I have heard there are various levels of qualifications in the field of NLP. How relevant is this to getting results?
Sad to say, in my experience the above answer is essentially correct, though it is not the whole story.
The three main levels in the FoNLP are Practitioner, Master Practitioner and Trainer.
Practitioner is the beginners’ course. Although you could in theory learn the basic techniques from a book, the main value of going on a course at this level is that you get plenty of supervised practice in those techniques.
Many companies run specialist Master Practitioner courses – for use in business, education, etc. And courses usually include more advanced techniques – though they, too, can be found in books. Apart from getting guided training there is also the advantage that (in theory at least) you will be working with fellow trainees who already have a fair amount of knowledge and experience.
The Trainer’s course is really designed for people who want to become NLP-related trainers,
A significant proportion of the course will concentrate on presentation skills – though with an NLP-orientation you will seldom find in convential presentation skills course.
Whether you get much in the way of more advanced NLP-related skills will depend on which training company you choose.
One thought to close with.
Leaving aside his stage shows, Paul McKenna has built a considerable and well-deserved reputation for his NLP-related skills. Not because he knows hundreds of techniques (though he might, for all I know), but because he is so skilled at applying a relatively small number of techniques appropriately and with great finesse.
When you’re dealing with human beings, quality beats quantity every time (IMO).
The world of NLP is very competitive with Practitioners vying for advantage and prestige by making claims about who they trained with, the number of workshops they have attended, the number of books they have written and the speed with which they can get results. I have found no correlation between so called qualifications and results in NLP or in any of the fields of human performance and healing. Results speak for themselves.
