664: Dr. Robert Cialdini on How to Persuade with the 7 Universal Principles of Influence

Pete Mockaitis
Bob, thanks so much for joining us here on the How to be Awesome at Your Job podcast.

Robert Cialdini
I’m glad to be with you, Pete.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I am glad to be with you as well. This is a treat and an honor. You’ve been on my list since before this show was a show. We’re talking about your latest, new and updated edition of Influence, and you’ve updated it and expanded a lot here. But I love how you have left the first two sentences in the introduction the same. Could you speak those words now and tell us if they still ring true after studying influence for all these decades?

Robert Cialdini
Yes. There’s a story that goes with them but let me give them first. They are, “I can admit it freely now. All my life, I’ve been a patsy,” which has to do with one of the reasons I got into studying the influence process and persuasion. I was forever the unwanted owner of various things that people would sell me, I was a contributor to causes I’d never heard of, and I would say to myself, “What just happened here? There must be something other than the merits of the offer that got me to say yes. It must be the way the presenter delivered the merits of the offer, that triggered some psychological tendencies in me to say yes to things. Wouldn’t that be interesting to study, not just out of self-defense but as a general inquiry into the way we work as members of our species?”

Pete Mockaitis
Indeed. And it is fascinating stuff and we’re all indebted to you for having delved in and codified and discovered a lot of this stuff. So, maybe we’ll give first a quick note to the pre-existing Cialdini fans. What is new in this latest expanded edition?

Robert Cialdini
Well, of course, it’s been 14 years since the last edition so I’ve added 220 pages of new material, updates, as to what it is that makes people say yes to requests, to recommendations or proposals – the science has advanced. But, in addition, I’ve looked specifically at how the internet has interacted with this process, how the principles of influence have migrated over to these platforms that didn’t exists in any meaningful sense 14 years ago, to look at how the influence process works on those platforms – social media, electronic marketing, and so on. That’s a big difference and a big addition to this edition.

But, as well, I’ve added a seventh principle of influence. There used to be just six that I thought covered the waterfront but, no, I think there’s a seventh that I call unity, and it has to do with the extent to which people are willing to say yes to anyone who is a member of what they will consider a “we” group, a group in which they share an identity with the other members of that group.

So, here’s an example. A study was done on a university campus. Researchers had a young woman asking passersby for contributions to the United Way. Most of the passersby were students at that university. She was able to double, more than double her number of contributors and the amount of donations by adding one sentence before she made her request, it was, “I’m a student here, too.” And now, Pete, all the barriers to yes came down. We say yes to those individuals who are not just like us but are of us.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, that is powerful. Well, so, I want to dig into, quickly, each of the six and then in some more depth, the seventh. But maybe for those who are not yet Cialdini fans, can you paint a little bit of the why for us? Like, just how much more persuasive are we when we utilize these principles? Is it a little bit of a lift or is it transformational? And could you give us maybe some of the most dramatic numbers you’ve encountered?

Robert Cialdini
It’s transformational. We just talked about one. If you could more than double, it’s two and a half times the amount of assent that you get to a request, you’re going to be a master of that moment. But that will be true in a lot of instances even though all it takes is an extra breath. All it takes is to say something that triggers a deeply seated psychological tendency in all of us. It’s that trigger that produces the power.

In the same way that if I were the person who was in charge of lighting a stadium, I don’t have to go run around on a wheel to get all that. I flip a switch. There’s no effort involved. The power is what is stored in the system of that electronic network inside that stadium. Well, that’s what you do with these simple words or phrases or sentences. You trip a switch that engages the power of a system that moves us powerfully, like the system that says, “I say yes to those people who are of us, are one of us.”

Pete Mockaitis
All right. So, that 2.5X right in that particular example of unity is somewhat representative of all of these principles used well in action?

Robert Cialdini
It will vary from 20% all the way to 250% but you’ll get substantially more compliance than your competitors who don’t know how to trigger those psychological principles.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. That’s huge. So, I just wanted to establish that for the record. We’re not talking about studies that somehow managed to eke out statistical significance with a big sample size – it’s transformational. All right, so, covered. Now, I’d love to hear, before we get into the particulars, is there one or two discoveries about influence that you’ve made over the course of your career that just surprised you the most, like, “Holy smokes, is that how we humans really operate? Wow”?

Robert Cialdini
Yeah, I’ll give you two. One is how small the footprint is for the fundamental principles of persuasion. I spent two and a half years studying, undercover, the techniques and practices of various kinds of influence professions: sales, marketing, advertising, fundraising, recruiting, and so on. And what I’ve found was that there were only very few principles of influence that worked across the whole range of these. There were thousands of individual tactics and techniques that were used but I thought we could categorize the majority of them in terms of just these seven universal principles. So, that’s one.

We don’t have to have a long compendium of these things that we’ve memorized and checked off and so. No, there are only seven. We can handle seven. Know to include one or another of them into a message or a communication which will significantly increase the likelihood of assent. And here’s one thing I should say. The word likelihood is crucial here. These aren’t magical. There’s no such thing as a 100% all of the time that will get you success, but will get you better chances of success, will get you better probabilities of success every time. And if, as I said, you use them and your rivals and competitors don’t, you’ll win every time.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, beautiful. Okay. Well, then let’s zoom in, let’s talk about these universal principles of influence, also might be called weapons of influence, or tools of influence, or levers of influence, the big ideas here. Could you maybe give us the quick version of the original six? Hey, what is it? And maybe an example that you find intriguing of a professional using it masterfully and then maybe disastrously, like, “Whoa, that’s the wrong way to use reciprocation”?

Robert Cialdini
Okay. Good plan. Let’s begin with the principle of reciprocation which says, “People want to give back to those have given to them first.” So, if you invite me to a party, I should invite you to one of mine. If you remember my birthday with a card, I should remember yours. And if you do me a favor, Pete, I owe you a favor. And I’ll say very simply, in the context of obligation, people say yes to those they owe.

So, let’s take an example. Recently, one of my colleagues, Steve Martin, did some research at McDonald’s with a little procedure in which the manager arranged for every family that came into that McDonald’s location for the children in the family to get a balloon. Half of them got the balloon as they left as kind of a thank you, the other half got the balloon as they entered. Those who got the balloon, the kids got the balloon as they entered, the family bought 20% more food.

Pete Mockaitis
Beautiful, because they thought a tug of reciprocation, like, “Oh, that was nice of them. I should probably go ahead and get some extra fries.”

Robert Cialdini
Yeah. Do you have kids, Pete? Do you have kids?

Pete Mockaitis
I got two toddlers, yeah.

Robert Cialdini
You know if I do a favor for your children, I’ve done a favor for you, and that’s what happened. Now here’s the interesting thing about that study. They also got a 25% increase in coffee purchases not for the kids. The parents bought more food for themselves.

Pete Mockaitis
I’m thinking of John Mulaney, “One Black Coffee.” It’s not for kids.

Robert Cialdini
No, right. Okay, now, to your point. So, how do people sometimes use this poorly? Notice that it was the same cost of the balloon for the kids as they left. You have to go first. How many restaurants have you been in that they do this wrong? As you leave the restaurant, there’s a basket of mints on the desk for you to sample. As you leave, nobody gets any benefit inside the restaurant for that little favor that you’ve done. In fact, it probably cost you more because I see people digging their hands in and taking handfuls of mints.

Well, there was a study that showed that if you put a mint on the tray just before people pay their bill, the tip goes up 3.3%. If you put two mints on the tray per customer, the tip goes up 14.3%. All right. So, you can see the difference now. It’s the same expense but only one gives you anything in return.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s powerful. And while we’re talking about reciprocity, I said we’d go fast but I can’t resist, you suggested if you do a favor for someone and they say thank you, don’t say, “It was nothing.” But you might say something along the lines of, “I know you’d do the same for me.” Do you have any pro tips on how to deliver that line or alternatives if people feel a little funny saying it?

Robert Cialdini
Look, that’s what I would recommend for somebody who you don’t have a relationship with. So, what do you say to just put them on record that, “In the future, if I need something, you’d do the same for me”? So, one of the tips is don’t say, “If the situation had been reversed, I know you would have done the same for me.” That’s in the past. You say, “If the situation were ever reversed, I know you would do the same for me.” Now, they’re on record. All right?

Now, if there is a relationship and you’ve done something, a little special for people inside that relationship, maybe a business relationship, and they say, “Thank you so much. I really appreciated the way you got this order to me quicker, you arranged the payment plan for me to fit.” All right. And then here’s what I think you say, “Of course, it’s what long-term partners do…” and then you add the addendum, “…for one another.”

Pete Mockaitis
I’m applauding. Thank you. I’m glad I asked. So, that’s reciprocation. Let’s talk about commitment and consistency.

Robert Cialdini
Yes, so one thing, another thing that people feel very strongly is they want to be consistent with what they have already committed themselves to either in action or word, especially in public. You want to be consistent. You don’t want to be seen as a flip-flopper, somebody who says one thing, does another, and so on. So, if you can arrange for people to make a small step in your direction, or make a statement, or something that they truly believe, but make it out loud in public, they’re more likely to then continue to move in that direction.

And the great story I like in this regard comes from a study that was done in a restaurant in Chicago, where the owner was getting about 30% no shows, when people would call and book a table then 30% of them wouldn’t show up, and they wouldn’t call to cancel. So, he had his receptionist change what she said when she took a booking from, “Thank you for calling Gordon’s restaurant. Please call if you have to change or cancel your recommendation” to “Will you please call if you…?” and then pause. The pause was crucial because it allowed people to say, “Yes, sure. Of course.” In other words, they committed themselves.

No shows dropped from 30% to 10% that day and never went back up. What’s the implication for your listeners? If you’re running a meeting and you’re assigning people tasks to do before the next meeting, never let anyone out of the room without saying, “Will you be able to complete this task properly by the time of our next meeting?” If they say no, that’s good. That means you know, “Oh, we got to give them more time,” or you got to give them some resources or help. But most of them will say yes, and you’ve now significantly increased the likelihood that they will come properly prepared because they’ve made a commitment to it, a public commitment.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, so one key principle there is just to do it and not forget and not assume but actually get the yes. Any ways this can be done inappropriately?

Robert Cialdini
Yeah, it’s by failing to pause and let them make a commitment to you.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Perfect. Well, now, how about social proof?

Robert Cialdini
Social proof, this is the one, the principle that says, “People want to follow the lead of multiple comparable others.” If a lot of people are raving about a new restaurant, a piece of software, or a new film, or something on Netflix, “You don’t want to miss The Queen’s Gambit,” you’re likely to follow through because they’ve beta-tested it for you. So, people are much more likely to say yes if there’s evidence that that’s the case.

There was a study done in Beijing, China that shows you the cross-cultural reach of this. Restaurant managers put a little asterisk next to certain items on the menu which increased the purchase of those items by 13-20%. What did the asterisk stand for? It wasn’t what it usually stands for, “This the specialty of the house,” or, “This is our chef’s recommendation for the evening.” That’s what we’d normally see. It’s, “This is one of our most popular items,” and each one became 13- 20% more popular for their popularity.

Pete Mockaitis
You know, that is interesting in terms of…And did they do that research kind of head-to-head, like “most people like this” asterisk versus asterisk means chef’s suggestion, and social proof wins?

Robert Cialdini
No, they didn’t do that.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, I guess we don’t know.

Robert Cialdini
We don’t know but what we know is that they had never used, “This is one of our most popular items,” there, and it produced this effect. Honestly, it was their most popular item.

Pete Mockaitis
Certainly, they’re not just blowing smoke. And that makes everything easier from like a supply, management, inventory, complexity, running your business situation on the backend because it’s just way simpler.

Robert Cialdini
Yeah, just point to it. And the lovely thing about it is it makes it ethical. You’re just informing people, into assent. You’re not tricking them. You’re certainly not coercing them. It’s just educating them.

Pete Mockaitis
It’s even helpful, it’s like, I don’t know…

Robert Cialdini
Exactly.

Pete Mockaitis
…I’m a tourist. I might actually want to know. People might ask me, “Oh, did you get the dish?” I had no idea I should’ve gotten the thing. Okay.

Robert Cialdini
Pete, you put your finger on another factor in this study that I usually don’t talk about but it’s true. Although this technique worked for every demographic that came into the restaurants – young, old, business people, men, women, whatever it was. The one demographic that most responded to this was people who were there for the first time who were unsure. And what this does is it reduces your uncertainty. That’s what social proof does. It reduces your uncertainty of the step you should take.

Pete Mockaitis
Certainly, yeah. And that really does seem where social proof shines. Have you ever had the conversation with a parent, like, “Everyone else is doing it”? and I say, “Well, if everyone else were jumping off a cliff, would you do it?” I think the real answer is, if you were on top of a cliff, you’re like, “This is kind of scary. I’m not so sure about this.” But then you see ten people jump off, have a great time, be okay.

Robert Cialdini
In the water, right.

Pete Mockaitis
And like, “I guess it’s fine.” Social proof.

Robert Cialdini
Yeah, precisely.

Pete Mockaitis
Cool. Let’s talk about liking.

Robert Cialdini
There wouldn’t be a single member of your audience that’s listening to us who would be surprised that we prefer to say to the people we like. That’s not a surprise. Here’s what’s surprising. There are two things you can do, very small things you can do to significantly increase the rapport that people feel with us. One is to point to genuine similarities that exist between us.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, Bob, we’ve both written books. I like you.

Robert Cialdini
We’re authors. If I just bring that to the surface, at the top, there’s a bond between us now, right? Well, there was a study done with negotiators that found that if they sent information to one another before the negotiation started about their interests and hobbies and backgrounds, where they went to school and what their family situation was, and so on, they significantly reduced the percentage of stymied negotiation where people just walked away, nobody won, both sides left with nothing.

Now, the interesting thing was it wasn’t the amount of information that was conveyed by one or another partner. It was whether there was a commonality, a parallel inside that information that was revealed, “Oh, you’re a runner? I’m a runner,” “You’re an only child? I’m an only child,” “You have twins? I have twins.” And that was the thing.

So, we now have the internet available to us where we can identify, before we ever try to do business with somebody, or negotiate with somebody, or make a request of somebody, they tell us all kinds of things about them on LinkedIn or Facebook. It’s not proprietary information. It’s not embargo. They want us to know this about them. If we go there and locate something that’s truly in common and then bring it to the surface, we get a better outcome.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s good. And not to get too into the weeds with distinctions, but so there’s liking, and one way that we produce liking is seeing a similarity, then that kind of feels like we’re now in unity territory, like, “Oh, hey, we’re both authors.” Do you think about that distinction in any particular way that’s helpful?

Robert Cialdini
I do. One is a similarity of preferences, or tastes, or styles, inclinations, and these kinds, proclivities. The other is a similarity of membership in a group that people define themselves with.

Pete Mockaitis
Like, who I am identity.

Robert Cialdini
Yes. So, if I were to say to my fellow group members, “Oh, Pete is like us,” I’ll get some movement in your direction from them. They’d be more inclined towards you. But if I were to say, “Pete is one of us,” everything, all barriers to influence come down now. That’s a much more powerful form of similarity. It’s “Who I am” is shared by this individual. We share a social identity. And there are various ways of doing that that don’t take a lot of time.

Everybody says Warren Buffett is the most successful financial expert, investor of our time. He did something in a recent letter to his shareholders where the question was, “What’s Berkshire Hathaway’s…” that’s his business, his company, “…future going to look like in the future? What is it going to look like?” And he said, “I would tell you what I’d say to a family member if they asked me that question.” In other words, he brought everybody inside the boundaries of his family.

I own some Berkshire Hathaway stocks, and what he said at that moment opened my ears and opened my mind to the next thing he said in ways that he wouldn’t have been able to do without that preface. He said, “I’m going to bring you inside my family, my identity, my social identity. I would do the same thing for you as I am for them.” Wow! You can do it. You can do those sorts of things.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, hey, we’re talking about unity, let’s roll with it. So, any other key things you want to share about unity? It’s about identity, that shared we-ness, we’re in the same tribe.

Robert Cialdini
Yes, we-ness, partnership. So, here is one small…again, small thing you can do that flips the script and significantly increases the likelihood that people will follow what you ask them to do. Many times, we have ideas or initiatives perhaps at work that we would like to get installed and we would like to be associated with that would bolster our reputation as somebody who comes up with ideas that worked if we run them up the hierarchy, but often we need buy-in from people around us, fellow colleagues, maybe our immediate manager and so on, that this is a good idea.

And what we typically do is to show a draft of our idea or a blueprint of it to this person whose buy-in we want and we ask for their feedback on it. And, typically, here’s the mistake that we make. We ask them for their advice, and the truth is, psychologically, when you ask for someone’s advice, you get a critique. You get someone who goes inside, who introspects and thinks about you as different, and they separate from you almost physically, take a half step back, certainly psychologically, and go inside themselves to consider the pros and cons.

Pete Mockaitis
Just with the word advice.

Robert Cialdini
I’m sorry. Did I say advice? I meant opinion.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay.

Robert Cialdini
If you ask for their opinion, you get a critique.

Pete Mockaitis
Opinion leads to critique. All right.

Robert Cialdini
If you ask for their advice, you get a partner, you get a collaborator. And there’s research to show that if you send people, and this is an online study that was done, a business plan for a new restaurant called Splash, it was going to provide fast, healthy food, and they read the business plan. And then you ask them, “To what extent do you favor this idea?” If they were asked for their opinion on it versus their advice for it, the opinion gets significantly less favorable commentary than advice. And the researchers asked why, and here’s the kicker. It was because they felt more identity, they felt more of a shared identity with the business plan developer if the business plan developer asked for their advice, they felt a partnership with them.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s right. It’s like, “We’re members of this community. We want to make the downtown really cool. Like, yeah, let me…” And I imagine, to the extent that they would sort of write in options, there’s probably more of that, more helpful stuff written by word count.

Robert Cialdini
Yes. There’s another example of a small thing. You change one word and you get a different psychological response based on what it triggers in you. In one case, it triggers a sense of, “Well, I’m a critic here.” And the other case, for advice, “Oh, I’m a collaborator, I’m a partner with this man, or this business developer, in this project, in this idea.”

Pete Mockaitis
That’s good. Well, I don’t want to be a critic of other podcasters and bloggers but I guess I will. Sometimes I feel a little weird when it’s almost like as if we have the language of the unity principle. But if I’m listening to a show and a podcast and they sort of address me in the group. For example, if I were to say to my audience, “What’s up, awesome nation? We got a really cool guest, it’s Bob.”

And so, I’ve sort of just defined that this is our group. If I’m on the receiving end of that, I’m like, “Hmm, I feel a little weird. It’s like I don’t know if I am in awesome nation, and I almost feel a little bit more distanced from them having to try to grab me in.” What do you think about this?

Robert Cialdini
Well, that may be the case because you see it as manipulative. But if you’re truly looking for insight and collaboration and you want to share the idea or the membership, and people see that, that you feel that you want to be more inclusive and bring people in inside the tent, then I think they’ll let you get a pass with that.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Cool. Thank you. Well, all right. So, we talked about liking and then went right into unity. So, should we hit authority?

Robert Cialdini
Sure. Another way to reduce your uncertainty about what constitutes a good choice for you is to follow the lead of genuinely constituted experts, people who know what they’re talking about. And, of course, if you have that access, if there’s a testimonial that fits with the recommendation you’re making or the request that you’re making from a legitimate authority on the topic, you need to bring that to bear, especially online.

You see this all the time where people provide testimonials of one sort or another what they make. Here’s the mistakes they make though. They bury it inside the message. My view is that it should go first. It should be the first thing you see so that all that aura, that positive aura of authority now infuses the rest of the message.

Pete Mockaitis
So, that’s authority so we want to put that a little bit more front and center as opposed to buried.

Robert Cialdini
Right. Where you’ve got it, don’t forget to bring that. And people say, “Is there anything you can do to up the amperage of the authority?” Yes, multiply it. Multiply the authority. It turns out that people are more swayed by multiple authorities that you present all pointing in the same direction than anyone. Don’t stop at one.

Pete Mockaitis
Perfect.

Robert Cialdini
You’ve missed a gear. There’s another gear available to you.

Pete Mockaitis
Certainly. And I guess it might vary case by case but, as you noted with like the mints, there’s one mint, it gives you a little bump; two mints give you a much bigger bump. I guess you can go overboard. I’ve seen some books, I kind of like it but there’s like 20 of other authors and endorsers on it, I’m like, “Oh, that’s pretty impressive. That’s a good lineup.” But, at some point, I don’t know, it’s sort of like trying too hard. I don’t know. It comes across like that.

Robert Cialdini
What I think it is, is people don’t read it, read all 20 of them there because you’ve made it a burden for them to process all of that. But I think the fact that there are 20 is a plus.

Pete Mockaitis
Got you. And that’s true, I’ll scan them, it’s like, “Oh, okay, you got Bob Cialdini, you got Adam Grant, you must be fairly legitimate even though I’m not going to read the details of every single one of those people said about the book.” Cool. And now how about scarcity?

Robert Cialdini
Scarcity. People want more of those things they can have less of, and that’s true it turns out from a very young age in us. By the age of two, children are preferring to go in a direction of something that is scarce or rare or dwindling in availability to them; a toy, compared to a comparable toy that isn’t dwindling in availability. So, that’s true of all of us.

And the reason that that’s the case is that if things are scarce or rare or dwindling in availability, we suffer the possibility of loss, and we have loss aversion as a species. We are more motivated into action by the idea of losing something than gaining something of equal value. The Noble Prize winner Daniel Kahneman showed this in his prospect theory, and he says, “We’re twice as likely to move in a direction of something that prevents a loss than that obtains a gain for the same thing.”

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, that’s good. That’s good. Well, Bob, this has been quite a rundown. Thank you. You tell me, is there anything else you really want to make sure to mention before we shift gears and hear about a few of your favorite things?

Robert Cialdini
Well, I think we’ve highlighted it before, and that is the importance of doing this ethically, that the only way you get to continue long-term productive relationships with people is that if these principles are used to inform them into assent rather than trick them. As soon as they recognize the trickery, they’re gone to you. They’re going to ghost you. That’s it, you’re gone, so ethics is crucial.

Pete Mockaitis
Certainly. Well, maybe, could you share with us, what is the most frequently occurring abuse you’ve seen of these principles?

Robert Cialdini
I think it’s lying with statistics where people will claim certain kinds of growth or size of the market share and so on, and they fix the data so that it seems that way, and it’s not really that’s the case.

Pete Mockaitis
Right. It’s not the representative for the reader.

Robert Cialdini
That’s right.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, now, could you share with us a favorite quote, something you find inspiring?

Robert Cialdini
I’m a researcher so I’m going to use a version of this quote, but there’s an old Chinese proverb “The years say what the days can’t tell.” So, it means don’t jump on the first impression, the first piece of information, the first datapoint that you get as a way to decide. If you can collect more evidence, then your choice will be more solid. So, the research-based version of that would be multiple data points tell what a single datapoint can’t say.

Pete Mockaitis
Well done. And, speaking of datapoints, boy, this might be hard for you, is there a particular study or experiment or piece of research that you think of often, that you’re fond of and has shaped your thinking?

Robert Cialdini
Well, I’ll say there’s one that, really, I love because of what we also talked about, one small change that makes a difference. It was a study done by the Harvard psychologist in a library and in front of a library copying machine where she had a research assistant go to the front of the line and say to the first person, “Excuse me, I have eight pages. Could I butt ahead of you in line?” And under those circumstances, she was successful 60% of the time.

In another condition, she went and said to the first person in the line, “Excuse me, I have eight pages. Can I move ahead of you because I’m in a rush?” And now she got 94% compliance. So, it seemed like the reason “I’m in a rush” made the difference. But she had a third condition that showed that wasn’t the case. Third condition? “Excuse me, I have eight pages. Could I butt ahead of you in line because I have to make some copies?” Now, that’s not a real reason.

Pete Mockaitis
Right, “We all have to make copies.”

Robert Cialdini
Ninety-three percent. It was the word because. We are programmed to respond to the word because as if it leads into a genuine reason, and people automatically responded to it rather than to the genuine merits of the reason. So, what I love about that is it just shows you how much of this is psychology rather than the merits of the thing. We have to train ourselves to know as much about the psychology of what goes before the offer as we do the merits of what’s in the offer in order to protect ourselves properly.

Pete Mockaitis
Well said. Thank you. And could you name one favorite book?

Robert Cialdini
Favorite is a tough one for me but I’ll give you the one that was most formative to me, the most impactful to me. I read it at 12 years old. It was the book The Hidden Persuaders by a guy named Vance Packard who showed the hidden cues inside advertising that triggers psychological reactions in us. And it opened for me the idea that, “Wait a minute. It’s not just what’s in front of you,” even at 12 years old, “It’s not what’s being presented to you on the surface. It’s what’s underneath the surface that’s often driving our behavior.”

Pete Mockaitis
And a favorite tool, something you use to be awesome at your job?

Robert Cialdini
I would say Zoom is terrific and Google Scholar where I could get the research reports of people. All I have to do is type in their names or a concept or a title of an article, and, suddenly, I don’t have to be a library unto myself in my office with all my journals and books, and so on. No, it’s right there.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s good, yeah. Then I’m sure you’ve got your full text access. And, usually, I get a tease, and I’m like, “Where’s the rest?” That’s the kind of dork I am. And how about a favorite habit?

Robert Cialdini
I do an exercise workout every morning, and then I brew myself a cup of coffee that I leisurely sip and savor, sip by sip, which allows me, first of all, to celebrate and reward the fact that I just did a workout, but also it gives me the calm to plan my day.

Pete Mockaitis
And so, as you savor the sips, you have notepad in hand as you’re writing the plan? Or how does that go?

Robert Cialdini
I often don’t. I just order in my mind which things I need to prioritize once I’m finished with that cup of coffee, what’s the first thing I need to do that’s not just there but important for me to do. So, inside that time of thinking about my day, I prioritize.

Pete Mockaitis
Lovely. And you share a lot of wisdom, but is there a particular nugget you say that seems to connect and resonate, get Kindle Book-highlighted, retweeted more than others?

Robert Cialdini
Yeah, I would say, and this has to do with the influence process again, and what I will say that gets retweeted a lot is “When the science is available, why use anything else?”

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah. Well, hey, talk about authority, it’s like a ladder of authority. Like, yeah, double-blind, controlled, thousands of participants stuff is excellent. Well, tell us, if folks want to learn more or get in touch, where would you point them?

Robert Cialdini
Our website InflueceAtWork.com.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And do you have a finale challenge or call to action specifically for professionals looking to be awesome at their jobs?

Robert Cialdini
Go into every new situation thinking the best of the people who are there. That will allow you to be generous with them which will cause them to reciprocally be generous with you and to like you for it. And now you’ve got two people who like each other and are giving each other grace.

Pete Mockaitis
That is lovely. Bob, thank you. This has been a treat. It is no exaggeration to say it’s literally been a dream come true for me to have this conversation, so thank you so much. And I wish you much luck with the latest edition of Influence and all your adventures.

Robert Cialdini
Thank you. I’ve enjoyed myself with our interaction.