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Top Spying Techniques of Mobile Soldiers in the High Tech World.

1. COLLECTING INTELLIGENCE

Build a file on the organization when you're planning to pitch your products or services to a new customer. Stalk them--gently. Scour the firm web site. Look for national and local news stories about the business. Identify one person (the asset), preferably a sharp, hungry someone well short of the C-suite, but whose star is rising. Start with his bio dig deeper.

You can learn more than you think from Twitter and Instagram feeds: Believe food porn and post postings do not matter? Analyze those, and also you learn what actually matters to someone. Find out magazines, publications, and his favored eateries, and also you learn his culture.

2. ASSET RECRUITING

My grandpa used to say, "Shoot one quail at a time." At networking events, don't hand out 100 business cards, only to go back to your office and send out 100 form e-mails. You're a spy. You're cleverer than that.

Rather, network like a spy: Use that brains you've assembled to determine the best way to fit into that person's tribe. Do not shove on it--first contact should feel natural and easy. In other words, "We 'get' each other."

3. MIRRORING

Authentic experts in the PI (and secret agent) world use one technique to devastating effect: reflecting -- the skill of discreetly imitating someone's body language or facial expressions. Often, we do it automatically; it is built into our neurons. It's why yawns and laughter propagate, and babies mimic their parents' grins.

Interviewers and interrogators use reflecting to establish rapport with defendants. And it can work the same for you: When you are negotiating or pitching, try harking back to the position of your asset. It is a good hint you've set him at ease, if he begins to mirror yours back.

IF you are NERVOUS GOING INTO A MEETING OR A COCKTAIL HOUR, YOU MAY BE JUDGED AS LESS TRUSTWORTHY.

Mirroring says, "People like us do things like this." And it can work even when your advantage, in several ways, isn't actually in your tribe.

4.

Traditional lie detection techniques are based on detecting signs of stress. To appear more fair, command your pressure indicators. You could be judged as less trustworthy, if you're nervous going into a cocktail hour or a meeting.

Two things that you are able to do to fight stress:

Understand your topic, and know it wellAssume a position of confidence

Dale Carnegie famously said, "Should you would like to be enthusiastic, act enthusiastic." Eagerness CAn't just camouflage anxiety; it can melt away tension. And your energy might just be contagious.

5. INTERROGATING SOFTLY

As a PI, I can generally coax the truth from a grudging witness. You, as a budding business spy, can pivot this technique toward filling those awkward silences at board meeting or a stilted seminar cocktail hour.

I try and shoot one quail at a time, if I do find myself at a networking event. I scan the room for somebody who piques my curiosity. Perhaps she is the geeked-out one wearing an X Files T shirt under her blazer. Decide one individual and make it your mission to discover something really interesting about them.

NARRATIVES CAUSE REAL DIALOG. REAL DIALOGUE LEADS TO CONNECTION.

A superb interviewer understands the art of asking great questions. Rather than the old standards, like "What do you do?" try asking something unexpected, like: "Tell me why you love your work." A narrative will be told by her responses, although it might take your interviewee by surprise. Stories lead to real dialog. Actual conversation results in spy for phones connection.

BE GENUINE

If employed simply as a tactic, none of this works. You will come across as insincere in case you do not take a real personal interest in your "goal." At the conclusion of the day, making an actual connection that is individual is worth more than simply gaining a new customer. And when you can achieve both, well...you're a suitable operative.