We’d like you to train our team
The regional manager for the multinational had taken part, as a private individual, in our NLP Core Skills course a few months earlier and (of course đ ) was very impressed with it. So much so that he was now approaching us to quote for a training programme.
He wanted a 3-day Team Development training for his 40-strong team so they could learn NLP skills and experience the benefits of the High & Low Ropes Challenge course which he had experienced on NLP Core Skills.
Now a three-day training for such group, who would be flying in to the UK from mainland Europe, was an impressive request. The profit from it and the opportunity to run the programme for other regions of the multinational certainly got my attention.
The dilemma
Then the dilemma arose. (By the way, this was nearly 10 years ago and Pegasus NLP was going through a change. We were struggling to establish ourselves in the training world as a ‘pure NLP’ training company.) Now the potential earnings from pursuing this opportunity with the multi-national were huge. The team development experience would certainly be a profitable one for us. And the potential for lots of follow-on work with this major international organisation very alluring.
But… the multinational was a household-name cigarette manufacturing company.
I had to decide if we at Pegasus NLP wanted to be involved in enabling this group of 40 people to function better as a team, to be better at doing their job, and to be better at selling cigarettes – to be better, not to put too fine a point on it, at selling death.
I decided to turn down the opportunity.
NLP, Selling and ValuesâŚ
Financially this was a difficult, painful decision. Because Pegasus NLP was then in a transition process work was a little thin on the ground. So turning down an opportunity which we could very likely convert into 10âs of ÂŁ1,000âs wasnât easy.
But one of the benefits of NLP is the clarity it/we bring to things like decision-making… and I recognised that I had a valuesâ conflict. Did I fulfil my value of Be Successful & Profitable or my value of Be true to yourself?
This conflict wasnât immediately obvious to me â hence the few days of angst. But, once I recognised that it was such a conflict and once I checked my current Values Hierarchy, it was a no-brainer. And, as it always does, making the decision was both liberating and de-stressing.
Then it was simply a matter of letting the company know ‘Thanks. But no thanks.’ And moving on â without doubt or regrets.
So what brought this up â and why today?
I actually hadn’t thought of this incident for years. Until today, that is. What triggered the memory was hearing on the news that today (31 May 2010) is designated by the World Health Organisation as âNo Tobacco Dayâ.
Each year âNo Tobacco Day’ has a theme and this year the theme is ‘Smoking is Ugly’ because the WHO is attempting to counteract the very effect marketing campaign by the tobacco industry to get young women and girls to perceive cigarette smoking as cool and a beauty aid!
http://www.who.int/tobacco/wntd/2010/tob_ind_marketing_women/en/index.html
http://www.gazettelive.co.uk/news/teesside-news/2010/05/31/quitting-smoking-is-the-best-beauty-tip-84229-26556543/
NLP Reframing and cigarettes
Getting people to perceive smoking as a beauty aid is what, in NLP, we would call reframing. Reframing is where we use our NLP methods to influence others to perceive things differently. (And, yes of course, reframing can also be applied in, or even called, marketing!)
The thing is NLP provides some very effective tools for this reframing thing. NLP tools are very, very good for reframing.
Which raises the question: do we have any standards on which organisations can and will benefit from this very effective communication methodology? Or do we adopt the arms dealers’ or the drugs dealers’ argument ‘Well, I better do it â because if I donât someone else will! And, at least, I do it ethically…..’
Do we, as NLP training providers, have resolute standards â and no-go areas â or does commercial expediency over-ride everything?
‘Its easy to have principles when you’re rich. The important thing is to have principles when you’re poor’. (Ray Kroc )
If you help people get better at what they do, isn’t that direct support for their outcome?
I learned the uncomfortable truth during my first job as an engineer in the aircraft industry that if I did my job well, people would die. Ever since, I have always made a value judgment on the desired outcomes of the person or organisation before engaging with them. I’ve turned down some opportunities but something better always seems to turn up.
A difficult decision, Reg. It does however raise the question of how individuals and groups use NLP to promote their own interests.
I have witnessed occasions where NLP was used to bully those on the receiving end, and where the principals of NLP were distorted to suit the user to gain an advantage. NLP is like any other psychological tool – it can be misused.
So whilst I think your decision not to help promote the Tobacco industry is commendable, maybe a dose of Pegasus Training might have helped the trainees to âdiscoverâ the error of their ways ?
I personally believe that the way you facilitate the learning of the various ways of understanding and utilizing NLP is probably unique to you.
During your training sessions you include many challenging and thought provoking themes, that help people take a hard look at what they want and how that might impact on others.
Just another way of looking at the situation, now where did I learn about alternative ways of looking at things. Perhaps it had something to do with certain NLP trainings that I attended some years ago đ
Hi Tudor: first off, thanks for the comments about my/our facilitation.
And good point you’re raised i.e. that maybe some good might have come of it. Yes, that’s a thought I considered at length, at the time. Along with the one that if I don’t teach them the NLP approach somebody else will.
No doubt some good would have come of it. One or two might have used the experience to explore their values.
And, no doubt too, someone else will have taught them good teamwork and communicating skills.
For me it was also a matter of congruence – of being true to values.
I didn’t want to build a company on money earned from such a questionable enterprise – how could I subsequently walk the talk of being tru to one’s values? Which is a key part of everythign we now do in Pegasus NLP.
Iain’s Ray Kroc quote (above) is quite a profound one…