Persuasive Coaching – The Importance of Building Rapport

When it comes to coaching, building rapport is almost as important as gaining trust. Rapport is essentially that feeling of connection you have with another person. If you’re like most people you can usually tell when you have rapport with someone. However, like most people you probably could do a better job at creating rapport with a little help from social psychology.

Rapport is analogous to what Robert Cialdini calls the principle of liking. This principle of influence tells us it’s easier for people to say yes to us when they know and like us. There are many things we’ll say yes to when a friend asks. On the flip side, we’re usually quite comfortable saying no to someone we don’t know or don’t like. For example, if a friend asked you to go out for drinks after work it would probably be easy to say yes. But, if someone you don’t know asks I bet it would be just easy to say, “No thanks.”

When it comes to coaching, rapport or liking, is important because it’s easier for someone you’re coaching to say yes to your advice if they know and like you. There’re two simple things you can do to engage this powerful psychology. Look for what you have in common with another person and offer genuine compliments.

When you know you have something in common with someone it’s easy for them to like you. For example, if you find out you root for the same sports team, went to the same college, or grew up in the same town, it’s easy to have an immediate connection with someone.

When it comes to compliments, we all feel good when someone pays us to genuine complement. Unfortunately, too often people leave good thoughts in their head rather than expressing them to another person. While thinking good thoughts may positively impact you, you don’t get the same bang for the buck as if you actually shared a compliment with the other person. That’s so because sharing compliments naturally makes other people like you more.

Here’s a very important point; the power of the principle of liking isn’t about getting people to like you. The power comes when you like the other person. When you look for what you have in common and pay attention to things you can genuinely complement you will start to like the other person more. This is where everything changes! When someone senses you like them they’ll be much more open to whatever advice you may share with them.

A big part of coaching is getting people to change their behavior. Coaches try to get those they work with to discard unproductive behaviors and embrace new productive ones. This is where persuasion comes in handy because persuasion is all about changing people’s behavior. How you communicate may make all the difference between yes and no.

If we go back to our definition of the principle of liking – it’s easier for people to say yes to those they know and like – then hopefully you see why this principle is so important in coaching. If the person you’re coaching likes you and knows that you like them they’ll be much more open to any suggestions that you may have to help them improve.

When you’re in a position where you have to coach others, I cannot encourage you enough to build rapport by tapping into the principle of liking. Not only will the person you’re coaching be more inclined to make the productive changes they need, you’ll enjoy the process because you’ll like those you coach much more.