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Dreeke, Robin

WORK TITLE: The Code of Trust
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE:
WEBSITE: http://www.peopleformula.com/
CITY:
STATE:
COUNTRY:
NATIONALITY:

http://www.macmillanspeakers.com/robindreeke * https://www.linkedin.com/in/robin-dreeke-3a5b8824/

RESEARCHER NOTES:

LC control no.: no2015073670
LCCN Permalink: https://lccn.loc.gov/no2015073670
HEADING: Dreeke, Robin
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040 __ |a CLU |b eng |e rda |c CLU |d IEN
100 1_ |a Dreeke, Robin
370 __ |c United States |2 naf
372 __ |a Social engineering |a Interpersonal communication |2 lcsh
372 __ |a Communication in business
373 __ |a United States. Federal Bureau of Investigation |a United States. Marine Corps |2 naf
374 __ |a Behavioral scientists |2 lcsh
375 __ |a male
670 __ |a Hadnagy, Christopher. Phishing dark waters, 2015: |b title page (Robin Dreeke) page xxv (Robin Dreeke, USNA graduate, U.S. Marine Corps officer, FBI agent, behaviorist; website for “Robin and his services” is www.peopleformula.com )
670 __ |a www.peopleformula.com website, viewed June 4, 2015: |b home page (advanced rapport and trust building training/consulting strategies)

PERSONAL

Male.

EDUCATION:

Graduated from U.S. Naval Academy.

ADDRESS

CAREER

Author and behaviorist; agent, Federal Bureau of Investigation.

MIILITARY:

Served as officer in U.S. Marine Corps.

WRITINGS

  • (With Cameron Stauth) The Code of Trust: An American Counterintelligence Expert's Five Rules to Lead and Succeed, St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 2017

SIDELIGHTS

“One might assume that a man charged with the task of recruiting spies would be a Machiavellian master of shadows with duplicitous motivations and a shady demeanor,” wrote Jordan Harbinger in Art of Charm. “That’s why anyone armed with such assumptions would be completely disarmed upon meeting Robin Dreeke.” Dreeke has decades of experience working as a leader in the U.S. Marine Corps and in the Federal Bureau of Investigations, where he worked in counterintelligence investigations. “The real impetus of this book was the fact that I’m not a natural born leader at all, yet I was placed in situations, throughout my life, to lead. When you work in the realm of counterintelligence, the people I sign up to help protect our country are generally not doing anything wrong or illegal,” Dreeke stated in an interview appearing in Knowledge@Wharton. “But in my line of work … I’ve had to think not only in terms of convincing someone to do something, but inspiring them to want to do it. Luckily for me, I was surrounded by some great Jedi masters of interpersonal communication and leadership.”

Dreeke sets down his philosophy of leadership in The Code of Trust: An American Counterintelligence Expert’s Five Rules to Lead and Succeed, cowritten with journalist Cameron Stauth. “Since there’s no real compulsion for any human being to talk to me, it really came down to, ‘how could I inspire them to want to talk to me?,’” Dreeke explained in his Knowledge@Wharton interview. “A number of years ago, I wound up doing an article on what my team does on the behavioral analysis program. It was the first time I sat down and thought to myself, ‘What am I actually doing in all these counterintelligence investigations?’ … [It turns out] what I was actually strategizing in every single engagement [with people] was [developing] trust.” “Though Dreeke works in an industry where trust seems counterintuitive,” said Julia Carmel on the GenFKD website, “building trusting relationships has allowed Dreeke to do his job.” “As someone who’s been involved with American counterintelligence for three decades,” Harbinger said, “he says his real job is `developing relationships and trying to inspire people to want to help out and…protect the country.’… Think of Robin as more of a Captain America than a Doctor Doom. His currency is trust, not deceit.”

The Code of Trust lists five qualities that potential leaders need to cultivate in order to be successful. “Oddly, it may take someone who worked in a field more commonly associated with deception to hammer home the importance of trust. And if that reminder is all the book did, it would be worth the price of admission,” asserted an 800CEORead website reviewer. Dreeke “gives us a system forged in a field more fraught with danger than any to help all of us build trust and lead humanely.” “Dreeke’s set of rules is eminently practical and, if actually put into practice, would yield a measurably more pleasant world,” declared a Kirkus Reviews contributor. “Fittingly, many of his examples come from the oddly rule-governed world of espionage.” “Smart, empowering, and easy to follow,” stated a Publishers Weekly reviewer, “Dreeke ‘s manual should become a classic business–and personal—primer.”

BIOCRIT

PERIODICALS

  • Kirkus Reviews, June 15, 2017, review of The Code of Trust: An American Counterintelligence Expert’s Five Rules to Lead and Succeed.

  • Publishers Weekly, June 26, 2017, review of The Code of Trust, p. 170.

ONLINE

  • 800CEORead, https://inthebooks.800ceoread.com/ (April 11, 2018), review of The Code of Trust.

  • Art of Charm, https://theartofcharm.com/ (April 11, 2018), Jordan Harbinger, review of The Code of Trust.

  • GenFKD, http://www.genfkd.org/ (August 18, 2017), Julia Carmel, “A Counterintelligence Expert’s Guide to Building Trust.”

  • Knowledge@Wharton, http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/ (October 11, 2017), “Leadership: How to Build Trust and Lead Effectively.”

  • Robin Dreeke Website, http://www.peopleformula.com (April 11, 2018), author profile.

1. The code of trust : an American counterintelligence expert's five rules to lead and succeed LCCN 2017006882 Type of material Book Personal name Dreeke, Robin, author. Main title The code of trust : an American counterintelligence expert's five rules to lead and succeed / Robin Dreeke and Cameron Stauth ; foreword by Joe Navarro. Edition First edition. Published/Produced New York : St. Martin's Press, 2017. Description xi, 371 pages ; 22 cm ISBN 9781250093462 (hardback) CALL NUMBER HD57.7 .D738 2017 CABIN BRANCH Copy 1 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms - STORED OFFSITE

Print Marked Items
Dreeke , Robin: THE CODE OF TRUST
Kirkus Reviews.
(June 15, 2017):
COPYRIGHT 2017 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Full Text: 
Dreeke , Robin THE CODE OF TRUST St. Martin's (Adult Nonfiction) $25.99 8, 8 ISBN: 978-1-250-
09346-2
"You don't work for your country by being greedy and playing dirty, day after day." FBI agent Dreeke
delivers a pragmatic, patriotic recipe for the key ingredient of leadership: trust.With the assistance of Stauth,
Dreeke, a veteran of the bureau with direct experience in securing confidences among reluctant respondents,
begins with a provocative brace of challenges: "First: Be eminently worthy of trust. Second: Prove you are."
As if that weren't difficult enough, there are built-in obstacles: just as we would trust few people with our
lives or bank accounts, so few people trust us. How to inspire more to do so and thereby gain not just trust,
but allegiance? Be more considerate. Put other people first. Listen without thinking of the next clever thing
to say. It's not exactly Machiavelli, it's sometimes simplistic and often repetitive, and the presentation is a
little formulaic, but Dreeke's set of rules is eminently practical and, if actually put into practice, would yield
a measurably more pleasant world. Fittingly, many of his examples come from the oddly rule-governed
world of espionage. If you're shady, he notes, you can build trust among a network of spies, "but it's a weak,
fake type of trust, built on lies, manipulation, and coercion, and it can topple overnight." Given all the
headlines about manipulation and backroom dealing these days, it's a useful observation that high-level
leaders should consider, but in the main, the book is meant for ordinary Janes and Joes who seek to build
their leadership skills. There, Dreeke proves a worthy guide, making observations that might go without
saying if we lived in better times but that bear repeating--e.g., "common decency is the common ground of
humankind"; "a terrible deficit in our current culture is the lack of the civil give-and-take that has expanded
individual and societal intelligence for thousands of years." A book of broad application with useful lessons
for everyone from Girl Scouts to corporate masters to world leaders--and aspiring spies, too.
Source Citation   (MLA 8th
Edition)
"Dreeke , Robin: THE CODE OF TRUST." Kirkus Reviews, 15 June 2017. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A495427867/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=3bf4382d.
Accessed 27 Mar. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A495427867
The Code of Trust: An American
Counterintelligence Expert's Five Rules to
Lead and Succeed
Publishers Weekly.
264.26 (June 26, 2017): p170.
COPYRIGHT 2017 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text: 
The Code of Trust: An American Counterintelligence Expert's Five Rules to Lead and Succeed
Robin Dreeke, with Cameron Stauth. St. Martin's, $25.99 (352p) ISBN 978-1-250-09346-2
Complex problems can have simple answers, as FBI agent Dreeke (It's Not All About Me) shows in this
guide to building trust. He exhorts would-be leaders to follow the five principles of his "code of trust"--
suspend your ego, be nonjudgmental, honor reason, validate others, and be generous--and the "four steps to
inspiring trust," which are an action plan that implements the code. The four steps--align your goals, apply
the power of context, craft your encounters, and connect--are explained in detail. As an example of aligning
goals, Dreeke uses the story of another agent who managed to recruit a difficult source by listening carefully
to what the source wanted. "Applying the power of context" means using psychologist William Marston's
"science of finding human similarities" to mesh together different people's communication styles. "Crafting
the encounter" involves preparing opening remarks, asking for assistance, making an offering, and sticking
to the subject--the other person. The fourth and arguably most important step is making an emotional
connection. Smart, empowering, and easy to follow, Dreeke 's manual should become a classic business--
and personal--primer on the art of building trust. (Aug.)
Source Citation   (MLA 8th
Edition)
"The Code of Trust: An American Counterintelligence Expert's Five Rules to Lead and Succeed."
Publishers Weekly, 26 June 2017, p. 170. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A497444450/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=65d9c233.
Accessed 27 Mar. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A497444450

"Dreeke , Robin: THE CODE OF TRUST." Kirkus Reviews, 15 June 2017. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A495427867/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF. Accessed 27 Mar. 2018. "The Code of Trust: An American Counterintelligence Expert's Five Rules to Lead and Succeed." Publishers Weekly, 26 June 2017, p. 170. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A497444450/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF. Accessed 27 Mar. 2018.
  • Art of Charm
    https://theartofcharm.com/podcast-episodes/robin-dreeke-the-code-of-trust-episode-653/

    Word count: 1619

    The Art of Charm
    Advanced Social Skills Training for Top Performers

    Robin Dreeke | The Code of Trust (Episode 653)

    Robin Dreeke (@rdreeke) is a 28-year veteran of federal service, former head of the Counterintelligence Behavioral Analysis Program, and co-author of The Code of Trust: An American Counterintelligence Expert’s Five Rules to Lead and Succeed.

    “You can be the most brilliant person on the face of the earth with the most amazing skills, but if you can’t develop relationships and have trust, you’re completely worthless.” -Robin Dreeke
    The Cheat Sheet:

    Learn the Code of Trust’s five principles and how they help us build rapport.
    Understand the difference between manipulation and trust.
    Discover why trustworthy people always rise to the top.
    Find out how to get others to open up and connect with us — spy style.
    Recognize why real leaders put the needs of others before their own — and don’t keep a score card.
    And so much more…

    AoC-Subscribe-Button_iTunes
    AoC-Subscribe-Button_Stitcher

    (Download Episode Here)
    (Download Transcript Here)

    The elusive obvious: things people think they know, yet nobody does — or they think they’re the exception to the rule, even though this thought process is the reason they’re missing out on relationships and opportunities in their lives.

    The Code of Trust: An American Counterintelligence Expert’s Five Rules to Lead and Succeed co-author Robin Dreeke joins us to talk about five principles that are often overlooked as the elusive obvious, but crucial for building trustworthy and worthwhile relationships with others.
    Please Scroll down for Full Show Notes and Featured Resources!

    With pain-free invoicing, FreshBooks helps entrepreneurs and freelancers save time and avoid a lot of the stress that comes with running a small business. Try a month of unrestricted use for free here (no credit card required)! Enter ART OF CHARM in the How You Heard About Us section.

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    Free yourself from typing notes, reports, and documents by going with the transcriptionists we trust here at AoC: TranscriptionOutsourcing.net — 99% or higher accuracy guaranteed!
    More About This Show

    One might assume that a man charged with the task of recruiting spies would be a Machiavellian master of shadows with duplicitous motivations and a shady demeanor. He might even sport a perfectly waxed mustache and an eyepatch — or, at the very least, a prescription monocle. His laugh would convey a sense of cruel superiority — mockery at your feeble attempts to thwart whatever schemes he’s hatching from the safety of his secret lair.

    That’s why anyone armed with such assumptions would be completely disarmed upon meeting Robin Dreeke, co-author of The Code of Trust: An American Counterintelligence Expert’s Five Rules to Lead and Succeed. As someone who’s been involved with American counterintelligence for three decades, he says his real job is “developing relationships and trying to inspire people to want to help out and…protect the country.”

    Think of Robin as more of a Captain America than a Doctor Doom. His currency is trust, not deceit, and he understands that connection-building rapport will get you farther than any other skill in your arsenal. This is why he lives by — and shares with others — what he calls The Code of Trust.

    “[As] human beings, we are exceedingly genetically coded for self-centered self-interest,” says Robin. “So when you get an individual that actually knows how to communicate in a way with someone else to figure out…this other person’s priorities…their needs, wants, dreams, and aspirations personally, professionally, long term, short term, understand the context of how they see the world, and understand how they see prosperity from their point of view, now what’s really easy — as a leader and someone who’s honoring The Code — if I provide available resources for you to achieve those things that are important to you, I guarantee you’re going to…want to stay affiliated with me.”

    Contrast this with someone who bullies their way into a leadership position. He or she may have succeeded in the eyes of the short-sighted, but this isn’t someone who’s going to inspire the people unlucky enough to get stuck in the position of following him or her for the long haul. People who feel threatened and manipulated aren’t going to give the task at hand their all in the same was as people who follow a leader they trust and respect.

    How to strike up a conversation with anybody

    3-step Conversation Formula helps you avoid awkward silences--and never run out of things to say

    So what does this Code of Trust entail? These five principles — which are simple enough in concept, but require constant practice to perfect.

    Suspend your ego.
    Be nonjudgmental.
    Honor reason.
    Validate others.
    Be generous.

    And if the idea of perfection scares you, don’t worry — even Robin considers himself not quite there yet. As he tells us, “I’m not done being a moron — it’s a journey, not a destination!”

    Listen to this episode of The Art of Charm to learn more about how Robin became a leader (though he considers himself not naturally born to do so), why trust and trustworthy people rise to the top, the three anchors Robin honors to establish trust with others, why it’s easier to build trust with rational people — and how to make sure the people you’re dealing with are rational, how to make others feel better for having met you, four ways to reinforce value and affiliation, how to build trust with people we don’t quite understand or agree with, how to avoid judging others, how we can open a trust-building conversation without getting personal, what we can do to build the habit of listening without worrying about what we’re going to say next, how to be a resource for the prosperity of others, and lots more.
    THANKS, ROBIN DREEKE!

    If you enjoyed this session with Robin Dreeke, let him know by clicking on the link below and sending him a quick shout out at Twitter:

    Transcript for Robin Dreeke | The Code of Trust (Episode 653)
    The Code of Trust: An American Counterintelligence Expert’s Five Rules to Lead and Succeed by Robin Dreeke and Cameron Stauth
    It’s Not All About Me: The Top Ten Techniques for Building Quick Rapport with Anyone by Robin Dreeke
    People Formula
    Robin Dreeke at Facebook
    Robin Dreeke at Twitter

    Sponsored By:

    With pain-free invoicing, FreshBooks helps entrepreneurs and freelancers save time and avoid a lot of the stress that comes with running a small business. Try a month of unrestricted use for free here (no credit card required)! Enter ART OF CHARM in the how you heard about us section.

    Are you trying to hire the right person for your business, but the best candidates keep slipping away? Let ZipRecruiter -- the fastest way to hire great people -- help you screen only the best here!

    Now save a whopping 50% on new webhosting packages here with HostGator by using coupon code CHARM!

    DesignCrowd helps startups and small businesses crowdsource custom graphics, logos, Web design -- even tattoo designs! Check out DesignCrowd.com/Charm for a special $100 VIP offer for our listeners or enter the discount code CHARM when posting a project.

    Free yourself from typing notes, reports, and documents by going with the transcriptionists we trust here at AoC: TranscriptionOutsourcing.net -- 99% or higher accuracy guaranteed!
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    Jordan Harbinger - author of 952 posts on The Art of Charm

    Jordan Harbinger has spent several years abroad in Europe and the developing world, including South America, Eastern Europe, and the Middle East, and speaks several languages. He has also worked for various governments and NGOs overseas, traveled through war zones, and been kidnapped -- twice. He’ll tell you the only reason he’s still alive and kicking is because of his ability to talk his way into (and out of) just about any type of situation. Here at The Art of Charm, Jordan shares that experience, and the system borne as a result, with students and clients. View all posts by Jordan Harbinger →

  • 800CEORead
    https://inthebooks.800ceoread.com/giveaways/the-code-of-trust--an-american-counterintelligence-expert-s-five-rules-to-lead-and-succeed

    Word count: 700

    Book Giveaway: The Code of Trust: An American Counterintelligence Expert's Five Rules to Lead and Succeed

    Codetrust

    Robin Dreeke has an almost intimidating bio. He is a retired marine who was, until recently, the head of the Counterintelligence Behavioral Analysis Program, "where his primary mission was to thwart the efforts of foreign spies and to recruit spies." At this point, you might be expecting a spy novel, but his new book, The Code of Trust, is built around the system he devised to help him lead that work—a system he has since taught to "hundreds of military groups, corporate groups, law firms, financial institutions, and universities," and implemented it in counseling "a select group of CEOs, academicians, public servants, and think-tank analysts."

    It all began in an unlikely place: "in the streets of New York City, among spies and counterspies." (I swear this isn't a spy novel.)

    In the profession of spies and counterspies, trust is a scarce commodity, even though it's the currency of the trade.

    But what does that have to do to the 99 percent of us with lives less likely to be made into dramatic movies? Dreeke believes that all good, lasting leadership is rooted in trust, and he makes a quick and convincing argument of it. There are shortcuts to the top. We all know someone who has risen to great heights with beguilement, bullying, lies, and manipulation. But those kinds of leaders, Dreeke tells us, don't last:

    Of course, from time to time, people that you don't trust may temporarily have power over you. They might be bullies, or people who gambled, lied, and manipulated their way into power.

    That kind of power doesn't last, and the influence of those people fades fast. Bullies are overthrown, liars are exposed, gamblers lose, manipulators make mistakes—and trustworthy people inevitably take their place. The world isn't perfect, but it does reward and empower those who have earned the honor of being trusted.

    Coming from someone else, that might sound naive even if it were true. Coming from someone who has been at the nerve center of the intelligence games nations play, it come across a twee more convincing. Dreeke will show how building trust simply works, and it's what works best—in both intelligence work and the work the rest of us do everyday. The system he developed has two components: The Code of Trust (five rules to gain trust and be a leader), and The Four Steps (the action plan for inspiring trust). And it boils down to a central truth:

    To inspire trust, put others first.

    That single, central action empowers all legendary leaders.

    The book also provides a "Trust Training Manual" consisting of 15 drills, and an appendix that acts as a user's guide and glossary for the book, among other everyday tools and lessons that are both wonderfully mundane and immediately useful. But, being a former Marine and spy chief, he can illustrate these lessons with wildly entertaining stories—like, these-need-to-be-made-into-movies kind of stories. It may not be a spy novel, but it's anything but boring.

    We tend to take trust—in our home life as well as at work—for granted. But when we dig deep down into the topic, we find that it isn't that easy, that it can be hard to trust even those we love most—and to inspire trust of us in them. The truth is that trust isn't soft. It's the hardest thing of all. And it's the most important element in our daily lives—even if we're not spies.

    Oddly, it may take someone who worked in a field more commonly associated with deception to hammer home the importance of trust. And if that remider is all the book did, it would be worth the price of admission to its pages. But Robin Dreeke does more than that. In The Code of Trust, he gives us a system forged in a field more fraught with danger than any to help all of us build trust and lead humanely.

  • Knowledge@Wharton
    http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article/five-rules-lead-succeed/

    Word count: 2833

    Leadership
    How to Build Trust and Lead Effectively

    Oct 11, 2017

    Counterintelligence expert Robin Dreeke and co-author Cameron Stauth talk about their book on building trust.

    Leadership Content

    bookBuilding good teams starts with having strong relationships based on a foundation of trust. But how does one develop that trust at work or in life? Counterintelligence expert Robin Dreeke, who spent decades as a senior FBI agent, knows how to make strangers trust him enough to be recruited as spies. And it’s not about deception or being a ‘yes’ man. In the book, The Code of Trust: An American Counterintelligence Expert’s Five Rules to Lead and Succeed, Dreeke and co-author Cameron Stauth share simple steps to generating trust from all sorts of people. They recently joined the Knowledge@Wharton show, which airs on SiriusXM channel 111, to discuss the concepts in more detail.

    An edited transcript of the conversation follows.

    Knowledge@Wharton: Robin, give us the background on this book, which is based on what you have tested during your time working in the counterintelligence field.

    Robin Dreeke: The real impetus of this book was the fact that I’m not a natural born leader at all, yet I was placed in situations, throughout my life, to lead. When you work in the realm of counterintelligence, the people I sign up to help protect our country are generally not doing anything wrong or illegal. When you work in law enforcement, people [are compelled] to talk to you because they’ve already done something wrong.

    But in my line of work [of cultivating U.S. spies and thwarting foreign ones] … I’ve had to think not only in terms of convincing someone to do something, but inspiring them to want to do it. Luckily for me, I was surrounded by some great Jedi masters of interpersonal communication and leadership. I was able to synthesize what they were doing down from a subjective art form to a very cognitive [system].

    Knowledge@Wharton: Cameron, is building trust a prevalent problem in business culture today?

    Cameron Stauth: Huge. Since the Great Recession alone, trust in America’s most fundamental institutions, which are business, government and media, dropped by a combined average of 60%. Right now, [only] 19% of all Americans trust big business and 33% trust banks. [The distrust is] at every level. It’s not just the CEOs [suffering from a lack of trust] — only one-third of all people trust store clerks. This has got to change.

    “Understand the priorities of others … and do it with no expectation of reciprocity, which is the real key.” –Robin Dreeke

    Knowledge@Wharton: Robin, tell us about how trust works in counterintelligence.

    Dreeke: Since there’s no real compulsion for any human being to talk to me, it really came down to, ‘how could I inspire them to want to talk to me?’ A number of years ago, I wound up doing an article on what my team does on the behavioral analysis program. It was the first time I sat down and thought to myself, ‘What am I actually doing in all these counterintelligence investigations?’ … [It turns out] what I was actually strategizing in every single engagement [with people] was [developing] trust. … Whenever there are two human beings interacting and you hope to move forward, you’re not going to do it without trust.

    Knowledge@Wharton: If you’re working with people within an agency, if there’s not trust, how can you move forward with these investigations?

    Dreeke: You’ve got to understand what your priorities and goals are. That’s what leaders do, they identify them. But as soon as you identify them, just let them go. … As soon as you label what you’re looking for, let go of it because now your job is to understand the priorities of others: their needs, wants, dreams, and aspirations, both professional and personal, long term and short term. Ultimately, if you’re talking in terms of what the priorities of others are and you offer resources for them to achieve those things, that’s what starts begetting trust. And do it with no expectation of reciprocity, which is the real key. You can’t do it for the gain. … You’ve got to do it because leaders are about offering their resources for others’ success.

    Knowledge@Wharton: The results of not having trust in a company is being written about more and more.

    Stauth: Yes, probably because this is the worst crisis in trust we’ve ever had. It’s seen in every aspect of life. People have fewer friends than they used to, which just sounds sad. People don’t even trust members of their own family. We all need a big dose of a healthy degree of trust, and we need to learn how. The beauty of what Robin did is he created this system. He just lays it out. Do this, do this, do this and it will all come together.

    Knowledge@Wharton: Let’s go through the five steps. The first one on the list is to suspend your ego.
    Knowledge@Wharton High School

    Dreeke: That’s the cornerstone that’s really going to enact the code. The code is flawless because the code is about everyone else. The one thing that’s going to undermine it is your ego and vanity. In other words, your ego is going to get in the way. It basically overwrites what you want to do in your heart. Your mouth comes out with the wrong words because we get insecure and fearful and resentful. If we can let go of our own ego and vanity in every situation and keep the focus on the other person, it’s going to enact the code flawlessly.

    Knowledge@Wharton: I would think that might be one of the toughest ones because there are many people who feel that ego is an important component of success.

    Dreeke: It is the hardest one to let go of, and a lot of people do think it’s the most important thing in the workplace. But how many successful people are successful alone? You can have all the skills and talents and expertise in the world, but if you’re an island, alone, you’re useless. You’re absolutely ineffective.

    “A lot of people like to think that validation is agreeing with someone. It’s not.” –Robin Dreeke

    Knowledge@Wharton: Being nonjudgmental is No. 2 on your list.

    Dreeke: It’s another cornerstone and also a very hard thing to do. After 20 years at the FBI, I cannot be judgmental of anyone because shields would go up. I had to seek to understand. At our core, we seek to be valued and understood and accepted because that meant our survival genetically. When we are not judging others and demonstrate their value by seeking their thoughts and opinions … we empower them with choice and validate them.

    Knowledge@Wharton: The next is to honor reason. I’ll let you get into that one.

    Dreeke: One thing that effective and inspirational leaders do really well is that they’re a resource for the prosperity of others. The way that leaders are resources for the prosperity of others is they maintain an objectivity so that they can honor reason. In other words, they understand the priorities and goals of those they’re leading, and they can ask cognitive questions, such as “how is what you’re doing helping or hindering you getting there?” If someone gets emotionally attached to what you’re doing and your choices, you start riding that emotional roller coaster and are no longer unbiased. Honoring reason is simply [providing] a lot of clarity of thought without all that emotional hijacking that goes on during stressful moments.

    Knowledge@Wharton: Validating others is next. I guess if you’re able to validate other people that you work with, you’re able to build a better team.

    Dreeke: Absolutely. A lot of people like to think that validation is agreeing with someone. It’s not. It might be, but validation is the simple task of trying to understand the human being you’re interacting with, why they have the thoughts they have, how they came to be the human being they are and how they make the choices they make. Again, you’ve got to do this without judgment because if you have any tone of voice or nonverbals that indicate judgment, you’re going to crash and burn. If you can validate others just by seeking to understand the human being in front of you, you’re building that affiliation and demonstrating that value.

    Knowledge@Wharton: The final one, which seems very simple, is to be generous.

    Dreeke: There are lots of ways to be generous, and the key is to understand how the other person wishes you to demonstrate generosity. [Many] people just want your time, so be generous with your time. Everyone has different resources. Understand what your resources are and be generous with those resources for other people’s prosperity. The thing that really makes it work is be generous with no expectation of reciprocity. When you build solid relationships, your network and connections and trust start expanding exponentially.

    “Negativity is happening mostly because people are insecure.” –Robin Dreeke

    Knowledge@Wharton: How much do you think these ideas are impacted by the digital world, where we have less face-to-face interaction with the people we work with?

    Stauth: We spend a whole chapter on how to deal with people in the digital world, how to write the correct kinds of emails, how to talk on the phone, which is different than talking in real life because you don’t see the body language. That’s a problem. We are disconnected, and that’s part of the reason we don’t trust each other anymore. You can’t look somebody in the eye.

    Dreeke: I’ve done a lot of undercover work that was face-to-face. I remember I was tasked [to find the answer to this] question, “How do we do this kind of work in a digital age?” I thought about it, and [I realized that one benefit is that] you have the ability to think about every single line you’re writing. When you’re going live, you’re playing off what the other person’s [saying] and thinking about everything you’re saying.

    When you’re writing, you can do one of these four things: You can seek their thoughts and opinions, you can validate them, you can empower them with choice and you can talk in terms of their priorities. When you build that into everything you do in a digital world, I can guarantee you that every statement you make is about them, and it’s going to escalate. It’s a challenge, but if you build it in there consciously, it will really help a lot.

    Knowledge@Wharton: Cameron, I’d be interested to know how these concepts have influenced you personally?

    Stauth: Well, I just got married last month. … We got along a lot better after I met Robin. It actually changed my life. That happens with me sometimes in a book. I wrote the first book about cancer prevention 40 years ago, and it changed my life. I wrote a book, The Science of Happiness, about 20 years ago and that changed my life. This one did, too. It teaches you how to get along with people, even though I should have known that at my age. I was trying to win battles, and you can win every battle and lose the war. What do I do now? If my wife [says or does] something that she thinks I don’t agree with, I just try to understand her. As Robin was saying, people don’t need you to be a ‘yes’ man, they just want to be understood. That’s what I do now. And I tell you, it’s working at work, at home, everywhere.

    Knowledge@Wharton: Robin, you believe these concepts work in people’s lives in general.

    Dreeke: Absolutely. As Cam and anyone else who knows me can attest to, what you hear is what you get with me. I am the same person everywhere because I live the code. This is my manual on how not to be the person I was born to be. This is my manual on how to overcome that type A, hard-charger [personality] that just barrels forward and ruins relationships because they think it’s all about them.

    Knowledge@Wharton: What is it about our society that made people live that type of lifestyle or be that type of employee?

    Dreeke: Societies and cultures go through ebbs and flows. One thing that happened in the last 20 or 30 years was that people became very divisive because they were singling out groups. Anytime you single out one group, even if it’s in a positive way, everyone else feels ostracized. They start trying to convince themselves that they should be part of that group because, again, our genetic code says we want to belong. Belonging means survival. Anytime you single out a group or validate someone and not someone else, shields go up and arguments ensue. That’s what starts mistrust.

    “Since the Great Recession alone, trust in America’s most fundamental institutions … dropped by a combined average of 60%.” –Cameron Stauth

    Knowledge@Wharton: How has social media affected the loss of trust? People feel like they can say anything at any time online, no matter the impact on a person or a company. That has changed the dynamic of conversation.

    Dreeke: It really has. With anonymity, the fear of reciprocity is really low. When there’s no social cost to the actions you’re taking, people are going to take whatever actions they want.

    Knowledge@Wharton: What’s the best way to handle negative people in the office?

    Dreeke: Negativity is happening mostly because people are insecure. They are trying to demonstrate their own value to other people with inappropriate behavior, whether they’re name-dropping, self-promoting and all these things. When I encounter someone who has annoying, negative behaviors, the first thing I try to do is understand them. I try to understand why they are insecure and what are they insecure about. As soon as I can discover those insecurities, I can start validating them and validating other aspects of them. Everyone has something they’re working on, and everyone has great strengths. If you take time to focus on the strengths and validate those strengths, the negativity will start flowing away.

    The Code of Trust: An American Counterintelligence Expert's Five Rules to Lead and Succeed
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    Join The Discussion One Comment So Far

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    Anumakonda Jagadeesh

    Excellent.
    Here are the Nine Principles of Effective Leadership Communication:
    1. See communication as the continuation of business by other means:
    • It is intentional.
    • It is interactive.
    • It is intended to provoke a reaction.
    2. To move people, meet them where they are.
    3. Walk the talk.
    4. Control the communication agenda.
    5. Remember that even small events, changes, or blunders can have big consequences.
    6. Plan ahead and align tactics with strategy.
    7. Invest in continuous improvement in communication skills.
    8. Harness the power of language and of framing.
    9. Understand how the human brain works.

    (The Power of Communication: Skills to Build Trust, Inspire Loyalty, and Lead Effectively by Helio Fred Garcia, FT Press, 2012).
    Dr.A.Jagadeesh Nellore(AP),India

    Knowledge@Wharton Partners

  • GenFKD
    http://www.genfkd.org/counterintelligence-experts-guide-building-trust

    Word count: 298

    A Counterintelligence Expert’s Guide To Building Trust
    Robin Dreeke's new book applies the art of building trust to succeeding in business and life.
    An FKD Feature exclusive

    Robin Dreeke has mastered the art of building trust.

    Dreeke, who has worked in the counterintelligence division of the FBI for 19 years, is the author of The Code of Trust: An American Counterintelligence Expert’s Five Rules to Lead and Succeed.

    His new book focuses on five main points:

    Suspend Your Ego
    Be Non-judgemental
    Honor Reason
    Validate Others
    Be Generous

    Building on these points, Dreeke walks readers through how to inspire other people’s trust in an authentic way.

    Though Dreeke works in an industry where trust seems counterintuitive, building trusting relationships has allowed Dreeke to do his job to the best of his ability.

    But the things that Dreeke has learned while working as the head of the elite Behavioral Analysis Program for the FBI’s Counterintelligence Division apply to day-to-day situations. Building trust changes the dynamic of any relationship, whether that be at a workplace or someone’s home.

    Despite his career, which often brings him in contact with tricky people, Dreeke has actually had the toughest time building trust with his daughter, who is wary of his trust-building tactics.

    The Code of Trust is based upon Dreeke’s experience over 28 years of federal service, building on a system that Dreeke developed while doing field work with the FBI.

    Have something to add to this story? Comment below or join the discussion on Facebook.

    Header image: Getty Images
    Author
    Posted 08.18.2017 - 03:46 pm EDT
    Julia Carmel