How to Convince People That You are Telling the Truth

When I was a fresh graduate in college, I attended a Call Center Training for two months. There I met our trainer who is very good in discussion. He told us to ask any questions to him. Let me stress that one more time. Ask any questions. He told us that he knows all the answers and he can explain his answers well. He said that he is a walking encyclopedia. At first, of course, we did not believe what he told us but we tried to ask questions to him.

He told us to listen carefully and try to grab the words that he will say for us to fully understand the discussion.

I will discuss how he did answer all the questions and how he made most of us believe him.

What I did was I asked him a question which I already knew the answer and I already made a research about my question. And guess what? His answer is incorrect but the good thing is he explained the answer well and most of the class believed on what he answered. If I did not made any research for the answer on the question I asked, I might be also one of the believers.

There were things that I noticed every time he answers the questions. I will share you guys what he did to make us believed on his answers.

First, he told us that he can answer all our questions and he is a walking encyclopedia that he spend his free time reading magazines, newspapers, encyclopedias and other informative reading materials. He also told us that he likes to watch TV shows like National Geographic and Discovery Channel. Well, we thought that if he is really doing that, there’s a bit of percentage that we can rely on his answers.

Image via Wikipedia

Second, he is very confident in answering. The word is “CONFIDENCE”. He stands straight and pretends that he really knew that answer. He will repeat the question while writing it on the board. I guess while he writes the question, he thinks of the answer and how he will explain it.

Third, he used to say “Oh, that’s easy….” then he will start answering.

Fourth, he always used precise numbers in giving dates, quantities and etc. For example, he will say “It was invented on the year 1845.. uhmm on the 24th day of April.”

Fifth, he also tries to give references on his answers like “Based on the book that I read entitled ‘The Dark Ages” by ‘Mark Jefferson Smith’ there were 11,255 people died”… though the title and the author of the book didn’t really exist. It’s only his strategy to make people believe him.

Sixth, he never ASSUME… I guess that is right. Never assume because when you ASSUME, you’re just making an ASS out of U and ME. On his act, I saw that he never assumed that we believe him.

Seventh, he used a white board and a marker as a visual aid. He used to write the important words he says and sometimes draw a figure about that topic.

Lastly, he also discussed the Origin of the words and names and define that origin of the word. For example he said that the Penguin came from the word “penguisa” where ‘pen’ is a Greek word meaning “unable” and “guisa” means “to fly”… Yes, it sounds funny but the way he delivered those words made us believe him.

At the end of the discussion he told us if we learned something and if he answered the questions well. And yes he did. And before he ended the class, he told us that all the answers he gave us are not facts. The answers only came from his ideas. He only tried to show us how to make an interesting discussion and how to make people believe us.