“THIS is a man’s handshake” said my Dad when teaching me how to impress at an interview at the young age of seventeen, as i was preparing for my interview with British Steel in an attempt to get a training placement and, hopefully, undergraduate sponsorship.
Now I don’t remember whether the following are the actual words, but the basic themes are certainly true, if slightly romanticised. His actual words were probably a little more post-watershed.
“A man’s handshake is a window in to his soul. You can tell what sort of person you are dealing with from that very moment that you shake hands. So, if you want people to see you as a strong, confident individual, then a handshake like this is what you should be giving them. Don’t crush their hands, because you will seem overpowering, but don’t hand over a wet flannel that will leave the other person squeaming to let go and wondering how quickly he can get you, the shirtlifter, out of his office.”
That obviously stuck with me as for many years I have been a handshake snob. In fact I would go so far as to say that the handshake at the start of a meeting, or interview, has had such a profound impact on me as to change my state. Firm handshake - a no mess guy that I can talk to without any BS. Overly tight grip and \ or other hand on mine, and this fella wants to dominate me, so I need to stand my ground. Wet flannel and how quickly can I get this shirtlifter out of my office??
However, my recent reading seems to be telling me another story. What about the other guy? How is he responding to MY handshake, and what about the women whose mobility may have been temporarily impaired due to my crushing squeeze? How am I affecting their behaviour? It is no surprise handshakes can have a profound effect on our behaviour on meeting someone - after all how often do we make physical contact with the majority of people we meet? Certainly in British culture the handshake represents the only contact we make with perhaps 90% of the people we meet, so it is unsurprising that it has such an effect on our impressions of people.
Now my recent readings suggest that I am doing myself a disservice, in attempting to create rapport with the people that I am meeting with. Back to Cialdini again, and his third principle of influence, Liking. People like people like them. So what does this mean? In that first moment of meeting someone, matching their handshake is going to give a considerably better first impression, and help you establish rapport quicker, without the setback of “offending” handshakes. This will take some doing for me. After all I have many years of ingrained response to handshakes - how am I going to react the first time I match a wet flannel handshake? Badly, probably, but being conscious of it is a start, and breaking the anchor between handshake and state will help me to be more responsive to their other communications.
Was my Dad wrong? No he wasn’t. He was known as a strong, confident person, and you knew that from the first moment you shook his hand. Had he know about NLP and rapport, I’m sure he would have simply said “So if I squeeze harder, i’ll scare people? Excellent, I’ll have that limpwristed Union Rep squirming out of the window.” And he would have done, quicker than usual.
