If I could only read your mind... oh yeah, I can!

It is amazing how the internet works. I wrote an article for a software magazine a few years ago about using magic and mentalism to help create better software. Funny though that the magazine either does not exist or does not have a googlable index so the only reference from the Googleplex was this:
Magic Is Golden - Pulling Rabbits Out of Hats (Software and Magic).

Follow the link and take a look. It is pretty good stuff and could open your mind to a new way to think about human/software interactions or even the harder human/human interactions.

The gist of it all is this: Use the information you have to both impress that you know something and further use the information to make accurate predictions about the demographics and psychographics of your coworkers/customers/tribe.

One of the important rules of persuasion is 'Liking' and found in the following book:Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion. The point here is that a person that finds common ground is more apt to do a deal with you. By using mentalism techniques you can find common ground that you can leverage opportunities.

Use the clues. Don't just sit in your customer's office! Look around. Find the sports, art, books, etc. Find common ground, even if it is common ground between your customer and another customer of yours. Just knowing someone like your customer helps you seem likable because of the common thread in your shared social network.

Caildini also looks at authority as persuasion. A simple lab coat can make people do things they would never do for anyone else. you can use mentalism techniques to be the knowing doctor. This is wacky simple. Look at many drug ads. Old=disease. How fortunate that they know and understand my problem!

But Cialdini also talks about the dishonest persuader. If you trick simply to gain advantage, the lack of honest persuasion causes issues later on. The key is to truly use a technique to to help the target of persuasion. If you simply trick, then you don't get repeat business. This is clearly seen with reciprocity (exchange of gifts). The Hari Krishna are a great example where they would give an unexpectant rube a flower which caused a reaction to give a donation. But the ploy failed as there was no real benefit and people learned to avoid the followers. The Hari Krishna are now banned from many places mainly because of their less than honest techniques. Of course many of you reading this don't have any idea what a Krishna is and that is in large part their own doing causing society to bad a practice and thus also limiting the exposure so much that it is no longer as widely known.
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Here in Bangkok (I am here 6 months out of the year) we have horribly disfigured beggars. Though there is a travesty for these poor people, they are placed by criminal gangs that reap the donations. The result is that these poor people that would have normally eked out a living are now mostly ignored. On the other hand the Buddhist temples bring in vast sums of money because their spending of the money is usually transparent. The reciprocity is in the form of both offerings and luck/fortunes and other spiritual services. The people are happy to pay for the spiritual piece of mind and it pales in comparison to the offering plate at your local church.

Back to mentalism, a less spiritual miracle of observation, statistics, choice words, and a little prestidigitation. Be honest, surprising, and appear to know things that others do not. This will help you go far if you do so honestly with the benefit of your friends, family, and tribe clearly a goal.

What is a the most important part of the tribe beyond the leader? Shaman or witch doctor and in some cases they are the leader as well.