Transcription
Here's a tactic that all intelligence operatives learn, and it's called elicitation. You use statements instead of questions to get the most powerful information from other people.
When a person's being asked a question, it raises a little door in the brain that says, "I need to be careful about the answer." If you're responding to a statement, your brain does not have that little security guard that comes out.
And so, as a light example, let's just imagine you and me took an Uber to get here. And let's imagine you and me get we're going to take an Uber back. We get into that Uber and I say, "I just read online that Uber drivers were rated the number one job satisfaction of all the jobs in the country." And I just said a statement, and he's going to turn turn around and go, "What? Where? Where did you see this?" So that starts a conversation. And then he says, "No, it's really bad. You know, I do this, this, and they take the money and this and this."
And then I do disbelief. This is another technique. Disbelief says, "No way. There's no way that company would treat you like that." He goes, "Oh yeah, you will never guess what happened just a couple weeks ago." And then he just kind of goes into this deep story that he would never tell another client. What, who does he tell these stories to? Friends? I've made his brain start behaving in friend mode, and I haven't even asked any questions yet.
And then let's say he he goes into a story and then I say, you know, my neighbor's daughter uh started driving for Uber, and she said she saw the wildest things happen in her back seat. And then you're going to hear a story again. And I have not asked any questions.
And the way that I teach this is if you and I are standing at the grocery store and there's a a young lady over there stocking fruits, and I said, "All right, Leon, you've got 60 seconds to go up to this person and find out how much they make for a living, and you're not allowed to ask any questions." So if if I went over to her and I said, "Hey, I'm trying to find the baby carrots," and she starts walking me over somewhere, haven't asked a question yet. That was a statement. And then I say, "I just read on LinkedIn that you guys got bumped up to $22 an hour. That's unbelievable. That's great. Congratulations to everybody here. That's amazing." And she goes, "What? We only make $17.50. Everybody does." I avoided that social barrier because there was no question being asked.
A different way to do this is called quotes, facts, and figures. And you deliberately say, "I saw a YouTube video, read an article, did something that said X, Y, and Z." And it triggers a need in the human brain that's almost irresistible, and it's called the need to correct the record.
And the next way we do this is just making what's called a provocative statement. So let's say I ask you what you do for a living, and you say, "Well, I make YouTube videos now. I'm starting this new podcast thing, and it's been uh interesting. It's been a good career change." And I say, "Wow, YouTube, that has got to be challenging." And then it it starts coming out. It's like people can't resist. And then let's say you said, "Well, yeah, it's challenging. We did this, this, and monetizing and YouTube language and whatever else." I said, "I cannot imagine what that is. That's got to be really stressful. It's it's got probably keeps you up at night." And then just, "Yeah. I mean, when I'm editing videos." And then I'll just let's say you just talked about editing a video, and I said, "Editing videos." And then you would keep.