I know alot of strength routines like to start off with hypertrophy phases such as kiefer's bench press protocol. Are these hypertrophy phases still effective if you do not gain any weight?
Yes? Weight is a debatable subject though. You could be dropping body fat (which we want) while building muscle. It happens.
+1 Also unless you never touched a weight before, it is unlikely that you will gain more than a pound of muscle in a 6 week period. This could by unnoticed as water weight tends to vary by several pounds.