NLP and developing genuine skills

When I first came across NLP in the 1990s I attended an event that had literally hundreds of attendees. There was a fair amount of "whooping", but fortunately also some good teaching, so we left with a basic awareness of NLP. We were not IMO 'practitioners" as indicated on our certificates, but certainly had some useful skills.

People attend NLP events for a variety of reasons and sometimes they can fall into the trap of believing that a few weeks training will equip them to leave the day job and set up a lucrative private practice. This rarely manifests for a number of reasons including the fact that in most instances the practitioner does not have the business skills to attract clients as well as not having the skills to properly work with client conditions.

One UK NLP training company claimed to have trained 50,000 practitioners and yet few individuals earn a sustainable income from NLP. Those who do make it beyond the "happy clappy" NLP online forums, establish their own reputations by creating new products and materials rather than attempting a karaoke version of imitating the trainer they first trained with! Many such skilled individuals take what they have learned from their original trainings and added their own insights to produce something truly useful for others.

I noticed that in recent years some people have begun to talk about "qualifying in NLP" and "graduating in NLP" as if NLP were an academic subject, which of course it is not! The NLP set of tools was created by the co creators modelling some of the best therapists who were around in the 1970s. Those who in my experience earn a reasonable living from using NLP skills tend to apply these skills in a specific niche. Unfortunately NLP has no real regulation and from the public's perception it can be regarded as a bit "new age" especially with some of the crazy comments online. The NLP skill set can produce some excellent results in learning and dealing with therapeutic issues, when practitioners learned their craft and put in the "fly time" to develop their own discrimination and professional skills.

www.nickkemp.com