Last weekend I attended Jonathan Altfeld’s Irresistible Voice event for 2 out of 3 days in London.

I must say I have not done a lot of training recently and was looking forward to this immensely and my expectations were met wonderfully.

Whilst this was not an overtly NLP event Jonathan used many of the skills elegantly, sometimes explicitly and sometimes not. There were some there who were Practitioners and Masters and other who had barely heard of NLP but that was of no consequence to the event or our learning. Or to put it another way there was something for everyone where ever you come from.

The Event

I can’t speak for the first day (I understand it was not dissimilar) but most of the time was spent doing what was effectively a series of drills. Jonathans view, I believe, is that there is nothing magical about these things, they are simple and require practice, constant practice and that is what we did.

All the drills were focused around working in small groups usually 3 or 4, sometimes just us together, interacting and sometime using voice technology to highlight how we sound and more importantly how we can adjust the way we come across and get instant feedback. Here are some of the drills we did:

• Talking loudly without shouting (Maintaining state)
• Throwaway lines (A delusion that JA is apparently under concerning English people)
• Fluff talk (great fun)
• Perfect pauses (tough for me)

Day 3 built on the previous day's activities with us using the coaching tips from the night before to consolidate our individual approaches. Finally some fun NLP stuff at the end on calibration and also playing with that ridiculous Aussie accent.

Was it fun? Eb-so-bluddy-lootly

High Point

What of the high point I hear you ask? Well for me it was the one to one coaching that took place towards the end of the day with each participant out front of the group talking about what they have learned so far while Jonathan elegantly weaved in and out of content and process to beautifully and precisely identify the one or two key things we could do next.

The amazing thing was how he could recognise something in each of us that was so simple to understand and easy to do that many of us were able to adjust in real time and see the dramatic effects immediately. A wonderful moment of revelation enjoyed by everyone as we each took our turns and the key for me was also the sign post to the future and the strategy to implement the learning. So often a change we might want to make, large or small may become apparent but the route map to integrating the new behaviour is not so clear and, in my experience, often flounders.

Who could attend and other flashes of the Bleedin’ Obvious

I have worked for twelve years as a self employed management consult and have attended many courses and training events during that time and before, and all have primarily focused on the content of what I do. NEVER once had it occurred to me that I should consider HOW I deliver that content using one of the most important tools I have – my voice.

There is only one criteria you need to consider when making a decision to attend this event and work with Jonathan –

Do you ever have to talk to people

If the answer is No then you may comfortably find something else more important to tackle first.

Whether it is this event or something else you MUST work on that voice until it becomes compelling and irresistible. Your message will be deficient otherwise.

If there is more you would like to know just ask.

John

I met the bloke who invented crosswords last week but I can't remember his name although it had 7 letters, A something T something something LD