I am delighted today to welcome Piernicola de Maria. Piernicola works from Morocco and can be contacted on LinkedIn or at piernicola.com/ or at PNL Maroc.
Talking4good (T4g): How did you come into contact with NLP?
Piernicola: That’s a long story. Let’s just say that, while I was at university, I spent more time “studying how to study” than actually studying. During this time, and thanks to my friend Gianluca Da Ponzacco, I came across NLP and naturally transitioned into becoming a professional… With the exception of the job I took while writing my dissertation, I’ve always made my living using NLP professionally.
T4g: What NLP qualification do you have?
Piernicola: NLP Trainer. But I guess the real qualification is 12 years living and breathing what I teach.
T4g: Which NLP association would your qualifications be accredited by?
Piernicola: First Society of NLP, under Richard Bandler.
T4g: What do you like best in NLP?
Piernicola: I absolutely love the patterning/strategies/modelling part. It’s a very valuable tool both for learning, creativity and for intervention…. and it’s a total shame that most of the people confuse NLP with the Techniques, which are nothing more than the results of the methodology. It’s like confusing a pie with baking!
T4g: What is your current focus with NLP in addition of training?
Piernicola: I love to work in individual or small groups settings and run a high end Coaching/Consulting program. That’s probably the space that’s more natural to me. What I do with this people is not “just NLP”, though. I am in fact one of the handfuls of people who are authorized by Dr. Joseph Riggio to apply and teach his “babies”: The MythoSelf Process Model[1] and the Exquisite Performance Coaching/Consulting Model[2]. I can’t go into too many details in writing, but the deep innovation that Dr. Riggio brought with his models is a sense of directionality that in the traditional way to teach NLP is not present. That makes a world of difference with clients because instead of using the traditional NLP approach “let me help you to get rid of the problems that stop you from getting what you want”, it uses the tools and instruments of NLP to work at a deeper and wholeform[3] level. On top of this I pioneered in NLP/Persuasion application to Marketing and I do a lot of consulting in that field for big clients, mainly in the online space.
T4g: How is NLP present in Morocco, where you live?
Piernicola: The future of NLP in Morocco is bright! There’s a lot of activity going on and people wanting to learn and know more. I am also very proud that we’re managing to put together a group of very competent NLP experts that I am training personally and that I sincerely hope will be our next generation of trainers/coaches.
T4g: How is NLP present in Italy?
Piernicola: Well… unlike Morocco, NLP in Italy is at a level of maturity and saturation that in a way is really stimulating, and there is very little space for low quality trainings or services. On the other hand it makes it harder for a practitioner or a trainer to get attention.
T4g: What about NLP and research?
Piernicola: I am not getting into a rant about some myths spread within some of the NLP community that NLP takes 20 minutes to do what Psychiatry do in 20 years….. or many other stories that are told. One thing sure, there’s A LOT of very exciting research going on right now in the field of neuroscience that can be integrated into the model and yet very few people are aware of it… every now and then something makes it mainstream, for instance “mirror neurons”[4], but a lot of brilliant stuff is still undiscovered.
T4g: Any specific NLP research you would like to be involved with?
Piernicola: Well… while I am an avid research reader, I don’t like doing it! <Laughs> My interest is always in application, and I let other people, fitter than me for number crunching, to look after the research.
T4g: A last comment to conclude?
Piernicola: I am more and more interested in mentoring NLP experts at a very deep level. NLP is a field full of shining objects so it’s really easy to get lost. I owe 99.9% of what I know and do to Dr. Riggio, who was able to do this with me in a very “karate kid” way. And I look forward to continue his legacy with other people.
© 2011 Florence Dambricourt – talking4good.com/
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