The Like Switch: An Ex-FBI Agent's Guide to Influencing, Attracting, and Winning People Over
Jack Schafer & Marvin Karlins · 2015
The Like Switch (2015) is a book by Jack Schafer & Marvin Karlins on Rapport building. A former FBI counterintelligence agent reveals the science-backed playbook he once used to turn hostile spies into willing informants, repurposed so you can make almost anyone like, trust, and open up to you in everyday life.
Practical FBI-based techniques for building rapport and likability quickly in any interaction.
Three of the ideas you’ll keep
The Clif summary of The Like Switch pulls out 7 insights. Here are the first three.
- Likability is engineered, not innate: increase proximity, frequency, duration, and intensity of contact, and connection follows almost automatically.
- Live by the Golden Rule of Friendship, make the other person feel good about themselves, and they will gravitate toward you without knowing why.
- Send unconscious 'friend signals' on first contact: a quick eyebrow flash, a slight head tilt, and a genuine eye-crinkling smile read as safe and approachable.
The other 4 — and the full 11-minute summary — are in the app.
What’s inside: 10 chapters
The whole summary runs about 11 minutes, read or listened to.
- Likability Is a Skill, Not a Gift
- The Friendship Formula
- Friend Signals: Getting Liked Before You Speak
- Foe Signals: The Cues That Quietly Repel People
- The Golden Rule of Friendship
- The Laws of Attraction
- Speaking the Language of Friendship: Listen with LOVE
- Testing for Rapport
- Maintaining Relationships with CARE
- Building Connection in the Digital World
Finish The Like Switch tonight.
Read or listen to the full summary in about 11 minutes, then keep the ideas with a minute of review a day. Start with the 2-minute quiz — no card required.
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