Speechcraft is a toolkit for ethical influence. It subliminally changes minds. Speechcraft disguises your message so it slips unnoticed into the client’s System 1. In this way, your words shape your client’s ER.
The language tools that make up Speechcraft are;
- Cause and Effect
- Resistance Breakers and Embedded Commands
- Tag Questions
- Assumption
We’ll review these tools, and then we’ll see how Speechcraft helped Eddard to save the lives of Jacqui and her children.
Cause And Effect
“Cause and Effect” is a phrase that implies a link between two events. People often accept this link without questioning it.
It is usually voiced in two parts. One part acts as a distraction to hide a suggestion in the other part. By accepting the cause and effect link, people unknowingly accept the suggestion as well.
1. Because
You can learn The 7 Skills to impress™ quickly and easily because…”.
Without thinking and with no conscious effort, your System 1 mind searches for why you can learn The 7 Skills quickly. And since all its focus is on what’s coming next, it is not resisting the first part of the sentence.
It may seem like the second part of the phrase has to be really persuasive to work. But it only needs to be credible, because Cause and Effect is a distraction technique. It captures your listeners’ attention and shifts it away from the hidden message. So if part 2 retains your client’s attention, they have accepted the command.
So a follow up ‘phrase’ such as, “…because it’s a simple approach”…, will work to convince someone they can learn impress™ quickly.
You finished your essay on time because you can apply yourself when you want to.
- Distraction = Essay finished on time.
- Suggestion = Your client can apply themselves when they want to.
It’s very empowering for a student to believe that they can “apply themselves when they want to”. And this Cause and Effect is effective because the first phrase is a ‘verifiable truth’.
2. Which Means
“You got a great response to your presentation, which means you are a popular speaker.”
- Distraction = Great response to a presentation.
- Suggestion = Your client is a popular speaker.
This could be used to inspire your client to see themselves more positively in this role. It would help to shift System 1 to scan for signs of being ‘popular’ when speaking. A very nice effect!
3. Before you…
And before you relax, notice how comfortable the chair is.
- Distraction = Noticing the comfort of the chair.
- Suggestion = To relax.
This is a suggestion to ‘relax’. The piece about the chair sets up the direction for relaxation. Suppose your client does indeed notice how comfortable the chair is. In that case, they are likely to unknowingly accept the instruction to relax.
4. If you … then you’ll
“If you … look at how you solved this problem… then you’ll … see the strengths you have, to drive your success in the future”.
- Distraction = Reflecting on successes.
- Suggestiont = Belief in broad and lasting strengths.
This is a useful passage to use when inspiring someone with the Elevate Formula.
Back to Eddard’s Cause and Effect
Now let’s look again at the cause and effect in Eddard’s brilliant line to Jacqui;
“Yes, I know you’re going to put the phone down, and before you do, I’d like to ask you one question”.
He paused for a moment after the words, “… before you do …”. Even though it was just a second or two, it hung in the air, creating the sort of tension only silence can bring. Jacqui’s System 1 filled the gap, asking itself, “… before I put the phone down, what’s going to happen?”
This curiosity made her System 1 want to hear the “effect.” And so, the words, “I’d like to ask you one question,” weren’t resisted. They infiltrated her System 1 and shaped her Edited Reality. And so, staying on the phone seemed like the natural thing for Jacqui to do.
Embedded Commands
Eddard immediately set a new Outcome. He decided he had no more time and went for the big one, “To find out where Jacqui is”. And when he discovered her location, he could despatch a Fast Response Vehicle and make them safe.
This is what he said to achieve that;
“I don’t know if you can … imagine this now … feeding the ducks with your kids next week in the park.”
I wonder if … you remember how much you & the kids love that, do you?… although I’m not asking you to … think about that now…
I’m just curious … what advice you would give yourself, from that moment by the pond with the kids … which means … you can tell me where you are now … so I can help you”.
An Embedded Command is a verbal Trojan Horse. It hides direct instructions within indirect language.
Direct speech can sometimes sound abrupt, disrespectful, and even aggressive. It creates resistance. We instinctively oppose pushy language because it feels like we are being bossed around.
He could simply have said;
“… imagine feeding the ducks with your kids next week in the park …”.
However, her most likely response to such a direct statement is, “Why should I? I know what you’re trying to make me do, and I’m not going there!”
So what Eddard did was put a ‘Resistance Breaker’ (RB) at the beginning of the phrase. The RB’s role is to hide the command in neutral language. Now it doesn’t sound like an instruction, there’s nothing to resist, and the suggestion slips into System 1. Once there, it helps Jacqui change her Edited Reality to one with more possibilities.
The Resistance Breaker is typically followed by a pause, and a shift in tone and/or pace of speech marks out the command to the subconscious.
The full sentence was;
“I don’t know if you can … imagine this now … feeding the ducks with your kids next week in the park..”
For clarity, I put the Resistance Breakers above in bold text. Eddard used them throughout the passage. The others are;
- “I wonder if…”
- “although I’m not asking you to…”
- “I’m just curious …”
Without these softening phrases, his commands would have sounded too direct, like this;
“… imagine feeding the ducks with your kids next week in the park… remember how much you & the kids love that… think about that now… tell me where you are now so I can help you”.
Thinking about Ducks
And it was a great idea. If Eddard could get Jacqui to imagine a happy future, it meant that she had gone past this dark moment in her mind’s eye. In her imagination, it’s over and behind her. And so, she was open to the idea of a happy future. It went from being unthinkable to a possibility.
This was his big plan. The second paragraph doubled down on it. Eddard wanted Jacqui to process it vividly in her mind (again, the Embedded Commands are in bold):
“I wonder if you … remember how much you & the kids love that, do you?… although I’m not asking you to … think about that now…”
Tag questions
Did you notice the ‘… do you …” phrase in that passage? This is a ‘Tag Question’. They are easy and clever little influencers to add at the end of a sentence. Short phrases like “do you, will you, won’t you, isn’t it, create a reflexive, unthinking agreement, don’t they?
Eddard used it to create helpful momentum to his influence, and I think it worked, didn’t it?
Assumptions
And then he went in for the big close;
“I’m just curious … what advice can you give yourself, from that moment by the pond with the kids … which means, you can tell me where you are now so I can help you”.
The question about advice is not just an RB, it’s also an ‘Assumption’. If you answer the question, you’ve agreed to the assumption within it.
For example, at night time, a parent might want a child to go to bed without a quarrel. And so they may say, “Do you want to go to bed now or in 10 minutes?” If the child answers, “in ten minutes”, it has accepted the ‘assumption’ that they’re going to go to bed.
And so, if Jacqui answered Eddard’s cleverly placed question, it meant she had accepted that she was going to tell him where she was. You probably noticed that he gave the ploy a bit more momentum with the ‘Cause and Effect’, ‘which means’.
Once Eddard finished talking, Jacqui was quiet for a moment and then mumbled something like, “Well, I suppose, I’d say…”, then she burst into tears.
There was a heavy silence for a few moments, which Eddard resisted filling. He just waited, hoping for the best, while fearful of the sound of the phone going dead.
And then, to his immense relief, Jacqui spoke. She told Eddard where she was. It turned out to be that park where she often fed the ducks with her kids.
A colleague radioed the local police, and a Fast Response Vehicle was sent. Eddard kept Jacqui on the phone until the police officer got to her. They were saved!
And Here It Is, The Final Summary
Here is Eddard’s Process in The Jacqui Story;
1. On arrival, he was briefed. A very slim outline, time was short, and lives were at stake. There was no time to go into in great detail.
2. Eddard begins breathing,7-11 style He knows this will keep his brain switched on if the pressure becomes intense.
3. He thinks through his Outcomes whilst still being briefed;
- To save Jacqui and her children.
He had a Realisation to aid this Outcome. He imagined a post-incident interview with Jacqui. He envisioned a comfortable, relaxed and friendly meeting with a grateful Jacqui. In his mind’s eye, they were in a safe place, and the children were happily playing around them.
- To get a fast response vehicle to her location and protect her and her children.
- To get Jacqui to tell him where they were so he could send the Fast Response vehicle.
- To build Rapport with Jacqui such that she would give him her address.
4. He rang Jacqui and began to build Rapport.
5. During Rapport, he learned how her System1 & 2 relationship worked as best as he could with Reveal Persuasion Pathways and assessed her language against the Elevate Formula.
6. When Jacqui threatened to put the phone down, he used 7-11 Breathing and Realisation to gain his composure quickly.
7. He switched his Outcome to keeping Jacqui on the phone and used Pacing, Flow Words from Skill 6, Stay in Accord and Cause and Effect from Skill 7, Speechcraft. This seemed to come naturally as his System 1 & 2 worked together, given direction by his Outcome.
8. Having achieved that Outcome, he set a new one to find her location. He delivered a Speechcraft passage with Pacing, Embedded Commands, Assumptions, Tag Questions and Cause and Effect.
9. His Speechcraft had the effect of shifting Jacqui’s Edited Reality to imagine the possibility of a happy future. Jacqui broke down and told him where she was.
Take The Quiz For This Chapter
OK, it’s time to wrap it up with the final quiz.
How well can you frame your language with the essential tools of Speechcraft?
Are you a word wizard? Take this quick test and rate your understanding.
What happened to Jacqui?
At a presentation a little while ago, I was asked what happened to Jacqui following this incident. I was ashamed to say I didn’t know. I know she was taken to a place of safety because Eddard had visited her there for his post-incident interview. He said she was responding well to the support she was getting.
For Eddard and I, that was job over. Sadly, these incidents came thick and fast, and we were on with the next one within a few days. We had been deployed a few more times on differing jobs by the time we got together for a debrief.
What we had done, though, was to prove the value of The 7 Skills to impress™. In Jacqui’s story, Eddard had used the emerging system as a whole for the first time.
Since then, The 7 Skills to impress™ have been fully road-tested. They have a fantastic track record in Elite Sports Coaching and life-or-death cases. They have worked wonders in sales meetings and in changing classroom behaviours.
Business leaders have used them to inspire. Self-improvers have mastered their nerves to perform and thrive under pressure.
They have shown themselves to be simple enough to work in tough times and robust enough to forge incredible upturns in performance.
How To Apply The 7 Skills to impress™:
A Case Study and Guide
In Part 3 of The 7 Skills to impress™, I go over how I created and delivered an inspiring speech to lift a rugby team out of a slump in form.
It worked a treat. I used The 7 Skills to boost my confidence and smash through my performance glass ceiling. The speech was powerful, and I inspired the team to go on a record unbeaten run.
I cover all of The 7 Skills, how I set myself up to perform at the very peak of my potential and my step-by-step system for writing inspirational speeches.