Use Your Edge

Personal Coaching Styles - Directing Style

2012-02-10T09:00:00.003Z

Have you ever come away from a conversation with a different understanding than that of the person with whom you are talking?

Have you ever thought you had a personality conflict with a person?

Have you ever tried to persuade someone of something and couldn't only to find to find that another person have been able to do so?

In a previous post we introduced The Personal Coaching Styles Inventory®, a self assessment tool that quickly determines natural communication styles and identifies four principal communication style traits.

The Directing Style
The Presenting Style
The Mediating Style
The Strategising Style

The inventory helps you discover why and how these natural tendencies influence behaviour and interaction and helps develop awareness of your communication strengths and liabilities. You can use this tool to identify and appreciate the styles of others and as a result form better relationships by tailoring your communication. Though there may be one style which dominates a little more, people can show similar scores on more than one style and this shows their flexibility and ability to adapt their way of communicating to different moments, contexts and people.

The Directing Style
"This is your Captain speaking"

People who use this style tend to be natural leaders and like to be in control. They are results orientated and eagerly take on new, often risky, challenges and are quick to set goals and work hard to achieve them. They are fast paced and quick thinkers, decisive, visionary and are easily able to see the big picture.

On the other hand, they have a tendency to dominate others. They can be be judgemental and impatient with those working too slowly. They prefer to work alone and have difficulty trusting others with work.

Here is a humorous look at some of the characteristics typical of the Directing Style from the Monthy Python team.

Thanks go to Pedro Pablo R. and Carmen M. from Accelya Madrid for suggesting this video.

The Personal Coaching Styles Inventory® is available as part of The Coaching Clinic®, a two-day leadership programme designed to train managers, executives, leaders and supervisors to use coaching techniques in their work relationships, and thus gain the advantage of bringing a coach approach to managing people.

If you would like more detailed information on The Coaching Clinic® contact us at training@useyouredge.com

Coaching Skills - Acknowledging

2012-02-09T09:00:00.012Z

It’s probably fair to say that we don't usually spend nearly enough time as people would like in acknowledging and celebrating the successes of the people around us. As a result, the skill of acknowledging is an important one for both the coach and the coachee and one that oftentimes takes quite some practice. The dictionary defines 'to acknowledge' as 'to express recognition of' or 'to express thanks or gratitude for'. In coaching terms acknowledging is the process of bringing out the coachee’s best by reminding them of what they already know, who they already are and what they have already achieved and celebrating it with them.

In sport acknowledging plays a vitally important role. Most sports teams or athletes have their set of fans who enthusiastically get behind their team/player, offer support, provide feedback and give lots of encouragement throughout the match. Athletes feed off of that support and it can spur them on to greater effort and new heights of achievement and performance.

On a day to day basis however, in the workplace and at home, we are often too busy with what we have to get done or catch up on to take the time to recognise how much has already been accomplished. It's therefore important to stop and remind ourselves on a regular basis of our successes and of those around us, be they big or small.

When acknowledging, it’s important to recognise effort and progress not just milestones that have been fulfilled. You will also want to highlight the personal attributes that were used to reach the goals and acknowledge who the person is or has become not just what the person has done or achieved. Be specific, genuine and timely in your acknowledging. The more vague you are, the later you leave it, the less impact you have. Effectively endorsing and acknowledging people’s strengths helps them explore new possibilities and get even more energised to move toward the future.

"You get the best effort from others not by lighting a fire beneath them but building a fire within" - Bob Nelson

"I can live for two months on a good compliment" - Mark Twain

Coaching Skills - Powerful Discovery Questions

2012-02-08T09:00:00.001Z

Powerful discovery questioning is at the core of effective coaching and it is the ability to ask questions that support the coachee to move forward. Coaching questions seek to uncover truth, clarify meaning, test commitment and open avenues of thought. Well-placed questions allow the coach to guide and direct the flow of the coaching interaction in a direction that yields the most discovery, prompts the greatest change and is of optimal benefit for the coachee. In order to maximise effectiveness, it is important for a coach to free themselves of their own agenda and come to the coaching conversation with a sense of child-like curiosity.

There are many different types of coaching questions for a variety of different purposes. Nonetheless, there are five simple question words which are of great value, what, when, where, who, which and how. These help you form the type of open questions that have the effect that the coachee finds new options where they thought their were none and begins to think in a different way. The question why can be problematic as it tends to look for justification and can put the coachee on the defensive. Closed questions, questions that have a yes or no answer, can sometimes be useful but more so for clarification, checking commitment and establishing accountability. Remember also to avoid asking queggestions, suggestions (usually from your own agenda) dressed as questions.

The delivery of a coach's questions can can determine it's impact and can greatly effect it's power, urgency, importance and directness to the coachee. It is useful to consider the following elements, your pace, your tone, your volume, your body language and how animated your voice is as well as of course, your words.

"So why do coaches ask questions anyway?”

"...the answers are of secondary importance. The information is not for me (the coach) to make use of and may not have to be complete. I only need to know that the coachee has the necessary information. The answers given by the coachee frequently indicate to the coach the line to follow with subsequent questions...”

John Whitmore, ‘Coaching For Performance’

Coaching Skills - Listening The Chinese Way

2012-02-07T09:00:00.007Z

Solid listening skills are an essential part of the toolkit of an effective coach. Listening to another person for the purpose of supporting his or her growth and development involves knowing how and when to listen and respond, what to listen to and for, what the coachee's words actually mean and when it is appropriate to move the conversation in another direction.

How well you pay attention to what people tell you will determine to a great extent the quality of the information that you can learn from them. As you listen you will also realise that there is not only the words being said but also things such as about intonation, body language, vocabulary etc. You can also hear what's not being said as well as a person's beliefs, values, emotions, states, strengths, perceived liabilities, needs, wants etc.

Listening as a result, is more of an art than a science and something that requires consolidation. A helpful tool to consider in this process is the older style Chinese Character for the word Listening. (Today they use a less complex representation in their writing.)

Each section or portion of the character draws its meaning from other aspects and collectively tell the story of what they believed it meant to ‘listen’ to someone. From the bottom left:

King = Show respect for the speaker

Ear = This is what you use to listen and gather info

10 or maximum = Give 100% or all of your attention

Eye = See all there is to see

One or single = Give all your attention to the speaker

Heart = Get a sense all that is being said

Bringing all of these elements together as you listen will allow you not only to communicate more effectively with all of those around you, but help to ensure you get better results with the clients, coachees, team members, learners or participants etc that you work with.

"Listening requires giving up our favourite human pastime - involvement in ourselves and our own self-interest." - Sonya Hamlin

“To listen well, is as powerful a means of influence as to talk well, and is as essential to all true conversation” - Chinese proverb

G.R.O.W. - A Model for Coaching

2012-02-06T09:00:00.003Z

There are many models out there to support coaches in their work with clients and coachees. One of the most well-know and commonly used is called the G.R.O.W. model. This model was devised by Sir John Whitmore and described in his book Coaching For Performance. The G.R.O.W. model offers a way of structuring coaching sessions to facilitate an effective and balanced discussion.

G.R.O.W. is an acronym standing for (G)oals, (R)eality, (O)ptions and (W)ill, highlighting the four key steps in its implementation.
By working through these four stages, the model raises an individual’s awareness of their own aspirations, a greater understanding of their current situation, the possibilities open to them, and the actions they could take to achieve their personal and professional goals.

Goal: - What is your outcome? What you want to get out of this session?

Reality: - How do you see your current situation? What is stopping you from getting your goal?

Options: - What options do you have to help you get there?

Will/What Next? - What specific action will you be committing to? What, Where, When and How will you do it?

When it comes to setting goals it is also useful to put your goals through the S.M.A.R.T. criteria which you can read about here from a previous post.

One important skill to keep in mind as you coach and work with your coachee is creating and maintaining Rapport, which you can read more about here.

International Coaching Week - February 5-11, 2012

2012-02-05T09:00:00.013Z

International Coaching Week (ICW) is a week long global celebration of the coaching profession held annually, during the first full week in February.

Originally founded in 1999 by ICF member Jerri N. Udelson, MCC, ICW is a designated time each year for coaches and clients to educate the public about the value of working with a professional coach and to acknowledge the results and progress made through the coaching process.

During this extended commemoration, coaches around the world offer a variety of activities and pro-bono services in their local communities to share what coaching has the ability to do.

In conjunction with International Coaching Week we are offering 25% off all coaching sessions and processes booked before February 11th.

Coaching The VIP Treatment - Read about the history of the word Coaching

But what exactly is Coaching? - If you would like to find out more about coaching, read the recent post or visit www.useyouredge.com

For more information on coaching investment packages contact yoursuccess@useyouredge.com

Visualization - Dreaming It All Up!

2012-01-30T09:00:00.015Z

Recently we spoke about how beliefs and values were important in modelling success and saw Michael Flatley from Lord of the Dance talking about what it means for him to prepare for and deliver excellent performance. Here is another interesting video where he talks about how he started dreaming up his success at the age of six.

Some men see things as they are and say, "Why?" I dream of things that never were and say, "Why not?" - George Bernard Shaw

A man's dreams are an index to his greatness - Zadok Rabinowitz

To dream anything that you want to dream. That's the beauty of the human mind. To do anything that you want to do. That is the strength of the human will. To trust yourself to test your limits. That is the courage to succeed. - Bernard Edmonds

Whatever you do, or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius and power and magic in it. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

The NLP Cookbook - Something Smells Good!

2012-01-23T09:00:00.007Z

The NLP Cookbook - 50 Life Enhancing NLP Techniques for Coaches, Therapists and Trainers is a mouth watering collection of tools, techniques and powerful strategies for all those interested in getting more effective results when working with others.

There are some stunning pictures to wet the appetite and the format and instructions for each of the recipes are clear and simple. Each one is very usefully laid out over a double page and the ingredients list the purpose of the activity, appropriate time frame, the resources needed, suggested skill level, the delivery method and the NLP frame that is being focused on. The steps are easy to follow for the novice and leave room for the more experienced 'cook' to adapt things to their own taste.

The recipes are divided up into seven different categories depending on their purpose and cover a wide variety of NLP areas.

State
Behaviour & Skills
Beliefs
Identity
Goals
Relationships
Change

To help prepare the right dish for the right moment and to quickly find your way around the techniques there is an extremely helpful reference table at the back. Definitely, a book to dip into again and again for ideas and tasks. This one definitely won't stay on the shelf, you'll want to have it at hand on a regular basis. It will prove over time to be an invaluable source of inspiration for both new and more experienced practitioners alike.

The NLP Cookbook is published by Crown House Publishing, a rapidly growing publishing house specialising in the areas of Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP), Hypnosis, Accelerated Learning, stress management, health and well-being and personal growth.

Click below to buy the book from Amazon.

The NLP Cookbook - Amazon UK
The NLP Cookbook - Amazon US
The NLP Cookbook - Amazon Spain
The NLP Cookbook - Amazon France
The NLP Cookbook - Amazon Germany

NLP Modelling - Up On The Catwalk

2012-01-16T09:00:00.007Z

Somebody who can copy can do. Leonardo de Vinci.

Modelling is the process of observing and mapping the successful behaviours of other people in order to apply them to ourselves and others. It is a very effective way to achieve your goals and it allows you to copy or 'model' the people who can do what you would like to do or those who have the skills, strategies and tactics that you would like to have. There are endless things that you can model and if you want to be a great parent, a better golfer, more confident at presentations, stay in good health etc., find out exactly what it is that the best people and the experts do. Once you know that, you can imitate or model them to help you get similar results.

There are a number of key elements involved in modelling. The first element is physiology. This focuses on the typical behaviours that a person engages in when they do what they do well. The second area to consider is the person's beliefs and values. The final area are the strategies that people have for doing things. These refer to the order and sequence of what each person does inside their head when they do something and they usually consist of making internal pictures, hearing internal sounds or voices (oftentimes talking to yourself) and checking how they feel in some regular sequence. There are other strategies as well.

Some strategies are conscious but many of them are non-conscious. If you want to model the rugby kicking skills of a Dan Carter, Johnny Wilkinson or Ronan O' Gara, then you will obviously pay more attention to the area of physiology. On the other hand, if your goal is to model the great sales people, you will probably concentrate more on the strategies that they use when they are in the process. Modelling therefore, will first of all mean paying close attention to what is happening.

So what kinds of things will you want to focus on when you are observing a person's typical behaviours or physiology? Here is an example of some questions that you can ask yourself if, let's say for example, you want to observe a person's presentation skills.

How are they standing, sitting or moving?
How do they carry themselves?
How close are they to their audience?
What facial expressions do they use?
How do they make eye contact?
How do they use gestures?

What kind of gestures do they make?
How big are they?
Do they move their hands a lot?
How often do they move them?

In what way do they speak?

How fast/loudly do they speak?
Do you notice anything about the rhythm of their speech?
What do you notice about their intonation?
How are they breathing?
Do they make any noises that are not actually words?

Do they touch anything?

What?
How?
Where?

How are they using their visual aids?
Is there any language that they typically use that helps them to be effective?
How are they dressed?
How do they deal with questions?
What other things do you notice?

On the other hand, you will also want to take into consideration a person's beliefs and values. Here is a short video of Michael Flatley from Lord of the Dance talking about what it means for him to prepare for and deliver excellent performance.

One of the pioneers of NLP, Robert Dilts, did a study of the healing patterns of Jesus Christ and with the information that was available from the Biblical sources, saw a pattern of strategies that Jesus would typically use. It appears that when Jesus was doing his healing, there were certain consistencies that happened in the order and sequence of things that he stepped through. Jesus would first of all touch the person (something that the other healers of the day did not do), he would then look up and finally he would sigh and the person would be healed. When you look at successful people in business such as Richard Branson you will also find that they tend to have quite clearly defined strategies that they use to get their consistent results.

The Coaching Clinic®

2012-01-09T09:00:00.001Z

Use Your Edge offers The Coaching Clinic® to individuals, businesses and schools and organisations.

The Coaching Clinic® is a two-day leadership programme designed to train managers, executives, leaders and supervisors to use coaching techniques in their work relationships, and thus gain the advantage of bringing a coach approach to managing people. It generates rapid development of individuals and teams, and increases leadership potential. It has been brought into organisations worldwide by Corporate Coach U trained and licensed facilitators, and has earned the reputation as a comprehensive training in core coaching skills.

What does The Coaching Clinic® do?

The Coaching Clinic® effectively trains individuals in the skills necessary for coaching within an organization. It is a fully developed model, which managers and leaders can implement immediately in their organization to promote innovation and accelerate results. effectively develop and retain valuable organizational members. improve organizational communication and team effectiveness. deepen commitment to personal and organizational goals.

What's in it for me?

Through The Coaching Clinic®, individuals, businesses and organizations can

discover coaching as a powerful model of management and leadership.
experience and practice “state-of-the-art” coaching tools.
understand and learn the structure and process of integrating a coach-approach to management.
find out how to apply learning within the workplace immediately.
position the organization for rapid growth.

The Coaching Clinic® equips managers and leaders to ‘show up’ as coaches in their working relationships. Workplace coaching expands beyond performance review to become part of every workplace interaction, whether formal or informal.

If you would like more detailed information on The Coaching Clinic® contact us at training@useyouredge.com

Make 2012 Your Olympic Year

2012-01-02T09:00:00.008Z

Make 2012 Your Best Year Yet

Yes, the new year is here. 2012, a leap year, which promises a host of interesting events including, the World Exhibition in Yeosu, South Korea, European Capital of Culture celebrations in Maribor and Guimarães, Presidential elections in the US, the year of the Dragon in the Chinese calendar, the UEFA Euro 2012 football championship in Poland & The Ukraine, the summer Olympics in London and much much more.

It is especially at this time of the year when people think about how they plan their life to be different and make their New Year's Resolutions. Funny that, they way we call them 'New Year's Resolutions', because that's often how long they last, a couple of weeks and if you are lucky, until the end of January. Well, what do you expect? I mean they are only New Year's Resolutions after all. So, what we need then are All Year Resolutions? Well, not quite. When you think about it, a resolution is only a re-solution, a repeated solution to an familiar problem or issue. How often do you find yourself with the same resolutions every new year? Therefore, what you will want to find are real solutions, those strategies and techniques that can support you in reaching your goals and making 2012 your best year yet.

To help with that we are going to look at a series of questions that you can ask yourself to enable you to clarify and achieve what you want to most focus on for 2012. These initial questions will allow you to build a solid foundation for you to move forward.

What did I accomplish in 2011?

Before you look ahead and decide how you want to make the most of this new year, you will find it useful to look back and remember the good news from last year. Take some time to make notes for yourself. What did you see, hear and feel at each of those moments? Make the most of the opportunity to savour the sensations. Remember where you were this time last year, give yourself some appreciation and focus on your successes. You can also take the question forward and as you go through 2012 use it and get into the habit creating a track record of the things that go well for you.

What were my biggest disappointments?

This is an important step. Here you make the opportunity to tell yourself the truth about what didn't work for you and let it go. It was simply a case of not getting the result you wanted. Once you bring it to the surface and get it all down, the disappointments and negativity lose their value. This allows you to travel forward without any excess baggage. It more effective to be a good friend to your successes than to be seduced by your failures or perceived failures.

What did I learn?

Here you have the opportunity to focus on the learnings you made over the last year. When things didn't go so well for you, what did you take from those situations? Write the lessons down for yourself as simple rules, reminders or instructions. It's important to get into the habit of tracking your thought processes and identifying your mis-takes and constantly correcting your path as you go along.

Maybe last year you learnt some new skills and abilities. If so, make a list of them. Also, when you think of the things that went well for you, ask yourself questions such as

How exactly did I do that?
What was the secret of my success in that situation?

Based on all that you have observed, what tips and advice would you pass on to your family and friends?

What do you want to get more of in 2012?

Here you have the opportunity to look forward to 2012 and begin to consider how you want things to be different. What goals do you want to do more of? What are you going to do differently? What are you going to stop doing in 2012? Write your answers down and take time to properly reflect on each one.

How do I limit myself, and how can I stop?

This can be quite a challenging area to focus on, but you will find it useful and it will prove to be a key area in your road map to success this year. Think about the areas that you are not getting results in and begin to figure out how you are limiting yourself. What roadblocks are you putting in your own way? What do you hear yourself saying to explain away your failures? What is it that you can't see that maybe others can see from the outside? How can you recycle your can'ts into cans? Remember that your thoughts and feelings help to shape your results and just imagine how really different 2012 will be once you change your negative paradigms into positive statements of possibility.

What are my personal values?

An important element of success is being congruent in how we think and act. Reflecting on this question and becoming more conscious of what is most important to you, will allow you to empower yourself to make real changes in your life. Once your goals and plans reflect your personal values, these values will act as strong and vibrant motivators as you work to get improvements in your behaviour and performance. So again, make yourself a short list and remind yourself of what really matters most to you.

What are my top ten goals for next year?

Before you select your top ten goals again you will find it useful to review your answers so far and remind yourself of what is really important to you. Choose the goals that are most exciting for you. Select the ten that, once you have already begun to achieve them, will make the most difference to you. Prioritise your list, starting with the goals for your major focus and work your way down.

How will I stay constant and be sure of my success?

So how are you going to make sure that your best year yet doesn't get lost among the sometimes crazy world of day to day life. Well surprisingly enough, you have certainly come a long way already. You now have a clear plan and mission statement for yourself. You have exploited time, energy and a lot of motivation to get this far. First of all, stop and congratulate yourself. Then, each month set yourself new Monthly Goals to help keep you on track. Now that you are already in the rhythm, you will find it so much easier to set Weekly Goals to progress to those monthly goals. Consider working with a coach. Remember that coaching will support you in getting the results you want faster and more effectively. You will also want to consider that when assessing your success, focus on your roles and your personal values rather than the individual tasks that you achieve. This will help you to get a panoramic view of how your life is changing.

Here is a short quote to finish.

People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. The people who get on in this world are the people who look for the circumstances they want and if they can't find them, make them. - George Bernard Shaw

The Zeigarnik Effect - I've Started So I'll Finish!

2011-12-19T09:00:00.014Z

Have you ever been faced with a larger task and tried to avoid starting it?
Have you ever procrastinated over something important that you had to do?
Has it ever been that you didn't know how or where to start!

"I've started, so I'll finish" was the well know phrase of Magnus Magnusson, presenter of the BBC television quiz Mastermind. Contestants would face two rounds of questions, one on a specialised subject of their choice, the other a general knowledge round. If the bell rang in the middle of a question, he would repeat that question and give the contestants another opportunity to answer.

While it might sound obvious, actually starting tasks, be it somewhere, anywhere even, can be one way to make sure that you break through the procrastination barrier. Oftentimes we allow ourselves to imagine that our projects are more complicated than they really are and that can very easily get in the way of moving forward. A simple suggestion therefore should be to work with something easy first and once you get the project under way the rest will tend to follow from there.

Why does this work?

It works because of something called 'The Zeigarnik Effect'. Briefly, this says that people are more likely to remember what they have not yet got closure on. Bluma Zeigarnik was a Lithuanian psychologist who happened to study waiters at a local restaurant. She noticed that they would only remember the clients' orders while they were still in the process of being served and as soon as the orders were completed, they disappeared from their memory. Zeigarnik developed the theory with further tests where participants were asked to do a number of puzzles and other tasks. However, some of time the participants were interrupted half way through a task with the result that they twice as likely to remember the tasks during which they'd been interrupted, than those they had completed. Furthermore, the tests showed that adults remember unfinished tasks up to 90% better than finished ones.

How is this important in terms of learning and training?

Since the mind is motivated towards and likes closure and because people tend to remember unfinished or unresolved things much better than things that have been completed, it would be a good idea to spilt learning over time. While it might not always have been understood to be good practice until now, it is extremely effective to begin a topic, area or learning activity one moment and to complete it another. Activities could be split up over days, over lunch or even weaved within other activities so that you open a variety of different loops and close them at different times. This can help to develop creativity, ensure more successful learning and in the end, allow for lots of things to get done effectively.

From the trainer or teacher's point of view, leaving some unfinished business will also mean that they are more motivated to provide some useful follow up for their trainees or learners after the learning event has actually come to end.

Nonetheless, outside the learning environment it is also fair to say that if we allow for too many loose ends in our life, it can prove to be a little stressful. As a result, it's important to get started and strive to achieve some kind of balance.

So why don't you make a list of all of the unfinished business you have in your life at the moment and consider all the extra creativity and energy you will have as you work through it?

NLP Peace Negotiations

2011-12-12T09:00:00.000Z

Holding Your Own Peace Summit Meeting & Being Your Own Mediator

It's oftentimes easy for us to forget that not everyone sees the world like we do. Therefore, to understand a situation fully we really do need to look at it from a series of different perspectives. One point of view will only give one dimension, an incomplete picture of the whole. Good communicators appear to have the flexibility to shift easily from one position to another as appropriate. They understand all positions as useful and it is this that allows them to build better understandings. So, remember that effective negotiation is impossible without an appreciation of the conflictive views.

Let's look at an activity which will help you to develop this strength. This activity uses your visual, auditory and kinaesthetic senses and so needs sufficient space in which to move around. Think of a situation that is live for you now and that is not as good as it needs to be – one in which you would like to improve your relationship with the other person. This could be a learner, a colleague, friend or a member of your family.

1. Choose a position in the room to place a sheet of paper down on the ground and then stand on it. This is your First Position and as such it represents the true ‘here and now’ for you. Think about yourself, the other person and the issue.

· Notice what you can see in your mind’s eye, what you can hear and what you feel inside.

2. Look across to another position in the room and imagine that you and the other person are sitting there facing each other. When you are in this situation you are in Second Position.

· How are those two people relating to each other from that position?

· Step off the sheet of paper and let go of the first position by shaking your arms and body.

3. Take two more sheets of paper and place them in the Second Position to represent the chairs for the two people (say A and B). When you are ready, step onto the sheet that represents second position A. Take a little time and experience being A. Look at B from this position …. and then back to yourself at First Position.

· Ask yourself what is important to me, A, here in this position?

· Step off the sheet and let go of second position A by shaking your arms and body again.

4. Step onto the sheet that is Second Position B. Take a little time and experience/imagine being B this time. Look at A from this position …. and then back to yourself at first position.

· Ask yourself what is important to me, B, here in this position?

· What is really not being dealt with here?

· Step off the sheet and let go of second position B by shaking your arms and body again.

5. Now find another place in the room with a wider perspective, from which you can see all three pieces of paper. This is the Third Position. Step into it.

Ask yourself the following questions.

· What do I notice about the relationship and interactions between the others?

· What resources are needed here to change things?

· What could I bring to the situation?

· What do I notice that I didn’t notice before?

6. Take the answers back with you to first position. Step onto the sheet and from this first position, with all of this new information and new resources, take a look at the two people in A and B.

· Notice what has changed, anything that is different.

Taken from

Making Your Words Work - Using NLP to Improve Communication, Learning & Behaviour - Terry Mahony

Get Some Style!

2011-12-05T09:00:00.011Z

Use Your Edge and learn to communicate with style.

'Personal Coaching Styles Inventory®'

As we communicate in a faster paced and more crowded world, we can no longer rely on our ability to connect with just a few people and not others. The mastery of skills to communicate in a much more sophisticated and knowledgeable way is critical to bringing about the results we desire in our world, both personally and professionally. Whether you are working in a large company, an entrepreneurial business, or you are self-employed, such understanding of others will serve you and the people you interact with very well.

In the roles you play every day, whether it be at work or at home, as a company executive, shop floor worker, client, family member or friend, the understanding of yourself and the basic personal style of another can forward the conversations more clearly and precisely for both of you. Furthermore, in teams and groups, when each member understands the styles of other participants, the group mission and purpose can be forwarded as a result.

The Personal Coaching Styles Inventory® is a self assessment tool that was developed as a response to the need for understanding and mastering interpersonal interaction styles in a coaching context. Designed by and for coaches, it answers the need for a style assessment tool that is quick and convenient and translates into a person's everyday life. The PCSI® effectively determines and identifies four principal communication style traits.

The Directing Style
The Presenting Style
The Mediating Style
The Strategising Style

Furthermore, it helps you discover why and how these natural tendencies influence behaviour and interaction and helps develop awareness of your communication strengths and liabilities.

As you study the four styles and understand the variations of each, you will learn to interact, and consult with others in a way that is more effective for you and them. You will learn to better tailor your communication to suit the differing individual needs of those around you, thereby creating an atmosphere of cooperation and achievement. Moreover, it is intended to give a snapshot of how people are likely to communicate while giving and receiving coaching and feedback.

The 'Personal Coaching Styles Inventory®' was developed by Corporate Coach U and is available to individuals and teams. We also provide comprehensive tailored feedback and follow-up support.

For more information on how you can get some 'style' contact us by email at training@useyouredge.com

The Genius Movie - Authentic Change

2011-12-02T09:00:00.002Z

The Genius Movie is a great short film designed by Kelly Rippon from Authentic Change. This 60 second film reveals the genius potential within all of us and it reminds us how important it is to not only make the most of every moment, but literally every single thought!

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator® - MBTI®

2011-11-25T09:00:00.004Z

The MBTI® is a personality inventory or questionnaire that sorts people into 16 types depending on how they fall on four different scales. The four scales are:

Extraversion/Introversion - How am I around people?
Sensing/Intuition – How Do I prefer to gather information?
Thinking/Feeling – How do I make decisions?
Judging/Perceiving – What sort of lifestyle is best for me?

The theory behind the MBTI® is that people have a tendency to feel more comfortable at either end of the spectrum across those four preferences. The various combinations of these preferences result in 16 personality types.

Types are typically denoted by four letters--for example, INTJ (Introversion, Intuition with Thinking and Judging)--to represent one’s tendencies on the four scales. Your assessment report will help you better understand how you approach the world, how you prefer to make decisions and what kind of environment you feel most comfortable in.The MBTI® instrument is designed to help you understand your unique personality and the way you relate to others around you. It is backed by thousands of research studies and has been found to be both reliable and valid in assessing personality. Last year alone two million people used their MBTI® results to gain understanding about themselves and the people around them.The MBTI® is also used in a wide variety of contexts such as

Self-understanding and development
Career development and exploration
Organisation development
Reducing workplace conflict
Improving individual and team performance
Team building
Management and leadership training
Talent development and retention
Problem solving
Relationship counselling
Education and curriculum development
Academic counselling
Diversity and multicultural training

How does it work?

The MBTI® is taken on-line and takes about 20-30 minutes to complete. You receive an e-mail with a link to the assessment and full instructions, including user name and password.
Once you’ve completed your on-line session and your results have been interpreted, a personalised report will be prepared.
We will then schedule a 1-hour feedback session where we will discuss your results and provide you with an in-depth interpretation, as well as practical suggestions and advice that will help you get the most out of it and use it to address your individual needs.

Are there different reports?

There are a variety of different reports tailored to meet your specific needs.

MBTI® Interpretive report - Choose this if you want to understand more about MBTI® type, without needing a particular work perspective.
MBTI® Interpretive report for organisations - For people who want to understand and enhance their performance at work.
MBTI® Career report - If your goal is help in identifying alternative careers then choose the career report.

Who should take the MBTI®?

People interested in personal development who want to understand themselves more.
Employees who want to be more effective when working with others.
Those contemplating career change who want to get ideas for future career options.

For more information and to book your Myers-Briggs Type Indicator® contact us at training@useyouredge.com

Primacy & Recency - The First Shall Be Last, The Last Shall Be First

2011-11-18T09:00:00.013Z

The area of Primacy and Recency is a key principle to take into consideration when designing excellent learning and training. An awareness of this helps to make the very most of any learning episode.

Primacy and Recency are terms used in psychology to describe the effect of the order of presentation on memory. The Primacy effect results in information presented earlier being better remembered than information presented later on. The Recency effect results in better recall of the most recent information presented. Together, these two effects result in the earliest and latest information in a given presentation being recalled best, with information in the middle being least remembered.

Primacy occurs because people have time to rehearse the first few items until the short term memory capacity is reached. Recency on the other hand, occurs because the last items are still in short term memory and have not decayed yet so they are easy to remember. The items in the middle of lists are easy to forget because the short term capacity is too full for much rehearsal by then and as more items are presented, older items in short term memory are simply “pushed out.”

As a result, as we shorten the learning episode, the down-time decreases faster than the prime times and the data confirms that more retention occurs when training sessions are shorter. Furthermore, training divided into 20 minute segments is more productive than one continuous undivided session. As a result, breaks are very important. They provide a change of pace and focus and help to divide the training into manageable sections.

To summarise, both the beginning and end of a learning or training session are going to be very important. At the beginning, the trainer should spell out the learning and training goals of the period and provide some input. At the end of the period, the trainer would do well to sum everything up and review the most important parts again.

As regards what happens in the time between the Primacy and the Recency effect, there are a variety of issues to take into consideration when designing trainings to help make sure your participants get the most out of their time with you and that their learnings continue to expand in the days, weeks and months after the course has finished. We will look at these in a number of upcoming posts.

NLP for Teachers - How To be A Highly Effective Teacher

2011-11-14T09:00:00.001Z

Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) is an established set of principles for teaching, learning and personal development. It brings with it a range of methods and models and offers new understandings into how people think, behave, learn and change.

NLP for Teachers is certainly a great resource for all in the field of education. It contains a wealth of information on NLP, including the essential background to the most important tools and techniques.

One of the main strengths of the book is that it is directly aimed at classroom practice. As such, it is jam-packed with excellent advice and useful strategies as well as motivating and practical ideas. There is a bank of tips, Just Do It activities and a wide variety of NLP Toolboxes, all of which have immediate application to day to day classroom situations.

A small example of the areas and topics covered include

The Presuppositions of NLP & The Study of Excellence
How to plan successful lessons from inside out and reach your outcomes
Using sensory preferences in language
Building Rapport & Developing Effective Relationships in the Classroom
How to be elegant in your use of language to influence others and affect change
How to use body language to manage your learners
How to see the world differently and increase your success
Anchoring – Harnessing the resources within yourself and your environment
How who you are affects what you do – Working out your values hierarchy
The art of questioning and conversational belief change
The skill of being artfully vague and using language to get what you want
How to keep motivation on target

As you work through the chapters, try out the activities and become more comfortable with the principles, presuppositions and skills of NLP, you will find that you become a better and more effective teacher, not only in terms of what you do, but also in terms of who you are both inside and outside the classroom.

Also particularly useful are the short Resource Zones, which add academic depth to the chapters and cover a wide variety of areas such as mirror neurons, hypnosis, emotional intelligence, eye movements and much more. Written in simple and easily accessible language, they reference work from other fields relevant to NLP and also include an extremely useful and detailed list of sources for further research and study.

In addition, the book also includes an Instant NLP Training Day, which includes a number of mini-training sessions and useful advice on how to bring the learning back into your own context.

Overall, NLP for Teachers really is a very useful book. It is an excellent balance of practical ideas and theoretical insight and an essential resource for those in the educational sector interested in being the difference that makes the difference.

Click below to buy the book from Amazon.

NLP for Teachers - Amazon UK

NLP for Teachers - Amazon US

For more information on how NLP can support teachers and help you develop effective classroom practice, visit our website at http://www.useyouredge.com/nlpineducation.html

The Difference That Makes The Difference!

2011-11-11T09:00:00.003Z

Nowadays there is quite a lot of debate not only over the role of the teacher, learner motivation and classroom communication but over the educational system as a whole, both in the private and public sector. Teachers are constantly faced with new challenges and are being asked to stretch their resources in ways that makes it difficult for others to remember the value of effective learning and the opportunity that teachers have to make a real difference in the lives of others.

With that in mind here below is an inspiring video from teacher and poet Taylor Mali

Mali is a vocal advocate of teachers and the nobility of teaching, having himself spent nine years in the classroom teaching everything from English and history to maths and S.A.T. test preparation. He has performed and lectured for teachers all over the world, and his New Teacher Project has a goal of creating 1,000 new teachers through "poetry, persuasion, and perseverance."

"Before teaching, before learning, begin with something more. Teaching and learning and knowing must mean more than recapitulation. To teach install good learning strategies. To make that worth having do more. You can install in people something much stronger. Call it hope. Design hope. It pays off. People create ideas that shape reality. Those ideas can become reality to share. - Dr. Richard Bandler, Co-founder of NLP

But What Exactly Is Coaching?

2011-11-04T17:04:00.009Z

In a previous post entitled Coaching The VIP Treatment we talked about the origins of the word coach and how it was a means of getting people from where they were to where they wanted to be.

Nowadays coaching is used in a wide variety of contexts to help support a very similar transition. This is done by means of a powerful, thought-provoking, collaborative and creative process that inspires great results where the coach in conversation, partners with the client to maximize their personal and professional potential. Coaching accelerates the process of great performance and closes that gap between where the client's current situation and the goal they want to achieve. To support clients in getting there, a coach will challenge you to go further than where you would normally stop and acts as a catalyst to discover options and ideas you might not have thought of alone.

So how is coaching different from other similar disciplines such as consulting, counselling or mentoring?

Though it is very simplistic definition, it is probably fair to say that counselling is typically about healing the past and dealing with emotional issues or traumas. Coaching on the other hand, works essentially by encouraging individuals to look at the present and the future.

When it comes to mentoring, people typically choose a mentor because the mentor knows something or are doing something that the person wants to know and do as well. It is most often about a transmission of information, experience or wisdom. There is usually a difference in status between the two people and as such mentoring tends to be directive and proscriptive. In coaching however, the coachee decides what the course of action will be and devises their own solution.

Consulting is the business of giving specialist advice to other professionals on a variety of business matters in a given situation or industry. They provide content and expert knowledge and typically come in to a group or an organisation and may or may not be part of the integration and implementation. The consultant takes responsibility for the project and is employed to deliver an end result. Coaching does not offer advice nor do coaches suggest that they are experts in the client's field. Working with a coach, people learn to recognise their strengths and through the coaching process the coachee can come to find their own solutions.

There are many models and frameworks used for coaching and coaching conversations. Those such as the GROW model, the STRIDE model and the STEPPA model give the process an underlying structure. Exploiting these models gives the coach a high level strategy that allows them to support the coachee understand, assess and plan how to resolve the situation, thereby increasing the coach's ability to respond adequately to whatever coaching situation they are faced with. Nonetheless, many coaches work from an intuitive base underpinned by the elegant use of a variety of coaching skills, language and tools.

These essential coaching skills that great coaches use and master include listening, questioning, using effective language, strategising, messaging and acknowledging.

Start Making Sense!

2011-10-31T09:00:00.017Z

We experience the world through our five senses or what are called representational systems in NLP. The five systems are called VAKOG for short - Visual, Auditory, Kinaesthetic, Olfactory and Gustatory. There are some subdivisions with the the systems. Auditory includes hearing words and sounds as well as the internal dialogue we have with ourselves (called Auditory Digital). Kinaesthetic includes bodily feelings, touch and emotions. Using our thought processes we recreate these experiences to ourselves internally.

The language that we use can often give us a clue about how we like to think and interpret the world. Most of us seem to express a preference for one or possibly two of the representational systems. This whole area of VAKOG gives rise to a lot of very interesting language based on the senses. Words that link to a particular representational system are called 'predicates' in NLP. As you listen to other people's language or 'predicates', you will soon begin to notice what these preferences are.

Noticing the sensory language that other people use and matching them be a very powerful way of gaining rapport, communicating sensitively and being influential. Let's say you are discussing a new project with a colleague and as you work to get point across, you want to check that the other person understands. You might decide to use one of the following linguistic options based on what you have seen/heard/picked up!

What I want to share with you will get you closer to that vision you have for you and you team, can you see what I'm saying?
This will help to get your team singing from the same page. Does it sound like we are talking the same language?
I think this idea will raise the bar and really knock you over. Are you really catching where we can go with this?

Explore, play, give it a go and see what happens.

Here are some examples of a variety of sensory language.

Visual

This tendency will focus on sight, mental imagery, spatial awareness etc. Typical words that would be used here could include see, view, observe, show, focus, picture, clear, perspective, imagine, frame, reflect, panorama, scan, overview, observe, visible imagine, shade etc. Here below are some phrases that use visual language.

It appears that …
It's her blind spot.
Get a bird’s eye view!
Let’s look closely at this issue.
She’s a sight for sore eyes.
His view is a bit coloured.
Turn a blind eye.
I see what you mean.

Auditory

Focuses on sound, speech, dialogue, white noise etc. Some useful words to use to increase your flexibility with this preference are words such as talk, tell, discuss, describe, resound, orchestrate, praise, tune, loud, whisper, hum, tone, voice, quiet, echo, harmonious, hear etc. Some phrases you could use might be from the list here.

The place was buzzing.
It’s all Greek to me.
I hear you loud and clear.
I’m all ears!
That strikes a cord.
That was unheard of!
That’s music to my ears.
The place was buzzing.
They were living in harmony for years.

Kinaesthetic

This relates to body sensations. In NLP it is applied to all types of feelings including tactile, visceral and psychomotor and also considers things such as temperature, pressure and emotion. Words such as handle, grasp, tender, touch, twist, warm, tingle, cool, shocking, hot, embrace, dry, soft, slippery, firm etc can be used here.

I can’t put my finger on it.
To cover the same ground.
Seize the moment.
To meet someone halfway.
I can feel it in my bones.
Tread carefully.
She pushes his buttons.
He's a warm-hearted person.
The project is up and running.
There was tension in the air.

Olfactory

This system consists of remembered and created smells. This preference is particularly important for people such as wine experts. Some olfactory predicates and phrases are scented, smelly, fishy, nosy, fragrant smoky, fresh, musky etc.

To sniff something out
It was a bitter pill to swallow.
He has a nose for business.
The sweet smell of success.
That's a fresh idea!
I smell a rat.
The relationship went stale.

Gustatory

This preference relates to our sense of taste and will be particularly well-developed in people such as chefs and cooks. Here you could use words and phrases like sour, bitter, sweet, juicy, salty, spicy, mouthwatering, minty, succelent

It’s a piece of cake.
It all smells a bit fishy.
He's got a taste for the good life.
He had to eat humble pie.
She is such a sweet person.
It's a matter of taste.
Let's chew it over.
He made an acid comment.

Audio Digital

This tendency focuses on things that make sense and that that are logical. It considers options and strategies and look to understand issues. It takes decisions based on what seems logical and makes sense. There is a wide variety of verbs you can use here such as respect, enjoy, learn, organise, challenge, innovate, understand, make sense, notice, think, integrate, consider etc.

I understand what you meant.
We need to consider a viable solution.
Taking your opinions into consideration …
Do you agree?
The venture was deemed to be a success.
I know it’s important to value quality.
Can you back up your theory with facts and figures?

Charlie Brown's Quick Cure For Depression - Mind & Body Are Interconnected

2011-10-24T09:00:00.005+01:00

NLP has a series of different presuppositions or guiding principles. These presuppositions are not claimed to be universal or absolute truths, more so extremely useful guidelines. They are called presuppositions because we pre-suppose them to be true and act as if they were. These presuppositions are a useful way of thinking about people, their problems, communication, differences, needs, values etc. Sometimes just considering this new point of view will be enough to change your thinking about a particular problem or issue, and take, now, whatever action is necessary to make changes so acting as if, we can get better results in our communication with the world around us.

One of the NLP presuppositions that we will look at first is that mind and body form a system and are thereby interconnected. It is not possible to make a change in one without the other being affected. Every time we think differently our bodies change as a result. When we change our actions we change our thoughts and feelings. Therefore, if we can control our physical and mental processes effectively, there is little we can't do. Here is a great cartoon from Charlie Brown which makes the whole point very clearly.

Rapport - Body Talk

2011-10-19T09:00:00.000+01:00

Communication is a loop, what you do influences others and what they do influences you. Rapport is one of the four pillars of NLP and is the process of getting on with and being trusted by another person by 'meeting that person in their map of the world'.

There are a variety of ways in which you can get into rapport with another person. One such way is by matching and mirroring another person’s body language. This means adjusting to their facial expressions, breathing, body posture and body movement. In effect, we join the other's persons dance. We do this all the time, oftentimes without even realising it. When we learn to do this with purpose it helps to bridge a gap between our world and theirs and effects better communication and builds deeper trust.

When we talk about matching we mean doing the same thing with the same part of the body as the other person i.e. crossing your right leg over your left leg to match them crossing their right leg over their left leg. Mirroring on the other hand, is using the opposite side of your body as in a mirror, e.g. putting your right hand behind your head when they put their left hand behind their head.

We can also match a person's breathing and their general state of awareness and alertness. We can match the speed of their breathing, the rate, where they are breathing from etc.

Here is a fun video which shows how you can play with the idea of getting rapport by body matching.

Get S.M.A.R.T.

2011-10-17T09:00:00.043+01:00

One of The Pillars of NLP that we mentioned in a previous post is Outcome Thinking, how to think about what you want. There are many ways in which you can approach this area and it is indeed important to have a clear idea of what your goal is in each situation. One way that is used in Business Coaching and in personal Development Coaching to make sure that your goals are more achievable is to make sure that they meet the S.M.A.R.T. criteria.

S.M.A.R.T. is an acronym to assist you in remembering all the steps that you need to take to get your goals to a place where they need to be so that you can get really effective results.

S – Specific & Simple
M – Measurable & Meaningful
A – Attainable, As If Now & In All Areas
R – Realistic
T – Timed, Tangible & Toward

What exactly do we mean here? Well, let's look at each letter one by one.

S – SPECIFIC & SIMPLE

Specific
Jack Canfield in his book, The Success Principles, states that “Vague goals produce vague results.” Therefore our goal needs to be specific. If one of your goals is to get a better job, well here you need to be really specific. You will find it useful to think of specifically what kind of better job you want to find, with specifically what salary, where specifically do you want to work, with what specific responsibilities, perks, with what specific timetable etc. Here are some possible questions you can ask yourself.

Who: Who is involved in achieving this goal?
What: What exactly do you want to accomplish?
Where: Identify a location. (Where do you want to achieve this goal?)
When: Establish a time frame. (By when do want to have this goal achieved?)
Which: Identify requirements and constraints. (What resources and support do you need to make this goal a reality?)
Why: Specific reasons, purpose or benefits of accomplishing the goal. (How will your life be different by achieving this goal?)

Simple
The goal also needs to be simply written. We can understand the non-conscious mind to be like a 7 to 9 year old child who loves us very much and who is working for our benefit. The simpler the message the quicker it will be received by our non-conscious minds.

M – MEASURABLE & MEANINGFUL

Measurable
Our goals also will benefit from being measurable. As a result, it will be important to establish concrete criteria for measuring progress toward the attainment of each goal. When you measure your progress, you stay on track, reach your target dates, and experience the exhilaration of achievement. You are inevitably propelled on to bigger and greater things.
To determine if your goal is measurable, ask questions such as......How much? How many? How will I know when it is accomplished?
Say you want to lose some weight. How many kilos do you want to lose? How will you know that you have achieved that? Maybe you'll be able to fit into that dress you love for your sister's wedding! Therefore, the idea is to make sure that you get the last step in when you are writing your goal. What is the last thing that has to happen so that you know you’ve got your goal?

Meaningful for you!!
This might seem obvious but I wonder how clear it really is. How many times do we find that we are doing things for others and not really for ourselves? Oftentimes in this context, it is useful to be a little selfish. Either way, when your goal is really meaningful for you and when you are really committed, your commitment is like the fuel in your car that takes you from where you are now to where you want to be.

A – ATTAINABLE, AS IF NOW & IN ALL AREAS

Attainable
When you identify goals that are most important to you, you begin to figure out ways you can make them come true. You develop the attitudes, abilities, skills, and financial capacity to reach them. You begin seeing previously overlooked opportunities to bring yourself closer to the achievement of your goals. You can attain any goal you set yourself when you plan your steps wisely and establish a time frame that allows you to carry out those steps. Goals that may have seemed far away and out of reach eventually move closer and become attainable, not because your goals shrink, but because you grow and expand to match them. When you list your goals you build your self-image. You see yourself as worthy of these goals, and develop the traits and personality that allow you to possess them.

As if now!!
Think in the now and write your goals in Present Tense language. Picture yourself having achieved that goal and describe what your life is like. If you frame it in the future, the goal itself will move further into the future as you move into your future.

In All Areas of Your Life
A can also stand for In All Areas of Your Life. Does your goal fit in with all areas of your life? How helpful might it be to ask for more responsibility at work if it is going to mean that you have less time for family, friends, hobbies etc?

R – REALISTIC

To be realistic, a goal must represent an objective toward which you are both willing and able to work. You will need to truly believe that it can be accomplished. Ask yourself what you have achieved before and how you can go beyond that. Furthermore, be sure that every goal represents real substantial progress. You will want to create a real track record of success. Oftentimes, a higher goal is easier to reach than a low one because a low goal exerts low motivational force. Some of the hardest things you've ever accomplished actually seem easy when you look back and don’t take much effort at all because you are really in the moment and truly focused on what you want to achieve.

T – TIMED, TANGIBLE & TOWARD

Timed
A goal will be most effective when it is some kind of time-frame. Rather than I want to lose some weight (someday), anchor in some time-frame, a specific future date (September 1st) to help give a sense of urgency.

Tangible
A goal is tangible when you can experience it with each or any of the senses, that is, taste, touch, smell, sight or hearing. As we said above imagine yourself having achieved your goal. What can you see? What can you hear? How does your success smell? sweet? When you think of your goal in a tangible sense, you have a much better chance of making it specific and measurable and thus attainable.

Toward
This refers to focusing on what you want rather that what you don’t want. It’s not enough to say I want to stop smoking. This is using ‘away from’ language. When we use ‘toward’ language our goals automatically become more achievable, e.g. I want to look healthier, enjoy my food more, have more energy and have more money to spend on myself and my family.

Stay S.M.A.R.T.

Coaching The VIP Treatment

2011-10-10T09:00:00.008+01:00

The history of coaching starts off back in a small 14th century Hungarian village located on the main road along the Danube between Vienna and Budapest. These two great cities needed well-built, fast vehicles that would carry more than two people over the bumpy roads of the day in as much comfort as was then possible. And so it was that the important post-town of Kocs gave its name to the new vehicle type. It was there that they began to build superior wagons, carts and carriages. One of the best of these multi-horse carts was called, in Hungarian, “kocsi szekér” or a “wagon from Kocs”. This Hungarian coach was highly praised because it was capable of holding 8 men, used light wheels, and could be towed by only one horse. Its design was so compact, elegant and sturdy that it spread throughout Europe. The German-speaking Viennese started to call this vehicle a Kutsche, which is how they heard Hungarians saying the name of their little carriage-making town. From Vienna these lively vehicles traveled to Paris and the French, adapting the Austrian word, called it a coche. When it arrived in Rome in Italian, it was a cocchio. Eventually, the English called it a coach. So it was that the first coaches took VERY IMPORTANT PEOPLE from where they were – to where they wanted to go.

The Pillars of NLP

2011-10-03T09:00:00.027+01:00

When it comes to Neuro-Linguistic Programming there are four pillars which form the basis of the philosophy. These are also key skills that you can use to improve your ability to communicate more effectively with those around and thereby, support you to get better results. Pay attention to these four chunks of the subject and you’ll be well on your way to integrating NLP into the way you go about your daily life.

The Four Pillars are

Outcome Thinking - How to think about what you want
Rapport - How to build a relationship with others and with yourself
Sensory Awareness - How the world is different when you use all your senses
Behavioural Flexibility - How to do something different when what you're currently doing isn't working.

So to summarise,

Firstly, know what you want; have a clear idea of your goal in each situation.

Secondly, communicate with others effectively, get rapport.

Thirdly, be alert and keep your senses open so as to know what you are getting.

Lastly, be flexible enough to change your behaviour until you get what you want.

This might seem obvious but sometimes we are not always very good at following the model.

Sometimes we are not very clear on our outcomes. Even when we are, we don't always act in accordance with what we want. If our goals and outcomes are unclear, the road we take to get there will be just as confusing.

If a man knows not what harbour he seeks, any wind is the right wind. - Seneca

The bigger the outcome, the bigger the dream and it was Milton Erickson who once said, “Anything is possible in the presence of rapport.”

As regards awareness it was Abraham Maslow who once said “What is necessary to change a person is to change his awareness of himself.”

Sometimes we are not particularly flexible, if what we do doesn’t work, we have a tendency to repeat it just to see for one more time if it will work out. Oftentimes we blame someone or something else when it didn’t work out.

When it comes to flexibility remember “The bend in the road is not the end of the road unless you refuse to take the turn.” Anon

One absolutely essential point to add here to have a built-in formula for success is to TAKE ACTION. Unless you take the first step, and then the following ones, nothing happens to help you towards your outcomes, no matter how clearly they are defined. .

Yoda Does Some Training!

2011-09-26T09:00:00.018+01:00

Following on from the last post on rediscovering our strengths and resources an appropriate video from a master trainer!

Yoda: Use the Force. Yes, ...

Yoda: Now... the stone. Feel it.

Yoda: Concentrate!

Luke: Oh, no. We'll never get it out now.

Yoda: So certain are you. Always with you it cannot be done. Hear you nothing that I say?

Luke: Master, moving stones around is one thing. This is totally different.

Yoda: No! No different! Only different in your mind. You must unlearn what you have learned.

Luke: (focusing, quietly) All right, I'll give it a try.

Yoda: No! Try not. Do. Or do not. There is no try.

Luke: (panting heavily) I can't. It's too big.

Yoda: Size matters not. Look at me. Judge me by my size, do you? Hm? Mmmm.

Yoda: And well you should not. For my ally is the Force. And a powerful ally it is. Life creates it, makes it grow. Its energy surrounds us and binds us. Luminous beings are we... (Yoda pinches Luke's shoulder) .. not this crude matter.You must feel the Force around you. Here, between you... me... the tree... the rock... everywhere! Yes, even between this land and that ship!

Luke: You want the impossible.

Luke: I don't... I don't believe it.

Yoda: That is why you fail.

Indeed!

The Strong Interest Inventory®

2011-09-21T09:00:00.003+01:00

No idea of what to do next?

Need help identifying career options you might not have thought of?

Want practical suggestions as to what careers might be right for you?

The Strong Interest Inventory® is a powerful method for matching the interests of an individual with opportunities for jobs, education and leisure activities. It is based on the premise that individuals are most satisfied and productive when they work in jobs or at tasks that they find interesting and when they work with people whose interests are similar to their own.

The results of your test, i.e. your interests and personal style, are compared to thousands of individuals who report being happy and successful in their jobs. The occupations undertaken by people whose scores are identical (or very similar) to yours are therefore suggested as career options for you to consider. Since you share their interests and style it is highly likely that you would therefore also feel happy and fulfilled in their jobs and occupations.

How does it work?

The Strong Interest Inventory® is taken on-line and takes about 25-40 minutes to complete. You receive an e-mail with a link to the assessment and full instructions, including user name and password.

Once you’ve completed the on-line session and your results will be interpreted have been a personalised report which measures your individual interest in a wide range of occupations, occupational activities and also identifies your learning, interpersonal and management styles will be prepared. Your report identifies your optimum career choices based on your interests and includes additional related occupations with concise job descriptions. Click here to see what a Strong® report looks like.

Usually within 2-12 hours your report will be sent to you as an Adobe PDF file, at weekends it may take a little longer. We will then organise a 1-hour feedback session where we will provide you with an in-depth interpretation of your results, as well as practical suggestions and advice that will help you get the most out of it and use it to address your individual issue(s).

Are there different reports?

There are a variety of different reports tailored to meet your specific needs. Each report is designed to meet the needs of adults considering a career change, seeking more satisfying work within an organization or planning their retirement. It introduces young people to the process of career choice and what to study at university, or which occupation best meets their interests.

Profile Report: This report is for you if you want to find out more about the types of jobs that match with your interests. It comprises 9 pages, but you get much more detail with the Interpretive report.
Interpretive Report: As well as the profile report, you also get the expanded interpretive report. It goes into much more detail, 19 pages in total.
High School Edition: This is the profile report with additional information specifically for young people as they make their initial educational choices.
College Edition: This is the profile report with additional information to help you make university choices.

You can also take the Strong alongside the MBTI® and get a combined report in addition to the 2 individual reports.

Who should take the Strong Interest Inventory®?

People unsure about their future career goals
People in the early stages of career planning
People who would like some pointers as to what would be useful and interesting leisure activities

If you would like more about how you can take The Strong Interest Inventory®, contact me at yoursuccess@useyouredge.com

A Very Convenient Truth

2011-09-19T09:00:00.047+01:00

Rediscovering the Greatest Source of Renewable Energy

Richard Bandler and John Grinder based their discovery of NLP on the process of modelling. They studied excellent communicators and looked to find what those people did that made them outstanding in their field. At the very heart of NLP is the idea that if one person can do something, then so too can anyone else. It’s just a question of working out exactly what it is that the person does and applying the strategies and skills to ourselves. It is useful at this point, to make the important distinction between resources and skills. We don’t necessarily immediately have the skills to run a marathon in under two and a half hours or pilot a commercial airplane but we do know that we have the ability to learn. Of course, we will need to acquire the practical skills first and work on them until we can do it too.

Furthermore, one of NLP’s basic presuppositions is that we all have the resources that we need within us. We don’t always realise this or make good use of these resources, but they are there.

So what are some of the practical implications of this?
How can we begin to quantify the renewable resources that we have within us?
What can we do with these resources in the times of challenge and climate change in our daily lives?

Well here goes, so how ready are you for a roller-coaster ride?

Start by making a ‘Strengths Inventory’

Make a list of all of the things that you are good at. Keep going until you have filled three pages with bullet points. You have to be honest and some exaggeration is only to be expected! Include the things that are really easy for you and that you take for granted. Maybe you always remember people’s birthdays or you are great at recycling or you can always get the video or DVD working, or you are good at always going to see your favourite football team, no matter what the weather.
When you get stuck for ideas towards the end of the third page, think back to all the things that you have learnt to do over the years. Add those to your list.
Look at your list again and add what you think your Mum or Dad, your partner, your kids or your best friend would say about you.

Think about your work situation. What value do you bring to your workplace?

Again make a list and keep going until you get enough. Yes of course, it is all too easy to be aware of your weaknesses, so try something different. Decide to focus on your strengths for a change.

Now think about exactly how you do what you do well and make a list.

This is the key stage. Here you will find all of the skills and strategies that make you successful at what you do.

How exactly do you find it easy to tell great jokes?
What is it that you do that makes you a great Dad?
How exactly do you get your team 100% behind you on an important project?
What is it that makes you a good tennis player?
What techniques to do you use when you do your best presentation or negotiation?
What is it that you do and do well, so that you get to the end of the month and have that something extra to put into the bank?
If you had to explain to someone what to do to take over from you as your friends’ best friend, what would you say to them?

Think about what it is that you do when things aren’t going right for you in those situations and how specifically you get things back on track.

What strategies do you use to motivate yourself when you are having a less than successful day?
When you do you do when you meet a stumbling block?

Now take all that you have learnt about yourself and see how you can use your strengths in other contexts.

How can you use some of these same strategies in other areas of your life where you are not so successful?
What can you copy or repeat from another context and use here to get a different and better result?

Think of one situation in particular that you are having a challenge with and that you would like to get a better outcome with.

This could be in any area of your life, personal or professional.

Transfer the skills across and see how things look.

Imagine yourself dealing with that challenge but using all the skills and resources that you have from your lists.

To what extent do you now notice that this previous challenge or situation now feels a somewhat different?
How do you see yourself moving on from here?
What steps are you now ready to take?

Go out into your future having already solved the problem or dealt with the challenge.

Take some time to enjoy what it feels like.
From that future point look back to the present and notice all the things you have done, all the steps you have taken to get where you are.

Come back to the present and look ahead to your future.

Look to the future opening up big and bright in front of you, safe in the knowledge that you can make big changes.
Take some time to enjoy the realisation that these are just some of the ways that your life can improve in the days, weeks and months to come.

Have fun playing with the activity and travelling in time!

The Wheel of Life

2011-09-12T09:00:00.022+01:00

Spin The Wheel - If you're not in, you can't win.

The 'Wheel Of Life' is an exercise commonly used in coaching. It will give you a 'bird's eye view' of your life and a snapshot of your level of satisfaction with areas like career, money, relationships, and health. The 'Wheel Of Life' will help you to look at these different areas and see where you are in balance and what areas might need more attention.

Do you really enjoy your career and family life but have no time to enjoy your hobbies?
Perhaps you are working hard or undertaking extra study but neglecting your life at home?
Are you ignoring your health and paying more attention to other areas such as your finance or career prospects?

You can use the 'Wheel Of Life' as a way of understanding what you want in your life, what you have to build upon, and where you want to focus your energy.
Working with the 'Wheel Of Life' is a very easy process. When you identify the important areas and score yourself on how satisfied you are with each area, you will be able to see how much your life is in balance. Let's look at the different steps.

Step A.

Draw a circle and divide it into 8 wedges.

Step B.

Label each one with one of the following. You choose based on what is most important to you and you may even come up with different categories.

work/study/career/life purpose
health
personal growth
community/support
family/friends
fun/recreation
home/physical environment
creativity
money/finance
spirit

Step C.
For each area, identify where you are in your life at this point in time. How satisfied are you? Using a scale of 1-10, with 1 being little or no satisfaction and 10 being fully satisfied, place a dot on the approximate point in each wedge. (The centre of the circle is 0; the outer edge of the circle is 10, therefore a satisfaction level of "5" would be right in the middle of the wedge.)

Step D.

Now join all the dots together and draw a line from one wedge to the next to create a 'circle within the circle'. This is what it might look like.

Step E.

Look at the 'Wheel' again and ask yourself the following questions.

How round is your inner circle?
Would your wheel make for a smooth or bumpy ride?

Did any area jump out as being out of balance?
How much time do you spend in each area?

What area is most important?
What improvement do you want to make?

Step F.

You will now want to make a plan of action. Pick one of the sections that you would most like to see change in and brainstorm 5-7 things that you could do today or tomorrow to start changing this area for the better. Once you have this short list, choose one action, however small, and do it right away. This will help you to get momentum and move you in the right direction. Then take the rest of your list and prioritise your ideas. Decide what would be the most useful/effective thing to do next and set yourself a timelimit. Work through the different areas of the wheel, prioritising and mapping out your action plan as you go along.

A few quotes

"Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving." - Albert Einstein

"Just as your car runs more smoothly and requires less energy to go faster and farther when the wheels are in perfect alignment, you perform better when your thoughts, feelings, emotions, goals, and values are in balance." - Brian Tracy

"Balance is the perfect state of still water. Let that be our model. It remains quiet within and is not disturbed on the surface." - Confucius

I've learned that you can't have everything and do everything at the same time." - Oprah Winfrey

"True balance requires assigning realistic performance expectations to each of our roles. True balance requires us to acknowledge that our performance in some areas is more important than in others. True balance demands that we determine what accomplishments give us honest satisfaction as well as what failures cause us intolerable grief." - Melinda Marshall

What is NLP?

2011-09-05T09:00:00.002+01:00

NLP stands for Neuro Linguistic Programming and it was Richard Bandler and John Grinder who first used the term in the 1970’s at the University of California in Santa Cruz. Bandler was a student of mathematics and computer science, and Grinder a professor of linguistics. They studied the work of excellent communicators and amazingly successful therapists such as Virginia Satyr, who worked in family therapy, Fritz Perls, a gestalt therapist and Milton Erickson, an extremely successful hypnotherapist. They were fascinated by how some people defied the odds to get through to very challenging clients while others failed miserably to connect at all. In their work Bandler and Grinder also drew upon the skills and knowledge of linguists Alfred Korzybski and Noam Chomsky, social anthropologist Gregory Bateson and psychoanalyst Paul Watzlawick. With it they uncovered and developed a wide range of tools and techniques that allow people to achieve better results and a series of strategies that can teach you how to live more happily, become more motivated, communicate, influence and persuade more easily and make improvements in almost any area of life. Today these tools are widely used in the medical profession, sales & business, education, coaching and personal development.

The name itself comes from the three areas it brings together.

'Neuro’ refers to the nervous system through which experience is received and processed through the five senses. Visual - Auditory - Kinesthetic – Olfactory – Gustatory. We translate sensory information into thought processes, both conscious and unconscious.

Linguistic’represents how the language we use shapes, as well as reflects our experience of the world. It is assumed that if we change how we speak about things, both to ourselves and others, we can change our behaviour and therefore our results.

‘Programming’ refers to the patterns of thoughts and behaviours that either help or hinder use as we carry out tasks, make decisions, solve problems, learn, evaluate, get results etc. Furthermore, it describes how we can more effectively sequence our actions to reach our goals. It is the ability to discover and utilize the programmes that we run (in our communication to ourselves and others) in our neurological systems to achieve our specific outcomes, realise our potential and reach new heights of achievement.

Moreover, NLP is an attitude characterized by a sense of curiosity, exploration, adventure and willingness to experiment. It is a methodology based on the presupposition that all behaviour has a structure, and that behaviour can be modelled, learned, taught and changed (re-Programmed) and as such NLP has evolved as an innovative and pragmatic technology that allows the practitioner to support others to achieve results that were once inconceivable.