things N, L & P with people who know way more than I do. However, unlike most forums, those with the knowledge seem keen to impart it on request without belittling comments. If you are interested in NLP, maybe considering doing a course or have some questions, head over to www.nlpconnections.com and say hello, you might well see me there too.