Nelson Vergel
Founder, ExcelMale.com
In the 1960s, a small institute in Lausanne, Switzerland became famous for teaching something most people thought couldn't be taught — charisma. In Part 2, we dive into how they actually did it, and how those same techniques can help you make people genuinely like you.Tell us in the comments — do you think charisma can be taught, or are some people just born with it?
Source
The people who asked more questions were better liked, but the effect was concentrated in one specific type: follow-up questions. These questions stay focused on what the other person said instead of moving on.
Watch how most people converse. They ask something, receive the answer, and then share their own related story.
That is not a conversation. That is two people taking turns waiting.
The first question is easy. Everybody asks it. The second question is the proof. It says, “I was still listening after you finished.”
That is understanding, validation, and caring delivered in about four seconds.
In the speed-dating data, the people who asked more follow-up questions got more second dates.
The next time somebody tells you something, resist the pull to relate it to yourself. Stay with their story. Ask about the part they skipped over.
Think about what you do during a first meeting at a new job, with a new team, or among a new group of people.
You establish yourself. You mention what you have done, what you know, and where you have worked. You lead with competence because competence feels like the safest quality to prove. Yet you are answering a question nobody has asked.
Reverse the order.
Give them warmth within the first 30 seconds, and give it freely. Use their name. Be visibly glad to be there. Ask about them before sharing anything about yourself.
Your competence will still get noticed. It will receive a more generous response because warmth was established first.
Competence introduced first is judged. Competence introduced after warmth is admired.
You notice how a colleague handled a difficult call, how well someone explains complex ideas, or how much effort your friend has been putting into something.
Most of the time, you keep those observations to yourself because you think saying them will feel awkward.
Xuan Zhao and Nicholas Epley tested this across nine experiments. People who gave genuine compliments consistently underestimated how good the recipient would feel and overestimated how awkward the moment would be.
The awkwardness you are bracing for is mostly imaginary. The impact is greater than you think.
The important word here is specific.
“Nice shirt” is noise.
What lands is evidence that you are paying attention.
“You handled that guy in the meeting well. You never became defensive.”
That is a compliment nobody else could have given them, which is exactly why it works.
Most people focus on being supportive when someone is struggling. Yet the moment that quietly influences how close someone feels to you is what you do when they share good news.
Research on what psychologists call capitalization shows how your response to good news predicts relationship strength at least as much as your response to bad news.
Most responses quietly deflate the moment.
“That’s nice. Congratulations.”
Then the person changes the subject immediately.
Sometimes the response introduces a small deflation:
“Oh, so is it more money?”
Instead, slow down and expand the moment. Ask for the story. Ask how they found out. Ask what the experience felt like.
Let them stay in the good moment for another 30 seconds instead of closing it.
People remember who let them feel happy out loud.
When we think about showing vulnerability, admitting a mistake, asking for help, or saying the honest thing first, we evaluate the behavior as weakness.
When we watch someone else do the same thing, we evaluate the behavior as courage.
The same behavior receives two different interpretations depending on which side of the experience you occupy. Your instinct about your openness is not neutral information. It is a known distortion.
You do not need to unload your history on strangers. One honest sentence is enough.
“I have no idea what I’m doing with this yet.”
“I got that completely wrong.”
“Honestly, I was nervous about today.”
Something happens in the room when you go first. The other person exhales because you made it safe to be a real human being.
That permission is one of the most attractive things a person has to offer.
Four women of similar appearance attended a large university lecture course. One never attended. The others attended five, 10, and 15 sessions.
None of them spoke to a single student. There was no conversation, charm, or performance. There was only presence.
At the end of the term, students rated the women. The pattern was clear. The more often a woman had been in the room, the more warmly the students rated her.
No words. Only repetition.
Stop treating likability as something you win during one brilliant encounter. It develops through frequency.
Return to the same gym at the same hour. Say something small to the same colleague every morning. Become the person who is reliably present.
Almost everybody underrates this because showing up quietly feels as though it does not count.
It counts more than the performance you have been rehearsing.
Charisma stops being something you brace for and becomes a byproduct of where you place your attention. You stop walking into rooms with a plan and start walking in with curiosity.
The exhaustion fades because you were never tired from socializing. You were tired from performing while socializing.
You get to stop trying to be the brightest person in the room. You get to be the warmest.
People will struggle to explain what draws them to you. They will notice that they feel better around you than they do around almost anyone else, and they will keep finding reasons to return.
Perhaps the deepest truth is how little this asks of you.
You do not need a new personality, more achievements, or a voice you must manufacture.
You need to give your honest attention to the person in front of you.
The philosopher Simone Weil expressed this better than anyone since:
“Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity.”
There is a strange sense of relief in this idea. The quality you have been chasing was never in short supply. You already possess the only currency required to obtain it.
You have been spending all of it on yourself.
Of the six laws covered here, which one are you worst at?
Source
Law One: Ask Follow-Up Questions
Researchers at Harvard studied thousands of real conversations, including live speed dating, and found something almost nobody predicts.The people who asked more questions were better liked, but the effect was concentrated in one specific type: follow-up questions. These questions stay focused on what the other person said instead of moving on.
Watch how most people converse. They ask something, receive the answer, and then share their own related story.
That is not a conversation. That is two people taking turns waiting.
The first question is easy. Everybody asks it. The second question is the proof. It says, “I was still listening after you finished.”
That is understanding, validation, and caring delivered in about four seconds.
In the speed-dating data, the people who asked more follow-up questions got more second dates.
The next time somebody tells you something, resist the pull to relate it to yourself. Stay with their story. Ask about the part they skipped over.
Law Two: Lead With Warmth, Not Credentials
Remember what Fiske found. Warmth is measured first, and it colors everything measured afterward.Think about what you do during a first meeting at a new job, with a new team, or among a new group of people.
You establish yourself. You mention what you have done, what you know, and where you have worked. You lead with competence because competence feels like the safest quality to prove. Yet you are answering a question nobody has asked.
Reverse the order.
Give them warmth within the first 30 seconds, and give it freely. Use their name. Be visibly glad to be there. Ask about them before sharing anything about yourself.
Your competence will still get noticed. It will receive a more generous response because warmth was established first.
Competence introduced first is judged. Competence introduced after warmth is admired.
Law Three: Say the Specific Thing Out Loud
You notice things about people constantly.You notice how a colleague handled a difficult call, how well someone explains complex ideas, or how much effort your friend has been putting into something.
Most of the time, you keep those observations to yourself because you think saying them will feel awkward.
Xuan Zhao and Nicholas Epley tested this across nine experiments. People who gave genuine compliments consistently underestimated how good the recipient would feel and overestimated how awkward the moment would be.
The awkwardness you are bracing for is mostly imaginary. The impact is greater than you think.
The important word here is specific.
“Nice shirt” is noise.
What lands is evidence that you are paying attention.
“You handled that guy in the meeting well. You never became defensive.”
That is a compliment nobody else could have given them, which is exactly why it works.
Law Four: Handle Their Good News Properly
This behavior is often invisible, but its effect is enormous.Most people focus on being supportive when someone is struggling. Yet the moment that quietly influences how close someone feels to you is what you do when they share good news.
Research on what psychologists call capitalization shows how your response to good news predicts relationship strength at least as much as your response to bad news.
Most responses quietly deflate the moment.
“That’s nice. Congratulations.”
Then the person changes the subject immediately.
Sometimes the response introduces a small deflation:
“Oh, so is it more money?”
Instead, slow down and expand the moment. Ask for the story. Ask how they found out. Ask what the experience felt like.
Let them stay in the good moment for another 30 seconds instead of closing it.
People remember who let them feel happy out loud.
Law Five: Be the First to Be Slightly Unpolished
In 2018, Anna Brooke and her colleagues at the University of Mannheim documented what they called the Beautiful Mess Effect.When we think about showing vulnerability, admitting a mistake, asking for help, or saying the honest thing first, we evaluate the behavior as weakness.
When we watch someone else do the same thing, we evaluate the behavior as courage.
The same behavior receives two different interpretations depending on which side of the experience you occupy. Your instinct about your openness is not neutral information. It is a known distortion.
You do not need to unload your history on strangers. One honest sentence is enough.
“I have no idea what I’m doing with this yet.”
“I got that completely wrong.”
“Honestly, I was nervous about today.”
Something happens in the room when you go first. The other person exhales because you made it safe to be a real human being.
That permission is one of the most attractive things a person has to offer.
Law Six: Show Up Again
In 1992, Richard Moreland and Scott Beach conducted an experiment that deserves more attention.Four women of similar appearance attended a large university lecture course. One never attended. The others attended five, 10, and 15 sessions.
None of them spoke to a single student. There was no conversation, charm, or performance. There was only presence.
At the end of the term, students rated the women. The pattern was clear. The more often a woman had been in the room, the more warmly the students rated her.
No words. Only repetition.
Stop treating likability as something you win during one brilliant encounter. It develops through frequency.
Return to the same gym at the same hour. Say something small to the same colleague every morning. Become the person who is reliably present.
Almost everybody underrates this because showing up quietly feels as though it does not count.
It counts more than the performance you have been rehearsing.
Stop Performing and Start Paying Attention
Practice these six laws long enough, and something changes. You will feel the shift before you know how to describe it.Charisma stops being something you brace for and becomes a byproduct of where you place your attention. You stop walking into rooms with a plan and start walking in with curiosity.
The exhaustion fades because you were never tired from socializing. You were tired from performing while socializing.
You get to stop trying to be the brightest person in the room. You get to be the warmest.
People will struggle to explain what draws them to you. They will notice that they feel better around you than they do around almost anyone else, and they will keep finding reasons to return.
Perhaps the deepest truth is how little this asks of you.
You do not need a new personality, more achievements, or a voice you must manufacture.
You need to give your honest attention to the person in front of you.
The philosopher Simone Weil expressed this better than anyone since:
“Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity.”
There is a strange sense of relief in this idea. The quality you have been chasing was never in short supply. You already possess the only currency required to obtain it.
You have been spending all of it on yourself.
Of the six laws covered here, which one are you worst at?
