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Friend or foe? Fight or flight? Opportunity or threat?

Familiar or foreign?

Instinctively, we assess, undress and best-guess eachother. And if we can't present ourselves fast and favorably,we run the risk of being politely, or impolitely,passed over.

The second reason for establishing likability in 90seconds or less has to do with the human attention10span. Believe it or not, the attention span of the averageperson is about 30 seconds! Focusing attention has beencompared to controlling a troop of wild monkeys. Attentioncraves novelty—it needs to be entertained andloves to leap from branch to branch, making new connections.

If there's nothing fresh and exciting for it tofocus on, it becomes distracted and wanders off insearch of something more compelling—deadlines, footballor world peace.

Read this sentence, then look away from the bookand fix your attention on anything that isn'tmoving (a great piece of art doesn't count). Keepyour eyes on the object for 30 seconds. You'llprobably feel your eyes glazing over after just10 seconds, if not before.

In face-to-face communication, it's not enough tocommand the other person's attention. You must alsobe able to hold on to it long enough to deliver your messageor intention. You will capture attention with yourlikability, but you will hold on to it with the quality ofrapport you establish. More and more it comes down tothree things: 1) your presence, i.e., what you look likeand how you move; 2) your attitude, i.e., what you say,how you say it and how interesting you are; and 3) howyou make people feel.

11When you learn how to make fast, meaningful connectionswith people, you will improve your relationshipsat work and even at home. You will discover theenjoyment of being able to approach anyone with confidenceand sincerity. But a word of caution: we're notabout to change your personality; this is not a new wayof being, not a new way of life. You are not getting amagic wand to rush out into the street with and have theworld inviting you to dinner—these are connecting skillsto be used only when you need them.

Establishing rapport in 90 seconds or less withanother person or group, be it in a social or communitysetting or with a business audience or even in a packedcourtroom, can be intimidating for many people. It hasalways amazed me that in this most fundamental of alllife skills, we've been given little or no training. You areabout to discover that you already possess many of theabilities needed for making natural connections withother people—it's just that you were never aware ofthem before.

Part 2 first impressions

For the purposes of this book, there are three parts to connecting wwith other people: meeting, establishing rapport and communicating. These three parts happen quickly and tend to overlap and blend into each other. Our goal is to make them as natural, fluid and easy as possible, andabove all to make them enjoyable and rewarding.

Obviously, you begin the connecting process bymeeting people. Sometimes you meet someone bychance—the woman on the train who turns out to shareyour passion for Bogart movies. And sometimes it's bychoice—the man your cousin introduced you to becausehe loves Shakespeare, fine wines and bungee jumping,just like you.

If meeting is the physical coming together of twoor more people, then communicating is what we dofrom the moment we are fully aware of another's pres-ence. And between these two events—meeting andcommunicating—lies the 90-second land of rapport thatlinks them together.

Chapter 1 The meeting

13The GreetingWe call the first few seconds of contact the "greeting."Greetings are broken into five parts: Open—Eye—Beam—Hi!—Lean. These five actions constitute a welcomingprogram to carry out in a first encounter.

Open. The first part of the greeting is to open yourattitude and your body. For this to work successfully,you must have already decided on a positive attitudethat's right for you. This is the time to really feel andbe aware of it.

Check to see that your body language is open. If youhave the right attitude, this should take care of itself.

Keep your heart aimed directly at the person you'remeeting. Don't cover your heart with your hands orarms and, when possible, unbutton your jacket or coat.

Eye. The second part of the greeting involves youreyes. Be first with eye contact. Look this new persondirectly in the eye. Let your eyes reflect your positiveattitude. To state the obvious: eye contact is real contact!

14Get used to really looking at other people's eyes.

When you're watching TV one evening, note theeye color of as many people as possible and saythe name of the color to yourself. The next day,do the same with every person you meet, lookinghim or her straight in the eye.

Beam. This part is closely related to eye contact.

Beam! Be the first to smile. Let your smile reflect yourattitude.

Now you've gained the other person's attentionthrough your open body language, your eye contact andyour beaming smile. What that person is picking up subconsciouslyis an impression not of some grinning,gawking fool (though you may briefly fear you look likeone!) but of someone who is completely sincere.

Hi! Whether it's "Hi!" or "Hello!" or even "Yo!" say itwith pleasing tonality and attach your own name to it("Hi! I'm Naomi"). As with the smile and the eye contact,be the first to identify yourself. It is at this point, andwithin only a few seconds, that you are in a position togather tons of free information about the person you'remeeting—information you can put to good use later inyour conversation.

Take the lead. Extend your hand to the other person,and if it's convenient find a way to say his or her name15two or three times to help fix it in memory. Not "Glenda,Glenda, Glenda, nice to meet you" but "Glenda. Great tomeet you, Glenda!" As you'll see in Chapter 7, this will befollowed by your "occasion/location statement."Lean. The final part of introducing yourself is the"lean." This action can be an almost imperceptible forwardtilt to very subtly indicate your interest and opennessas you begin to "synchronize" the person you'vejust met.

Handshakes run the gamut from the strong, sturdy bone-crusher to the wet noodle. Both are memorable—onceshaken, twice shy, in some cases.

Certain expectations accompany a handshake. Itshould be firm and respectful, as it you were ringing ahand bell for room service. Deviate from these expectationsand the other person will scramble to make senseof what's happening. There is a feeling that something iswrong—like hot water coming out of the cold tap. Thebrain hates confusion, and when faced with it the firstinstinct is to withdraw.

The "hands-free" handshake is a handshake withoutthe hand, and it is a powerful tool. Just do everythingyou would do during a normal handshake but withoutusing your hand. Point your heart at the other personand say hello. Light up your eyes and smile, and give off

Chapter 2 Firing Energy

This is one of the most powerful exercises we do in myseminars, but even without supervision you can turn itinto a force to be reckoned with!

You'll need a partner to work with. Stand about eightfeet apart, facing each other like two gunfighters in acowboy movie. As you say "Hi!" clap your hands togetherand slide your right hand off and past the other in thedirection of your partner. Gather up all the energy youcan throughout your body and store it in your heart, thenclap the energy on through your right hand (the one youuse in a handshake) straight into the other person'sheart. This is a long explanation for something that takesno more than two seconds, but when all six channels—body, heart, eyes, smile, clap and voice/breath—are firedat the person in a rapid flash there is a vast transferof energy.

Immediately after receiving the energy, your partnershould fire it back at you in the same way. Taking turns,continue fast and focused, firing at each other. Be sure tomake contact with all six channels at once. Practice on eachother for two minutes.

Now the real fun begins. You're going to start firingdifferent qualities of energy: logic/head energy, com- ->

17munication/throat energy, love/heart energy, power/solarplexus energy and sexual energy. You've already firedlove/heart energy. Now do the same head to head instead ofheart to heart. Keep firing head/logic energy at each otheruntil you both agree that you can feel and differentiate itfrom love/heart energy. After two or three minutes back andforth, try the other regions: throat to throat, solar plexus tosolar plexus, etc.

It gets even better. Figure out which kind of energy youwant to send, but don't say what it is. Now greet your partner,shake hands, say "Hi" and fire! Your partner must identifythe kind of energy he or she is receiving. Take turns.

Practice and practice until your body language becomes subtleand almost imperceptible.

Next, go out and try it on the people you meet. Fireenergy when you say "Hi" to someone in a supermarket,to your waiter in the cafe, to your sister-in-law or theguy who fixes the photocopier in your office. They willnotice something special about you—some might call it"star quality."that same special energy that usually accompanies thefull-blown shake.

Incidentally, the "hands-free" handshake works wondersin presentations when you want to establish rapportwith a group or audience.

Chapter 3 Establishing Rapport

Rapport is the establishment of common ground, of acomfort zone where two or more people can mentallyjoin together. When you have rapport, each of youbrings something to the interaction—attentiveness,warmth, a sense of humor, for example—and eachbrings something back: empathy, sympathy, maybe acouple of great jokes. Rapport is the lubricant thatallows social exchanges to flow smoothly.

The prize, when you achieve rapport, is the otherperson's positive acceptance. This response won't be inso many words, but it will signal something like this:

"I know I just met you, but I like you so I will trust youwith my attention." Sometimes rapport just happens allby itself, as if by chance; sometimes you have to give it ahand. Get it right, and the communicating can begin. Getit wrong, and you'll have to bargain for attention.

As you meet and greet new people, your ability toestablish rapport will depend on four things: your attitude,your ability to "synchronize" certain aspects ofbehavior like body language and voice tone, your conversationskills and your ability to discover which sense(visual, auditory or kinesthetic) the other person relieson most. Once you become adept in these four areas,you will be able to quickly connect and establish rapportwith anyone you choose and at any time.

19Read on, and you'll discover that it's possible tospeed up the process of feeling comfortable with astranger by quantum-leaping the usual familiarizationrituals and going straight into the routines that peoplewho like each other do naturally. In virtually no time atall, you will be getting along as if you've known eachother for ages. Many of my students report that whenachieving rapport becomes second nature, they findpeople asking, "Are you sure we haven't met before?"I know the feeling; it happens to me all the time. Andit's not just people asking me the question. 1 am convincedthat half the people I meet, I've met before—that's the way it goes when you move easily into anotherperson's map of the world. It's a wonderful feeling.

Chapter 4 Communicating

Everyone seems to have a different sense of the word"communication," but the definitions usually gosomething like this: "It's an exchange of informationbetween two or more people" . . . "It's getting your messageacross" ... "It's being understood."In the early days of Neuro-Linguistic Programming(NLP), a research project devoted to "the study of excellenceand a model of how individuals structure their subjectivesensory experience," Richard Bandler and JohnGrinder created an effective definition: "The meaning of20communication lies in the response it gets." This is simple,and brilliant, because it means that it's 100% up toyou whether or not your own communication succeeds.

After all, you axe the one with a message to deliver or agoal to achieve, and you are the one with the responsibilityto make it happen. What's more, if it doesn't work, youare the one with the flexibility to change what you do untilyou finally get what you want. In order to give some formand function to communication here, let's assume that wehave some kind of response or outcome in mind. Peoplewho are low on communication skills usually have notthought out the response they want from the other personin the first place and therefore cannot aim for it.

The skills you will learn here will serve you on all levelsof communication from social dealings like developingnew relationships and being understood in your dailyinteractions all the way to life-changing moves for yourselfand those in your sphere of influence.

The formula for effective communication has threedistinct parts:

Know what you want. Formulate your intention in theaffirmative and preferably in the present tense. Forexample, "I want a successful relationship, I have filledmy imagination with what that relationship will look,sound, feel, smell and taste like with me in it, and I knowwhen I will have it" is an affirmative statement, asopposed to "I don't want to be lonely."21Find out what you're getting. Get feedback. You findthat hanging out in smoky bars is not for you.

Change what you do until you get what you want.

Design a plan and follow through with it: "I'll invite 10people over for dinner every Saturday night." Do it andget more feedback. Redesign if necessary, and do it againwith more feedback. Repeat the cycle—redesign-do-getfeedback—until you get what you want. You can applythis cycle to any area of your life that you want toimprove—finance, romance, sports, career, you name it.

Know what you want.

Find out what you're getting.

Change what you do until you get what you want.

This is terrifically easy to remember because acertain Colonel had the good sense to open achain of restaurants using the abbreviation KFCfor a name. Every time we see one of his signs,we can ask ourselves how well the developmentof our communication skills is going.

What's Coming Up ...

IIn the following chapters, we'll examine the arena ofrapport in much more detail, as well as the value of aReally Useful Attitude in projecting a positive image of22yourself. You'll learn what happens at first sight on thesurface and below the surface and the importance ofhaving your body language, your voice tone and yourwords be congruent, or all saying the same thing. Nocrossed signals, no mixed messages, no confusion.