How to Deceive without Cheating People

Sun Tzu in the Art of War stated that all war is based on deception. Does he mean to cheat? Of course not.

What Sun Tzu means is that we need to adjust the enemy's perception so that 'when able to attack we must seem weak, and when weak must appear to be strong'.

The reason is that people simply assume that the way we see things is the way they really are, or the way they should be. Also, our attitudes and behaviours grow out of these assumptions. In other words, we are not really seeing, but perceiving.

Pick up the phone now and call your own company pretending to be a customer. How are you treated? If you are going to adequately manage other people's perception of your company you need to know what that perception is. This is not an exercise to catch people out but to find areas of improvement. Like my seminar clients, you'll be surprised that the way your people answer the phone is not every business friendly!

In business it is imperative that your customers believe in you. Everything that you do and say, from the way you answer the phone, to the quality of your blog, facebook and webpage, builds a picture of your ability.

That picture needs to be manoeuvred wherever necessary so as to give people the impression that your company is good. Of course your company needs to be good or you'll really be cheating people!

In short, you need to put on a good show. This is what Sun Tzu means to deceive people without cheating people.

By Andy Ng, whose courses on Sun Tzu Art of War have now travelled all the way to Philippines. For details, click here or text to me at 8201-4347.

Comments

What an Executive Coach and Business Coach Does

The Secret Under the Mattress: Why would a 79-year Man Bet So Big on 4D?

It was 2007 when we discovered his secret. While moving my father’s mattress, we found them: heaps and heaps of Singapore Pools 4D tickets. They were stacked in layers, a paper trail of lost hopes. What shocked us most wasn’t just the volume, but the stakes. He wasn’t betting a few dollars for fun. He was punting hundreds of dollars per draw—nearly ten times a month. At the time, my siblings and I were furious. Our father was a 79-year-old retiree. We wondered, with a mix of anger and confusion, why a man at his stage of life would need to win such "big money." What was he going to do with the money? We saw it as a reckless habit, a sign of poor judgment in his final years. Some of us would say, "If I were to give him money to buy 4D, why don't I use the money and buy 4D myself? At least I have better discipline". It has taken me two decades, and the experience of raising my own three grown-up children, to finally see the truth that was hidden under that matt...

Head Bleeding when the Chair Falls

The Weight of Silence: What Were We Really Arguing About? My earliest memories are punctuated by the sound of shouting. In 1970, when I was barely 6 years old, I stood as a small witness to the fierce quarrels between my father and my late eldest brother Kah Yang (he passed away in 1971 at the age of 17). As I grew up, these contradictions became the soundtrack of our lives, usually centered around our family's shoe shop and clothing stalls in Chinatown. In the court of family opinion, the verdict was almost always the same: my father was "wrong." He was judged as a man who didn't fulfill his role, who wasn't "burdening" enough for the family’s success. But as I look back from the vantage point of 2026, I have to ask: Was that actually true? Let me finally put to rest what my father did right: the truths that were buried under decades of criticism: Unseen Labor: He worked grueling, long hours. I remember him hauling boxes of goods and equipment to set u...

Business and Money Tips

Search This Blog