Other forms: rapports
Rapport is the warm, easy connection between people who understand each other quickly. Build rapport, establish rapport, they had an immediate rapport.
It is a French word and keeps its French sound: ra-POR, with the final t silent, which is the single thing most often got wrong. It is uncountable and takes with: rapport with a client, rapport with an audience. The word belongs to teaching, therapy, sales and interviewing, where building rapport is a named skill rather than a happy accident. Compare chemistry, which is the informal word for the same thing, and empathy, which is one-directional where rapport is mutual.
1nounrapportAn easy, understanding connection between people.
“She built a rapport with the class in a week.”
synonyms: understanding, connection, chemistry
rapport is a kind of connection.
French rapport means a relation or a connection, from rapporter, to bring back — the same root as report. The word entered English through the mesmerists of the eighteenth century, who used it for the peculiar bond between hypnotist and subject, and it has been getting warmer ever since.
French
rapport
English, today
rapport
Borrowed from French rapport. a doublet of report.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA