Deception is about managing perceptions and it’s a two-way street. Like beauty, what constitutes deception “is in the eye of the beholder.” If I am to deceive you, I must have your help.
Deception is also about time, timing and a number of other factors, of which there are many combinations and permutations. All of these factors go toward affecting an organization’s tempo of operations, i.e., how long it takes the organization to complete a decision-making cycle. Logically, the steps in a decision cycle are: you observe, you evaluate what you have observed, you reach conclusions based on your evaluation and you decide what action to take based on your conclusions. Then, of course, you act on your decision.
For example, say I attempt to deceive you. In this case, I plant information where I know you will be able to find it. It is my decision as to whether the information comprises all truth, partial truth or no truth. If I am skillful, I frame the information in an ambiguous form and make it appear that I have inadvertently revealed it or lost it. The more ambiguous I make it, the longer it will take you to categorize it. This is very important, for once I have planted the information, a clock starts ticking.
After that, it’s up to you, governed by your organization’s tempo of operations, to take whatever time you have and using whatever means you wish to use, to resolve the ambiguities (if you see them) and decide into which of those three categories you will place the information. You can make the wrong choice. If you do that, you have been deceived and will probably take inappropriate action.
But, what if you make the right choice? This is where time and timing become very important. If I know that my tempo of operations is much higher than yours (my decision-making cycle is shorter than yours), it might be safe for me to plant information that is all truth.
Because of the relative difference in operating tempos, by the time you have completed your decision cycle, I will have begun another of mine and moved on to something else. In essence, you will be reacting to a situation that no longer exists. Thus, you have once again been deceived and will probably take inappropriate action.
The bottom line: an organization should strive to maintain a very high tempo of operations compared to its competitors. If it can do this, truth will have a very short shelf life. A new truth will have emerged. Such a rapidly changing situation can cause the competitors to become confused about what the truth really is, degrading and possibly paralyzing their decision making process.
Deception is also about time, timing and a number of other factors, of which there are many combinations and permutations. All of these factors go toward affecting an organization’s tempo of operations, i.e., how long it takes the organization to complete a decision-making cycle. Logically, the steps in a decision cycle are: you observe, you evaluate what you have observed, you reach conclusions based on your evaluation and you decide what action to take based on your conclusions. Then, of course, you act on your decision.
For example, say I attempt to deceive you. In this case, I plant information where I know you will be able to find it. It is my decision as to whether the information comprises all truth, partial truth or no truth. If I am skillful, I frame the information in an ambiguous form and make it appear that I have inadvertently revealed it or lost it. The more ambiguous I make it, the longer it will take you to categorize it. This is very important, for once I have planted the information, a clock starts ticking.
After that, it’s up to you, governed by your organization’s tempo of operations, to take whatever time you have and using whatever means you wish to use, to resolve the ambiguities (if you see them) and decide into which of those three categories you will place the information. You can make the wrong choice. If you do that, you have been deceived and will probably take inappropriate action.
But, what if you make the right choice? This is where time and timing become very important. If I know that my tempo of operations is much higher than yours (my decision-making cycle is shorter than yours), it might be safe for me to plant information that is all truth.
Because of the relative difference in operating tempos, by the time you have completed your decision cycle, I will have begun another of mine and moved on to something else. In essence, you will be reacting to a situation that no longer exists. Thus, you have once again been deceived and will probably take inappropriate action.
The bottom line: an organization should strive to maintain a very high tempo of operations compared to its competitors. If it can do this, truth will have a very short shelf life. A new truth will have emerged. Such a rapidly changing situation can cause the competitors to become confused about what the truth really is, degrading and possibly paralyzing their decision making process.
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