How to Intrigue Everyone Without Saying a Word

PART ONE

You Only Have Ten Seconds to
Show You’re a Somebody
The exact moment that two humans lay eyes on each other has
awesome potency. The first sight of you is a brilliant holograph.
It burns its way into your new acquaintance’s eyes and can stay
emblazoned in his or her memory forever.
Artists are sometimes able to capture this quicksilver, fleeting
emotional response. My friend Robert Grossman is an accom-
plished caricature artist who draws regularly for Forbes, Newsweek,
Sports Illustrated, Rolling Stone, and other popular publications.
Bob has a unique gift for capturing not only the physical appear-
ance of his subjects, but for zeroing in on the essence of their per-
sonalities. The bodies and souls of hundreds of luminaries radiate
from his sketch pad. One glance at his caricatures of famous peo-
ple and you can actually “see” their personalities.

Sometimes at a party, Bob will do a quick sketch on a cock-
tail napkin of a guest. Hovering over Bob’s shoulder, the onlook-
ers gasp as they watch their friend’s image and essence materialize
before their eyes. When he’s finished drawing, he puts his pen
down and hands the napkin to the subject. Often a puzzled look
comes over the subject’s face. He or she usually mumbles some
politeness like, “Well, er, that’s great. But it really isn’t me.”
The crowd’s convincing crescendo of “Oh yes it is!” drowns
the subject out and squelches any lingering doubt. The confused
subject is left to stare back at the world’s view of himself or her-
self in the napkin.
Once when I was visiting Bob’s studio, I asked him how he
could capture people’s personalities so well. He said, “It’s simple.
I just look at them.”
“No,” I asked, “How do you capture their personalities? Don’t
you have to do a lot of research about their lifestyle, their history?”
“No, I told you, Leil, I just look at them.”
“Huh?”
He went on to explain, “Almost every facet of people’s per-
sonalities is evident from their appearance, their posture, the way
they move. For instance . . .” he said, calling me over to a file where
he kept his caricatures of political figures.
“See,” Bob said, pointing to angles on various presidential body
parts, “here’s the boyishness of Clinton,” showing me his half smile;
“the awkwardness of the elder George Bush,” pointing to his shoul-
der angle; “the charm of Reagan,” noting the ex-president’s smiling
eyes; “the shiftiness of Nixon,” pointing to the furtive tilt of his
head. Digging a little deeper into his file, he pulled out Franklin
Delano Roosevelt and, pointing to the nose high in the air, “Here’s
the pride of FDR.” It’s all in the face and the body.
First impressions are indelible. Why? Because in our fast-
paced, information-overload world of multiple stimuli bombard-
ing us every second, people’s heads are spinning. They must form

quick judgments to make sense of the world and get on with what
they have to do. So, whenever people meet you, they take an
instant mental snapshot. That image of you becomes the data they
deal with for a very long time.

Your Body Shrieks Before Your
Lips Can Speak

Are their data accurate? Amazingly enough, yes. Even before your
lips part and the first syllable escapes, the essence of YOU has
already axed its way into their brains. The way you look and the
way you move is more than 80 percent of someone’s first impres-
sion of you. Not one word need be spoken.
I’ve lived and worked in countries where I didn’t speak the
native language. Yet, without one understandable syllable spoken
between us, the years proved my first impressions were on target.
Whenever I met new colleagues, I could tell instantly how friendly
they felt toward me, how confident they were, and approximately
how much stature they had in the company. I could sense, just
from seeing them move, who the heavyweights were and who were
the welterweights.
I have no extrasensory skill. You’d know, too. How? Because
before you have had time to process a rational thought, you get a
sixth sense about someone. Studies have shown emotional reac-
tions occur even before the brain has had time to register what’s
causing that reaction.4Thus the moment someone looks at you,
he or she experiences a massive hit, the impact of which lays the
groundwork for the entire relationship. Bob told me he captures
that first hit in creating his caricatures.
Deciding to pursue my own agenda for How to Talk to Any-
one, I asked, “Bob, if you wanted to portray somebody really
cool—you know, intelligent, strong, charismatic, principled, fas-
cinating, caring, interested in other people. . . .”

“Easy,” Bob interrupted. He knew precisely what I was get-
ting at. “Just give ’em great posture, a heads-up look, a confident
smile, and a direct gaze.” It’s the ideal image for somebody who’s
a Somebody.

How to Look Like a Somebody

My friend Karen is a highly respected professional in the home-
furnishings business. Her husband is an equally big name in the
communications field. They have two small sons.
Whenever Karen is at a home-furnishings industry event,
everyone pays deference to her. She’s a very important person in
that world. Her colleagues at conventions jostle for position just
to be seen casually chatting with her and, they hope, be pho-
tographed rubbing elbows with her for industry bibles like Home
Furnishings Executive and Furniture World.
Yet, Karen complains, when she accompanies her husband to
communications functions, she might as well be a nobody. When
she takes her kids to school functions, she’s just another mom. She
once asked me, “Leil, how can I stand out from the crowd so peo-
ple who don’t know me will approach me and at least assume I’m
an interesting person?” The techniques in this section accomplish
precisely that. When you use the next nine techniques, you will
come across as a special person to everyone you meet. You will
stand out as a Somebody in whatever crowd you find yourself in,
even if it’s not your crowd.
Let’s start with your smile.