Comment by ErrantX | Hacker News Reader

Comment by ErrantX | Hacker News Reader

Man, the one huge hack I have learnt in working for corporate clients (we do PEN testing and other nefarious sneaky stuff :)) is to act and look busy/harried when you meet them.

If the high powered CEO your meeting thinks you have to be across the city meeting someone else in a minute or two they treat you with a lot more respect.

When I started with this stuff I was treated a lot like a lacky because they mostly talk to my boss and I was "just" turning up the "do" things. If you act busy they assume:

- your an important (high ranking) member of the company

- they are getting # prime star treatment from a company "executive"

- but most importantly they give you clear instructions, treat you like a real person and let you leave at a reasonable hour :)

It has even got to the point where, when meeting a client who is likely to respond this way, I often walk in pretending to be on the phone to my "secretary" [ha] giving hurried instructions or something.

Not a wonderful way to have to act, but they lap it up :(

I guess that's social proof at work. I've also noticed I get a lot less hassle about my hourly rate with potential customers when I tell them up front that I'm already pretty booked up and can't promise when I'll be able to fit them in. This is almost always true anyway these days so at least I don't have to lie about it.

I suppose this could be interpreted as a variant of "playing hard to get".

Nitpick: the contraction of "you are" is "you're," not "your." You may also be treated with more respect by certain people if you learn to make this distinction.

Luckily it's one of the ones that doesn't affect readability too much. I'm not too interested in people who deal out respect based on minor grammar mistakes either, sorry :)

(the one that really gets me is when I split words I.e "thi sis". Can't spot them for the life of me)

Luckily it's one of the ones that doesn't affect readability too much.

This may just be me, but the your/you're thing trips me up like crazy. I usually have to re-read the sentence 2 or 3 times.

Ah, man. Sorry - I guess because it scans properly for me then I assumed it does for others.

I've thrown together a script to highlight your/you're on my HN comments(plus some other bits and pieces that get me) so hopefully I can improve things :)

(I really cannot recognise this and a few other types of mistakes; it's so damn annoying)

I enjoyed fragmented in my teenages but I don't understand why and how I actually hate it in my twenties :).

BTW thumbs up for real life social engineering :).

"thi sis" is clearly a typo. "you're/your" may mean that the person wasn't smart enough to figure out what to use

> I'm not too interested in people who deal out respect > based on minor grammar mistakes either, sorry :) The reason why I care about mistakes like "your" vs "you're" is when there's a limited number of cues available it can help to evaluate someone's competence.

In my mind the question is: If this person doesn't care enough to get this detail right--in this situation where it's about a detail I know about--how can I trust them to get the details right in a situation I know nothing about?

This approach does come with a downside--I probably spend too much time forming written communication trying to make sure it's "right". Like this comment, for example. :)

So, for me, it's not just about mindless adherence to arbitrary rules but a potential pointer to a deeper quality. However, you are free to continue not to be interested in me. :)

Make sure someone doesn't actually call whilst you're doing the on-phone-to-secretary trick...

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