* * *
THE FIRST INGREDIENT: THE GALLOWS RUMOUR
“Predictability allows you to trust that a loyal friend will help you in hard times. You can expect it. If you couldn’t, would that person be a real friend? Predictability also allows you to trust that a lion will be loyal to its hunger if it meets you in the wilderness. If it wasn’t, would that creature truly be a lion?”
The Caviar Trap
“Personally, I don’t trust anyone. Not my banker, business partners, or friends. I don’t trust my children ... However many there may be. To be frank, I don’t even trust my own mother. I love that woman. I lavish her with everything she ever wanted. But do I really trust her? No. And for the record, I forewarned all these people about this public expression of distrust. Those who still talk to me were not happy, but they will get over it. My wallet delivers effective apologies. As for those who are immune to monetary amends? I couldn’t care less. In my experience, such people tend to be too costly to know and too complicated to deal with. Why waste my time? Life is too short.”
The speaker paused to enjoy the mixed looks of shock and admiration on the audience’s faces. Both reactions were gratifying.
“‘Trust’ has a cousin. It’s called ‘loyalty’. What’s the difference between the two? Well, some believe that we grant the former to those who reciprocate with the latter. Is this view accurate? Who knows? I am not interested in the answer. In my opinion, the only relevant thing about loyalty and trust is the single feature they have in common: predictive value.
“Predictability allows you to trust that a loyal friend will help you in hard times. You can expect it. If you couldn’t, would that person be a real friend? Predictability also allows you to trust that a lion would be loyal to its hunger if it met you in the wilderness. If it wasn’t, would that creature truly be a lion?
“So, while friends and lions are different in many ways, they are united by their predictability. This trait allows us to forecast what we can expect from either one.”
The speaker ran his hand through his shock of red hair. The shaggy mane crackled from the static of wisdom in his skull.
“Predictability is animated by individual motivations which rise from our very core. Our character. Our needs. Our insecurities. Our world view. Our morals ... or lack thereof. These elements are the DNA of our identities. They compel us to act and react in reliable patterns. Predictable patterns.”
The speaker removed his glasses and glanced into the crowd.
“Dear graduates. If you can learn people’s motivations, you can predict how they will behave in any given circumstance. It does not matter if you are dealing with a friend or a ferocious feline. Once you understand what drives them, you can transform one into the other.
“I have been in hundreds of negotiations during my business career. The only reason I can afford to buy a larger yacht every year is that I have learned to read the souls of the people on the other side of the table. No matter how well they bluff or posture, I always get what I want. By the time we meet, they are no longer confronting an opponent. They are simply coming to meet their new puppet master. I grab them where it hurts and guide them gently in my chosen direction. I never enter the room without knowing exactly how I can make this outcome unavoidable. My foes lose the war before they even realize it has been declared.
“Sadly, many of them fail to realize this soon enough. They make ludicrous demands and throw themselves around with much bluster. It is embarrassing to watch. The humiliation is even more painful when inevitability hits them on the head, and they are forced to surrender. I am not gracious enough to allow them to save face. I make them bow their heads and ask my forgiveness. That’s how life goes for losers whose arrogance prevents them from realizing they are outgunned.
“Identifying and exploiting people’s motivations will free you from resorting to lies in order to outflank your opponents. There is no value in misdirection if you can predetermine the outcome.”
The speaker glanced towards the scandalized dignitaries on the podium. He shrugged his shoulders and continued.
“Trust and loyalty may be admirable traits. However, with all due respect to your ethics professors, I believe that both are unreliable. I recommend that you short-circuit the uncertainty. Focus on the quality that endows both traits with their practical value. Predictability. You may be leaving the ivory tower for the business world, but I recommend that you continue with one scholarly pursuit: to become students of other people’s motivations. The effort will reward you more than the time you have spent reading those obese finance textbooks. It will help you avoid the ‘caviar trap’. I hear you ask, what is the caviar trap? It is the beginning of a parable that is compulsory for all graduation speeches.
“Earlier, I made a reference to lions. This animal also features in the story of the caviar trap. The concept comes from a tale that my grandfather told me when I was much younger and far less ambitious. There was once a wealthy man who was obsessed with caviar. One day, he walked into a hungry lion’s den with a tub of the finest Russian product. Why? Because he wanted to prove that the delicacy was so tasty, the lion would prefer it over his bland human flesh. The lion disproved his theory by leaving the caviar untouched.
“Always start by understanding the tastes of the beast you want to court, subdue, or destroy. After that, everything is simple. I have met many lions in my life. I quickly learned that they did not spend millions of years evolving razor-sharp teeth so they could slurp on fish eggs. When I meet a lion, I toss it chunks of raw meat. Though I am a vegetarian, I never allow my apathy for meat to derail my mission.”
* * *
Doll Eyes
The man congratulated himself as he walked into his corporate headquarters.
“That speech was immortal,” he said to himself.
The man’s personality had evolved to match his features. His red eyebrows looked like bushels of tangled thorns and twigs. They were dry and dense, but well aired. The grizzled masses crackled whenever the man’s face contorted to express one of his intense emotions. These eyebrows were an arsonist’s wet dream. If set on fire, they were thick enough to light the path of his longest ego trip.
Planted into the lower part of his skull was a jaw of menacing proportions. If someone ever tried to mug him at gunpoint, all he had to do was to clench it. This alone would demoralize the robber.
Imbedded in his thick skull was a pair of hard, green eyeballs. They were glassy, bright, and incapable of producing tears, even for lubrication. His detractors nicknamed him “Doll Eyes”. His friends called him AB, for Apex Bachelor.
Though he reveled in the latter name, he also embraced the former. The business rivals who coined it failed to realize that the trait they mocked was the source of his dominance over them. Dolls do not sleep. They have an unblinking stare that makes them ever watchful. And since the road to legendary accomplishments passes through insomnia, Doll Eyes would always crush competitors who gave in to the shame of slumber. These mortals would sleep their way through history, only to wake up in that special hell known as “Inconsequence”. Doll Eyes would not be among them.
This afternoon’s business was urgent and unconventional. Loosening his tie, Doll Eyes marched into the meeting room below his palatial office. A group of men was waiting.
“Good afternoon, gentlemen. Welcome to Zimbabwe. I apologize for being late. I had to deliver a speech at the National University of Science and Technology. I am a generous donor to the institution, so they allowed me to be generous with my advice to their graduating business students. I must admit: I was charitable to a fault.”
Doll Eyes took a seat at the head of the table.
“First things first: roll call. For the sake of those who are uncomfortable with the English language, we have hired Arabic and French interpreters. I see some of you have brought your own.”
The interpreters nodded to identify themselves. Doll Eyes thanked them by returning the same gesture.
“Now, please raise your hand when your home country is called. Central African Republic? ... Good. Congo-Kinshasa? ... Congo-Brazzaville? ... Hello there. Good to see you again. Nigeria? ... Sudan? ... Nice tie you got there. Ivory Coast? ... Libya? ... There you are. Stay strong. Guinea? ... Guinea Bissau? ... Egypt? ... Rwanda? ... You look familiar. But now is not the time to figure out why ... Mali? ... You may put your hand down. Thanks. Mauritania. Yes, I know who you are. I also know your cousin personally. Equatorial Guinea? ... Cameroon? ...”
Doll Eyes looked up from his list. He glanced casually around the table, pretending to search for the last delegate who was still to raise his hand.
“Gambia? Do we have someone from Gambia? No? ... That’s unfortunate. Our Gambian friends have been busy. I was hoping they could share their experiences with us ...”
There was only one man in the room who had not lifted his hand so far. The likely representative remained silent. Vapour hovered around him like a swarm of smoke-stained mosquitoes. His eyes had been pushed to the far corners of his face by the extensive bridge of his flattened nose. If someone bumped him gently on the shoulder, his eyeballs would rip through his temples and roll out of his head.
“Hmm,” said Doll Eyes. “I was sure we had someone coming from Gambia today ... You, sir. You are from Gambia, no?”
The man crossed his hands tightly at his chest as though he feared someone would steal them. Without invitation, his interpreter intervened.
“We have no knowledge of the experiences you speak of. If we did, we would argue that the events in The Gambia have no floral significance. More importantly, you gentlemen must inform yourselves. The country’s full name is The Gambia. It is erroneous to simply refer to it as ‘Gambia’.”
The interpreter looked to the man whose silence he had just articulated. The man nodded his approval.
“Okay ...” replied Doll Eyes. “I guess everyone is here. Down to business.”
Before Doll Eyes could continue, a tiny man at the other end of the table raised his hand. He was drowning a red beret with an axe embroidered across the front. His aviator shades covered half his face. Doll Eyes nodded respectfully at him.
“Yes, Commander?”
“Thank you, Comrade Facilitator. I have a few questions for my not-quite-Gambian friend. What’s your country’s method of disposition? Is it the gallows, guillotine, or the gun? Do your executioners wear hoods? What happens to the prisoners’ bodies? Do you have an organ harvesting policy? Please share. I find these questions provocative.”
The man’s tiny frame shook with mounting intensity as he progressed through each sentence. Fortunately, his longest utterance was only seven words long. One more word would have caused a detonation.
The interpreter moved quickly to defend The Gambia’s privacy.
“Sir, we do not intend to remedy any provocation caused by those questions.”
Again, the silent delegate nodded his approval. Doll Eyes stepped in before the pent-up curiosity blew the little man’s fuse.
“Have any of you ever been rejected by a girl?”
Hesitantly, everyone in the room raised a hand. Only the man with the well-spaced eyes kept his arms wrapped around his body. Of course he had never been turned down. He had all the traits of a heartbreaker.
“Well, I cannot relate to any of you,” said Doll Eyes. “However, this is one of those situations where your adolescent traumas will serve you well. I have hired a man who would feel at home in your company. His own rejection inspired him to build a set of skills that will be useful to us. Tedward Gudo speaks ten languages. He has used his linguistic skills to build the continent’s top advertising and communications company. His firm crafted the most successful advert on any African television station. The client was a local company. After years of selling less than ten thousand bottles of their sunscreen each year, Chiredzi Cosmetic's sales spiked to more than ninety-thousand bottles a month after the advert was aired. The strangest part of this story was that the most enthusiastic customers were the blackest people in the country. Even more puzzling was the fact that sales peaked at the height of winter when the sun was not particularly intense. Why would those with the most melanin buy the most sunscreen? No clue. That is the talent of Tedward Gudo.
The advert was Tedward’s crowning achievement. A year later, he was voted president of the Global Union for Linguists and Polyglots (G.U.L.P.). It won him many prominent clients from all over the world. Some of you will know his work. He has serviced clients in many of your countries. In fact, he has consulted for a few election campaigns in some of your countries.
Tedward’s services will be useful at different stages of our baking exercise. But we must draw him in gently. We don’t want to scare him away with weighty requests at this early stage. Recently, I gave him a test assignment. I will call him now to see what he has come up with.”
* * *
The Shipping Documents
Tedward Gudo’s mouth was tingling. He was on the verge of formulating a delicious sentence. If he could crystallize the right slogan, he would lure hoards of consumers into buying products they did not need. Naturally, Tedward had a passion for immaculate syntax: the art of arranging words to express a message that no other combination or sequence could deliver with greater eloquence.
Earlier that morning, Tedward had deployed his passion to craft a slogan for a new flavour of Mhondi Beer, a brand named after the Shona word for “murderer”. After crafting the successful marketing campaigns for the Last Rites and Last Meal flavours, the brewer had hired him to work his magic with the new Gallows Humour, Tombstone and Impure Thoughts brands. The elusive slogan was dancing on the foremost taste bud of his tongue. But no matter how hard he tried, the bitter bubbles of the killer brew could not dislodge the pebble of brilliance that was stuck in his throat.
Tedward grimaced at the complimentary bottle that his client had given him for inspiration. Unfortunately, the beer had an 18.5 percent concentration of alcohol. The only feelings it inspired were a mild headache and stomach discomfort. Tedward sighed. He had violated one of his treasured mottos: “Don’t taste the product. Just sell it.”
Tedward blamed his anxiety for stifling his breakthrough. He was waiting for a phone call from a secretive client. If he pleased the client, many lucrative referrals would follow. Tedward placed his notepad and lucky pen on the desk in front of him. When the phone rang, he picked it up and answered with the right amount of self-importance.
“Tedward Gudo here.”
“Hello, Tedward. You are on speaker phone with me and the others. Do you have the answer?” asked the voice impatiently.
“Yes. Your assistant informed me of both your request and deadline. But first, I want to make sure I understood the assignment. You want to import a special piece of equipment into Zimbabwe from England. However, you fear that you may have problems with British customs because of the nature of the shipment?”
“Correct.”
“Okay. So the item is not illegal, but it could raise concerns if its true nature were revealed to the British authorities. But you cannot lie about its purpose because things could get complicated if they opened the shipment and saw what was inside?”
“Yes. We are using a private plane to ship the package, but we must still declare the contents. Our plane is too large to avoid the airports with greater surveillance.”
“So you need to put a name on the shipping documents that would make the officials less likely to ask further questions or open the package?”
“Yes. The customs officials always look at the documents accompanying the shipments. All the documents, including the bill of lading, must tell the same story. The authorities have the discretion to open the package, but we are hoping they will not do so. On the upside, the item will look quite ordinary on the x-ray machine. Also, because it is leaving rather than entering the United Kingdom, our chances are better. They do not search outgoing cargo as thoroughly as they do inbound ca
rgo. So what names have you come up with for our device?”
“Before we discuss my suggestions, I have created a broader strategy that will allow you to be honest without disclosing much about your device. I advise that you go with a medical theme.”
“Medical? As in, relating to health? That makes no sense. If the customs officials opened the shipment, they would consider such a term to be a lie. Then we would be in trouble. Unless your plan is to argue that it is ‘Opposite Day’, I am not impressed.”
“You don’t have to use the words ‘medical’ or ‘health’. We are not claiming that the package is a piece of medical equipment. We are simply noting that it relates to a ‘medical scenario’. After all, a doctor will confirm the fatality when the machine is used, right?”
“Yes, but we cannot call the item itself a medical scenario.”
“That is not what I am suggesting. Remember, in addition to naming the item on the shipping documents, you must also describe it. This is where the medical scenario comes in. You simply state that the package contains ‘equipment relating to medical scenarios and simulations’.”
“Tedward, there will be no simulations. Only implementations.”
“Well, the product needs to be tested on a mannequin first, right? I believe you are going to use a crash test dummy with special sensors in the neck? This will help you to measure the stress that the neck experiences after the free-fall?”
“… Of course. I had forgotten about that … completely.”
“No problem. You are a busy man. Such details are easy to forget. I took the liberty of securing such a dummy. I have a client in the automobile industry.”
The Hangman's Replacement: Sprout of Disruption (BOOK 1) Page 16
