The Security Circle
An IFPOD production for IFPO the very first security podcast called Security Circle. IFPO is the International Foundation for Protection Officers, and is an international security membership body that supports front line security professionals with learning and development, mental Health and wellbeing initiatives.
The Security Circle
EP 103 Julian Fisher Former British Spy: 'How to Think Like A Spy'
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About Julian:
Intelligence specialist and dedicated Africanist with over twenty years' hands-on engagement on the continent. Experienced public speaker on influence, interpersonal skills, international relations and diplomacy. Author.
"Fisher is an indispensable resource for companies seeking to do business or resolve disputes in Africa": The Modern Detective, by Tyler Maroney.
"For anyone looking to grasp the art of persuasion, interpersonal skills and alliances, Fisher's book belongs in your back pocket": I. S. Berry, author of The Peacock and the Sparrow.
LinkedIn:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/julian-fisher-67161920/
Security Circle ⭕️ is an IFPOD production for IFPO the International Foundation of Protection Officers
If you enjoy the security circle podcast, please like share and comment or even better. Leave us a Fabry view. We can be found on all podcast platforms. Be sure to subscribe. The security circle every Thursday. We love Thursdays. Hi, this is Yolanda Welcome. Welcome to the Security Circle podcast. IFPO is the International Foundation for Protection Officers, and we are delighted to be providing meaningful education, information and certification for all levels of security personnel, and make a positive difference to our members, mental health and safety. and well being. Our listeners are global. They are the decision makers of tomorrow. And we want to thank you wherever you are for being a part of the Security Circle podcast. Please don't forget to subscribe or even better, just like, comment and share the LinkedIn post. Thank you for your company. Well, when you find one, what's that phrase about buses? When you want one, you can never find one, but then all of a sudden three come along at once. We, we have another ex British spy here on the security circle podcast, and he's here because he's written a great book. Julian Fisher, welcome to the security circle podcast. How are you doing?
JulianI'm good, thanks Yolanda, fantastic to be here, lovely to join your lineup of stellar speakers, even if I am the third in the queue.
YoyoI don't know,, if we go back to the buses analogy, but look, I don't know that I would necessarily have, found you on LinkedIn, but that's the power of network, right? Yeah, absolutely right.
JulianAlthough I, I emphasize targeting over networking, but we can perhaps talk about that as we go on.
YoyoListen, one of the things I really love about your book, it's like a kit. I've noticed. It's like a kit that you can take with you and all of a sudden you do these recaps. You provide these little tips and advice. It's not just reading. It's a kit book, isn't it?
JulianI want it to be a manual., it's trying to do a lot of things at the same time. There's the autobiographical elements, there's a little bit of investigation of how spies work to the extent that I can do that without transgressing relevant laws. there's also the, as you say, the kit of, Skills that anybody can use to improve their personal and professional lives. So yeah, it's quite, it's trying to do quite a lot at the same time. I quite like, what Charlie Cumming, the, novelist and friend of mine wrote about it. he was kind enough to say that if I were a young graduate looking to gain an advantage in the workplace, this is the first book I returned to. And he calls it part memoir, part tutorial. I think that pretty much sums it up.
YoyoYeah, I think I didn't do it justice by saying kit book, tutorial, fantastic analogy. And I like what he said. And I get that. And I think, crikey, I would have loved to have read this 10 years ago.
JulianI'm so surprised at how many people say that to me, Yolanda. And it's really, it's gratifying, in fact, because I'm a great believer in social mobility, improving social mobility. I think we have a problem with that in this country. And if even a handful of, you know, Younger people learn to better improve their prospects in the workplace through reading my book, then I'm very happy that that to me counts as success.
YoyoTell me why I have to pick up on that. Why do we have a social mobility problem in this country or even in the Western world?
JulianI mean, these, these things have deep historical roots, but I think part of the problem we have in the UK is the prevalence of the public school system. What, uh, American listeners would understand to be private schools and the fee paying schools. There's a, A fantastic club, which has been set up, by inspiring a woman called Sophie Pender, and it's the 93 percent club. And what she points out is that 93 percent of people in, in this country, the UK go to non fee paying schools, but a preponderance of the most senior positions, whether it's in the judiciary, in the military, in business, in politics are drawn from the 7 percent who went to the fee paying schools. And that's a structural, it's a structural deficit that I think will take some time to address. I'm not going to get into the politics of it, but it needs to be done because there's a whole, there's a wellspring of talent out there, which just isn't being tapped into. And I think that's a shame for us as a country.
YoyoIf you look at centuries, um, and we won't go down this rabbit hole, but if you look at centuries, elitism seems to have been a theme in every single century, the elitism of wealth, power, money, and privilege. And that's woven its way through, hasn't it? Even to our society today, I noticed it seems to be something, you know, we don't seem to as a human race be able to be really, equality focused.
JulianNo, we're getting better, but. Inequalities take time to break down because there are so many vested interests, aren't there? I mean, that's, that's the way that inequality works. And I'm not a believer in top down solutions to a really big degree. I mean, I think that it's important that we have the right political setting to ease some of those inequalities. But I also think we as individuals, including younger people, have a lot more at their disposal. Disposal to address the problems that they might face through lack of social capital, for instance, and that's what this book is all about. And so I, I believe there's a lot of truth in that old saying that it's not what, you know it's who, you know, of course, I would urge everybody to educate themselves to the highest degree possible. It is true that it's important to, you know and if you're born to a particular background, you know, You don't have access to that network of people who represent social capital, who are able to make the introductions that ease your path in life. You can control both of those elements. You can control what you know through pursuing education and you can control who you know. And my book at its heart is about how to take control of building that network of goals, allies, building the group of people around you. In a perfectly reasonable and ethical way, seek to help you attain your goals.
YoyoThat's profound because, and it will be well received because a lot of the listeners to the Security Circle podcast, they listen because they learn and there are so many people within the security community, very broad community they're just learning kind. They want to learn. Listen, but you've given me a great segue to the book. The book is called Think Like a Spy, and I can see why you've called it that, Julian. Publishers have a lot
Julianto do with titles.
YoyoI know. In fact, I understand that the publisher determines the name of the book, even though authors quite often say, this is the name of my book. And the publisher will go, nope, it's not.
JulianI've, I've heard similar stories and actual fact, this was purely collaborative. So the publishers, I suggested the name in the first place, wavered about it. They liked it. They think it's, it's, it does what it says on the cover.
YoyoAnd it's described here by Charles Cumming, who you mentioned earlier, who is the best author of, uh, Box 88. What's Box 88? I've not heard of that.
JulianYou'd have to read the book.
YoyoSo Charles describes your book as, as close as readers are likely to get to the secrets of intelligence recruitment, a fascinating and instructive guide. The book is described as master the art of influence and build life changing alliances. And I want to give everybody, thank you for your inscription, by the way. Love getting those.
JulianOh, you're very welcome.
YoyoI love your introduction and I remember when I sat down, opened the pages and had a cup of coffee and I started to read, I'm going to read the introduction because I think it sets the scene nicely. Okay. A spy does something extraordinary. She travels abroad, often undercover to hostile territories. Once in country, she engages with senior political, military, and legal personnel. Some of them, she peels off from their professional settings and draws them into close, personal friendships. Over time, she focuses on the most promising of these relationships and deepens them, strengthening the bonds of mutual trust and understanding. Then, after careful assessment and with exquisite timing, she strikes. I was like, oh god, this is brilliant. Lastly, when the right day comes, she sits down with one of her new friends somewhere quiet and unobtrusive and relaxing. A plush hotel restaurant, perhaps, or a park bench on a balmy summer's evening. She pours him a glass of wine, soothes any nerves he may have, and settles him into an easy rhythm of attentive conversation. She reads his body language and listens intently to his words, her emotional antennae attuned only to him. Her sense of time, place, and occasion heightened, but her posture relaxed and her facial features open. And as the evening mellows and the edges of the day begin to soften, she asks him to do something for her. She asks him to betray his country. Oh, love it. It
Juliansums it up, doesn't it? You know, I think that's the first time I've heard that read back to me. And it still sends a tingle down my spine when I think about it. And I'm sure many of your listeners We'll be, we'll have had a similar experience when you first, when you're first introduced to the idea of what an intelligent officer is expected to do. I think it's a life changing moment in some ways. It's a moment when cognitive dissonance creeps in at first, because you think how on earth does anybody persuade another person to betray their country?
YoyoI'm sitting here thinking, could I betray my country? I mean it annoys the hell out of me sometimes. You see these clips and these soundbites everywhere and people saying, if they had the choice to live abroad, would they, and most people say yes, because the weather here is a bit naff on the naff scale.
JulianYeah, especially today.
YoyoBut when you go abroad, I find when I go abroad, my patriotism increases. My, my belonging meant to my country. is very strong when I'm abroad. yet I can be abroad and not like the British very much. So I feel a little bit conflicted, but would I betray my country? And I'm wondering if people hearing that would be thinking, well, cripes, would I betray my country? I mean, that would be a British man saying that, but American would be like, yee haw, would I betray my country? Y'all. I think that's, what's very poignant about that introduction. And I guess really that's what a spy is looking for.
JulianIndeed. Let me reflect on that by talking about a conversation I had with my producer when I made the Channel 4 TV series, released back in 2017 called Spies, where I was one of the lead trainers and we took 16 people and put them through a series of exercises to find out if they had what it takes to be a spy. I was part of the whole process of designing that series, as well as. Fronting it a lot of very interesting conversations with the producers. And at one point we were talking about the same thing, who, why would somebody choose to betray their country? Would you choose to betray your country? And it's moved into the question of what patriotism means. And my producer said, do you buy into Queen and country? This was before the Queen's death, obviously, and my response was, I don't, and cars on the table. I'm a Republican. And I think that's, I'm afraid that fits with my, the problem I have with the inequalities we have in this country. I actually think it stems from the fact that we have a monarchy. But that's a slight, that's a different conversation.
YoyoIt's not though. I think I've always supported the Queen and Country, King and Country. But recently, if we were to do a poll on where I stand, after the news came out about how much money they're taking from people using their land, I started to think, Oh, this could be a deal breaker for me. This, if nothing else has I don't like the way they've, dealt with, Megan and Harry. I think that's appalling. They should never have allowed that to happen. But I also think, well, if I was to do a poll right now on, on the socialization of that news, I think, what's the word I'm looking for? The consensus for me would be an all time low in favor of the royal family. And that's significant. I've always been a fan. Have you seen that change?
JulianI do always make one observation when, people are often surprised to discover that I'm a Republican. And they asked me why. And I say, well, consider this, but for a very minor quirk of fate, we may today have King Andrew and you would have no say in whether or not that man. Was allowed to reign over you, allowed to present himself as the person to whom you have to say you are his citizen, his subject, sorry, to me, it's mind blowing. And I think stemming from that comes every element of. inequality in Britain today. I genuinely believe that. That's a profound political statement to make. And I know it won't go down terribly well with the number of your listeners, but I'm not in the business of pretending to be something I'm not, but that doesn't stop me being a patriot. And, So when I was asked by my producer, okay, what is it then, if you don't buy into Queen and Country, what is it that makes you a proud Brit, if you like? I said, well, yeah, when I was 12, I was, I walked in front of a car. I write better than a book. I spent nigh on a year. In hospital where I was rebuilt by the NHS and following that I was able coming from the poorest postcode in the United Kingdom, I was able to go on to a world class education in Oxford University and that's what makes me proud to be British because we're a country that no matter your class, creed, background, whether you're a visitor to the country, whether you're a long time resident, whether you were born here, if you're smashed up in a car accident, You will be picked up, you will be taken and you will get world class care. And I think that's an amazing thing. I think it's particularly British, in fact, the country also gives opportunities to kids like me from backgrounds, which weren't terribly promising. There were great elements to my background. Don't get me wrong, but it wasn't terribly promising, but I was able to go on and study at one of the premier educational institutions in the world. And I think that's worth being patriotic about.
YoyoYes. I think you make an incredibly good case, but like me, when I joined the police, I would have sworn allegiance to the Queen and country. You would have done the same.
JulianI was a Crown servant. Yeah, absolutely.
YoyoI was also proud of that, David Blunkett was my, Home Secretary, but I was always very proud that we saw our allegiance to the Queen, but then I did as a Brownie. As well, when I was like seven,
Julianthis is a really complicated subject, isn't it? And I had huge affection for Queen Elizabeth. I think she did us as a country proud. And if you think about the amount of time she was on the throne and the stability, she represented during some quite chaotic times. I have nothing but respect for her. I don't have respect for the institution.
YoyoOne of the things I love that you've done in the book is that you've talked about the You, you've got a chapter here called a note on terminology, and I think it's really important that you've done this because you've said, and you've premised this with the phrase spy is an imprecise term because there are, like you say, even more murky intelligence officers that have a variety of functions. Some are engaged in intercepting messages sent by electronic means, signals intelligence or SIGINT. Others might spend. Others might spend their time analyzing publicly available information to spot patterns or provide leads for other types of operations. You've got obviously. OSINT, open source intelligence, yet others pour over photographs taken for military aircraft or drones and you've got image intelligence, IMINT. But the category of interest for present purposes is human intelligent. Do you call it human or intelligent? Or hamint. It
Julianis, humint. Hamint might run the risk of getting mixed up with a Greek snack food.
YoyoYes, so hamint, following the, for the general folk, the Ossint precipice, principle. This involves at the operational sharp end, the type of operation that you outlined in the introduction, identification, cultivation, and recruitment of human sources of intelligence. Let's talk also about why it's important to profile someone's personality in that element of human source intelligence.
JulianSo that comes under what I, turn targeting and it's, it's one of the preparatory stages. I divide the book as you know, into three sections, getting ready, getting together and staying together, getting ready. That first section is operational groundwork and within that, one of the important part, one of the most important skill sets to develop is targeting. And the reason for that is go back to the story that you read out about the spy sitting down with her target and inviting him to betray his country. Now that may well be happening in a hostile third country. Where if it goes wrong, the spy, the person making the invitation could well end up in a very uncomfortable situation, potentially imprisoned, certainly thrown out in disgrace. It's absolutely vital before you get to the stage of recruitment, that you have not a racing certainty, but certainly a strong balance of probabilities that the answer is going to be yes. And part of the way you get to that is by effective profiling, effective targeting. And you're looking for three things, really, you're looking for somebody who's got access to the information of interest, the intelligence that you want. You're looking for somebody who's got motivation. To give you that information, and we can talk about what motivations apply in different circumstances. And you're also vitally looking for suitability. You're looking for somebody who is not going to, be indiscreet about their new relationship. You're not looking for somebody who's going to take unnecessary risks. So all of that requires quite careful profiling, quite careful targeting. So I think a lot of human intelligence operatives are in some ways, Not academically trained, but they are psychology practitioners. You have to learn to become readers of people and to look for the clues in how people present themselves and what people say that might be missed by others, because if you get it wrong, the stakes are enormously high. So the incentive to get it right is incredibly strong.
YoyoTalking about that, does that mean that spies don't have the same, heartbeat as everybody else? Because surely they have this ability to remain cool and calm and collected in quite stressful situations. Are they a different type of human being?
JulianI don't believe so, in fact, all personality types are on a spectrum and there will be certain types of personality that are perhaps more suited for the profession than others. But the whole premise of my book is that everybody has what it takes. it's really, we all use the set of skills that I talk about throughout the three sections, whether or not we realize that we're doing it, we use them every day. Our interpersonal relationships depend upon the ability to use this suite of skills, but what we don't necessarily do is use them as intent. The difference between a trained spy, if you like, and a civilian is simply that, really. It's learning to use a set of skills, which is available to all of us, in an intentful and purposeful manner with a specific end in mind. I wrote this book because I realized over the years, I'd been doing that in my day to day life without realizing, It wouldn't have occurred to me to think that I was using spy skills, say, when I was cultivating Winston Churchill, the grandson, to be one of my referees on my CV. But actually, I had been targeting, cultivating, and recruiting him. And a lot of us do this, a similar thing, all the time, every day. We just don't realize
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Yoyoit. You talk in your book about how Churchill got you your first job. Yes. That's what you're referring to, isn't it? It
Julianis. I'll tell you. I'll just very briefly tell the story. So
Yoyolisteners love stories. Go for it.
JulianIndeed. So. Coming from a background in inner city Birmingham, without necessarily the contacts that were going to get me jobs in the more elite institutions, I had to do a lot of heavy lifting myself by making sure I had the right allies on my side. And during my gap year, I'd hoped that I would be spending it in Africa, working for an organization called Project Trust, but it turned out that, they required you to raised quite a lot of money. I quickly realized that money was usually raised through the simple expedient of going to the bank of mom and dad. And I didn't have that option. So I had to abandon that dream. And I ended up peculiarly working on the European parliamentary elections in 1989, which gives you an idea of how old I am.
YoyoYou're working it well.
JulianFrom Indeed. Thank you. That's very kind of you. Spying, keeps you young. The, during, I, I ended up working in, in a marginal conservative party constituency called Midlands West for a incredible chap called Mike Whitby, our law Whitby and. It was probably the most marginal seat in the country. And as such, the conservative party headquarters threw everything at it. And we had everybody visit. So I met Margaret Thatcher, Norman Tebbitt, and I think Cecil Parkinson, and the luminaries of the day, which to my young impressionable minds, made quite a big difference. What I decided to do as these. Figures were coming through. The constituency was on every occasion. I would ask them if they needed a parliamentary research or need, or knew of anybody who needed a parliamentary researcher. And eventually, I, struck, lucky, and ended up working for an mp. I won't name that MP 'cause it would be unfair. I figured that if I really wanted to have powerful impact on my cv, I needed to have another, more high profile MP as a referee. So, I set about a targeting exercise. I went to the library at the House of Commons and I sat down with a list of MPs and worked out who had the highest profile and who didn't have a full quota of researchers or speech writers or staff. And one name jumped out to me and that name was Winston Churchill, which for a moment threw me because I thought he was dead. And indeed he was, but he'd, he had, had a grandchild also called Winston and Winston was an MP. So I set about getting to know Winston and, you know, having a parliamentary past, I worked out where his office was and outside of his office, there was a, one of those old Reuters ticker tape machines that would basically spool out greener. White striped paper with the headlines of the day, you know, this is long before digitization. I got a rough idea of when Winston was likely to be arriving or leaving his office. And so I would make sure that on those, at those times I was outside examining the headlines coming through on this Reuters machine. And I also took it upon myself to work out what his areas of interest were. So what parliamentary committees did he sit on and, you know, what were his. Declared member's interests. And every time I saw a subject come through on the Reuters machine, and he was in my vicinity, I would engage him in conversation about it. And that way we struck up a friendship. And eventually I said to him, do you have need of a researcher? And he said, well no, I don't, but I do have need of a speechwriter. So suddenly I was a brilliant speechwriter and I presented myself to him as, the answer to his prayers. And indeed, he took me on as a speechwriter. There are somewhere in old Hansard some fairly exorable speeches that I wrote for him. I have to admit that looking back, but it did the trick. And having worked with him for a while and he was a really lovely chap. He was very, very supportive of me. And I asked him if I could put his name down as a reference. When I went for my. first graduate jobs. I ended up with him and the Lord Mayor of Birmingham, a chaplain called Peter Barwell. Sadly, neither of those two gentlemen are still with us, but they were most, both incredibly supportive and I think made all the difference as I put my CV around. And I've ended up being interviewed for a job at a firm called Casanova, which at the time was the last remaining independent stockbrokers in the city of London, a partnership. People mainly The types we were talking about earlier, the graduates of the 7 percent of fee paying schools, and they were of a particular type and suffice to say, I was something of a square peg in a round hole, but I got a job there and I actually enjoyed working there a great deal. I got to know a lot of people. And one day, many of whom remain friends to this day, but one day I sat with my boss, John,, fantastic first employer, brilliant mentor. And a man with a reasonable sense of humor, I hope because I said to him, okay, so why did you choose to offer me the job? And he said, well, I had to, didn't I? Because I really wanted to phone the house of commons and ask to speak to Winston Churchill. I think he was joking,
Yoyobut
Julianif he wasn't, then that's fine too, because it proves my point that in targeting a particular person, profiling a particular person, cultivating them, getting to know them and providing them with support as well, because that wasn't a one way street. I worked for Winston, Gratis, as I recall, and he needed my assistance. It may not have been the greatest speechwriter, but it was. So what I was giving him something, he gave me something in return. And that's what I think lies at the very heart of the best alliances. And that's also what I think lies at the heart of the very best agent recruitments. It's a partnership rather than an exploitation.
YoyoYeah. I think a lot of our relationships are transactional and I think we should accept that they're transactional. And I think one of the things that I've learned recently is when. Part of that relationship stops being transactional. It kind of leaves the other one in limbo a little bit. Um,
Julianyeah, it's just reality, isn't it? I mean, we can, we can get ourselves worked up about the idea of transactional relationships, but what's wrong with that? The simple act of living requires us to be transactional to some degree. We've created a whole thing, which reflects the importance of transactional relationships. And we call it money.
YoyoI don't think having transactional relationships is bad. I think the biggest mistake we can make is thinking we have true friendships and we haven't. We have transactional relationships the two
Julianare not mutually exclusive. By any means, and many many relationships, partnerships that start out transactional develop into very strong friendships, which transcends, quickly transcend the transaction. But there are all sorts of psychological studies that suggest that actually the number of true friends we can really manage is quite small. Yeah. You can count them on one hand, the fingers of one hand.
YoyoSo,
Julianand in this day and age where, and the last time I looked at the number of contacts I have in my iPhone, it was something like 1, 500, you know, that's not 1, 500 friends.
YoyoNo, it's associates, isn't it?
JulianAssociates. And, but some of them will be very strong transactional partnerships. A very small number of them will be very close friends.
Yoyothis is a nice segue because you have nine steps to building a relationship. And that must have taken some time to think about that structure. What led you down that route?
Julianit did and it didn't in the sense that the structure actually is one that's used by intelligence services everywhere. You know, if it is in its place. Simplified form. It's about the targeting, cultivation, recruitment, and running of a relationship, in secure terms. And so it's everything from that process of working out who it is you're going after to the adoption of an appropriate cover. there's an interesting area perhaps to unpack to the commencement of the cultivation, the use of elicitation skills in order to understand better what your targets motivations are setting the right recruitment pitch, and then use of influence to maintain relation to that relationship on a sound footing in the cases. Intelligence officers, strong debriefing and detection of deception skills, and then setting up around that relationship. The secure environment called trade craft in the business, and all of those things have that they are recognized steps in the building of a relationship, but it's what makes possible that extraordinary story you told at the outset. It's what makes it possible for the spy to sit down and say, will you do this extraordinary thing for me? And to give their target the confidence to say yes. the ability to create a secure environment for. for that relationship through tradecraft is equally important as the targeting, is equally important as the elicitation, is equally important as the motivation. So it took me some time to piece it all together in a way that makes sense in civilian terms, but the process is the process is the process. And it applies whether or not the practitioner of it is. Chinese or Taiwanese or South African or British or American or Irish or whatever. So actually in a funny sort of way, one, I've had one or two less obliging reviews saying there's nothing new in this book. That's my point. that is precisely my point. Spies don't have access to a suite of skills that are denied to the rest of us. They just use the skills that we can all use. And we all do use on a daily basis in an intentful and purposeful manner. And guess what you can too. And if you choose what that intent and that purpose is, you can turn that set of skills to almost any end. If you think about it.
YoyoAs you were describing those nine SERPs, with the exception of elicitation, you've described how I find security circle podcast guests.
JulianWell, there you are. I mean, what a brilliant, actually, I can't think of a better analogy. That's precisely it. you have, if you think about it, you've persuaded me to come on your podcast
Yoyoand
Julianin inverted commas, give up my time and talk to you and you gain something from it. I gained something from it. We also happened to get on incredibly well and I think there's chemistry there and that's great.
YoyoYeah.
JulianYou did the targeting, you did the cultivation, you've done the recruitment and here we are. You kindly helped me set up, as I fumbled around with my IT, you helped me set up a secure environment in which we could manage this relationship. So thank you very much. I absolutely, um grateful for your management of the relationship in, in, in using those steps that I outline in the book. It's a great analogy.
YoyoI started thinking also how other people can apply it when they're looking for customers. They are looking to manage customer relationships and some of the best sellers, some of the best, gurus in relationship management or targeting your customer always talk about finding a commonality, something that, you know, your potential customer likes. It could be golf, for example. So, you know, you do a bit of research on what they like to do. So when you go along, you can use a golfing analogy and it's, Oh, you like golf? Yeah, I like golf. And then all of a sudden you're building a rapport, a neuralistic program comes into a lot. So maybe, like you said, there are a lot of things, a lot of components that we are using as professionals that are ultimately, imagine reading your book and then having it all in one space. Wow. Yeah. Well,
Julianthank you for that. I'm going to put a shout out for another author, actually, who wrote a book, his name's Jeremy Hurovitz, and he published a book which came out a few months after mine called Sell Like a Spy. It is an exploration of the use of espionage skills in the sales arena. Say in the book that I don't think a spy is like a salesperson because although the relationship is transactional, they're looking for intelligence and often they're paying for that intelligence. Actually, that's more like a very highly specialized procurement officer when I think about it than it is somebody who's selling something because they're buying the intelligence. However, my perspective on that was changed when I read Jeremy's book. I do think there are many. elements of the sales process, which are equivalent to the process of cultivation, recruitment, and management of a relationship between a spy and their target. And you just had to buy one, which is commonality. And can I, I'll tell a story about commonality. This was in Zimbabwe. I think a little bit of it, plays into something you mentioned earlier, the ability to keep your head in quite difficult circumstances. And I was never actually entirely convinced that I could, but actually when I find myself often in very challenging circumstances, a certain coolness Kicks in. And this is a case in point. I was visiting Zimbabwe shortly after the 2008 elections, which have been pretty fraught. I won't go into the history lesson about Zimbabwe's politics, but I think we all recognize that there was a very, very Difficult relationship between the UK and Zimbabwe for many years, and perhaps the peak of that was around 2008 when, Mugabe and his suggs bullied their way to a victory. I make no bones about it saying that,, I visited that country shortly afterwards. It's a country I know well and have huge affection for. I think the vast majority of Zimbabweans are victims. in my experience are uniformly wonderful people. But they are, and have been abused over the years by Mugabe and his regime and perhaps his successor. I have many friends in Sarnia PF, which was the, Which is the ruling party, many of whom were educated in places in the UK and actually very pro Brit. If you strip away some of that political superficiality. Now on one occasion I was visiting one of these friends, pretty much on the top floor of the ZarnoPF headquarters, and I kid you not, the ZarnoPF headquarters are on a street called Rotten Row. Somebody has a sense of humor. Somebody has a sense of humor. But then I was brought up in a part of Birmingham called Rotten Park, spelled with an O rather than an E. Anyway, I was there in the Zona PF headquarters and I'd had a very good chap, a friend of mine, who's a senior figure in the party. And I climbed into the lights right in the stairwell and I was slightly claustrophobic. So I was a bit reluctant to go in the lift, but it was too dark really to use the stairwell safely. So I climbed into the lift and it sort of held my breath, hoping that there wasn't going to be a power cut. And we came down one floor and the doors opened and a group of. youth leaguers walked in and youth leaguers are sort of renowned for going around the country, sort of knocking heads. And they were all obviously reasonably drunk on the local, Chibuku, a local brew, quite evil brew. You could smell it on their breaths. And they were heavily armed with pangas, which are, you know, this long bladed. Tools, which can be used for everything from cutting hedges to decapitating people. They were, they're the weapon of choice during the Rwandan genocide in 1994. You know, really rather evil instruments. They're all sort of wielding these things. They kept piling in to the lift. So until there was barely room to move. So there's a group of these youth leaguers and then two slightly better dressed, suited gentleman in the corner. And I thought, well,, I'm just going to keep quiet and sort of shrink into the corner. And we started descending again. And then suddenly with a jolt, the lift came to a halt between floors. So that just the worst thing that could possibly have happened at that moment. But of course it was overloaded as well as everything else. Uh, and then the lights went out and bear in mind, I've said that I was, I am claustrophobic, um, I saw, I'm going to, you know, I'm going to have to really manage myself not to panic in these circumstances, sort of breathe in this rancid air, people crushing up against me, but I really wanted some light. So there was, I fished out my mobile phone and I used the torch function on the phone. And of course that just drew attention. To me, suddenly I was the subject of interest for quite a lot, quite drunk, quite angry, agitated Sarno Piaf youth leaguers who got it into their heads that I must be a British spy. What was I doing there? Who was I visiting? What was this Brit doing in a lift in Sarno Piaf headquarters? And all the venom started to come out. It was quite uncomfortable. And I, I make no bones about it. I was scared. My instinct kicked in or training kicked in or something kicked in. So I started looking for an ally. And what do you look for in an ally? Primarily you look for commonality. So first of all, I focused on the two men who were in suits. For a start, that's, at least it suggested they were. probably a bit more senior. And then on the lapel of one of these gentlemen, I noticed an old beaten up enamel badge and it just had the word United on it. And I don't really know anything about football. I really don't, or soccer. but I know enough about it to surmise that that was likely to be a reference to Manchester United. I think it was half the remainder of a, of an enamel badge. I thought, okay, I don't know anything about football, but I can pretend a commonality which doesn't exist. So I caught this chap's eye and I said to him, Oh, how was the game the other night? I had no idea whether there'd been a game the other night or not, it just, it was, but I had to do something. And he sort of looked at me quizzically for a while and then broke into a smile and he said, yeah, it was great. And, started singing the praises of one of the players and then somebody else piped up from over the. The other side of the lift saying that it's not him. Ronaldo is the greatest player. And suddenly we're into the middle of this very spirited debate about British football, one of the most high profile British football teams. And all these anti Brits were debating the merits of these different football teams and knowing nothing about it. I didn't venture very much, but I did throw in the odd question. By the time the lift had started working again, and we got down to the ground floor, all of those people who had been angry and jostling were now mates. And that was all about establishing a commonality. It's a commonality that didn't actually exist, but I created it. So there's a little bit about creation of cover there as well. In the instant I was creating a cover of being somebody who was a football fan could establish that commonality with them because I know enough about many African countries that they do have an obsession with British football in fact.
YoyoThe subject of commonality is phenomenal. You could have an apartment block in a pretty run down area of a city where nobody gets on. But the minute that apartment block is on fire. And everybody is standing outside all of a sudden they're united in this, almost vitriol of how could this fire have happened with this is our home and all of a sudden the commonalities come to the forefront and people start to form alliances and support for each other and like for each other. It's phenomenal, isn't it? How that's such an intrinsic part of our human society.
JulianWe often find commonality and adversity. That's absolutely true. And I think that's why in the past people fighting together in the two world wars. I think probably played quite a big part in establishing British identity. I'm not passing judgment on it one way or the other. It's just an observation that there is a lot of commonality to be drawn from adversity. And actually there's some hope there, isn't it? I suspect Without getting too political, I suspect we're in for some pretty rough times And I hope that the adversity that we will face, whether that's economical, political or social, will actually draw people together rather than drive them apart. I think that's the most optimistic assessment I can make of it.
YoyoWe've been through a diluted, version of where we are now. A few years ago, when Trump first had his, first position of power as president of the United States. And we had the same COVID. And COVID, I feel, put a pause on everything. It just put a pause on everything. It's the only way I could describe it. It's like having a VHS machine and just pressing pause. Everyone in their communities supported, they liked each other. People met people they didn't know before. There was a whole new way of thinking. It was actually a really nice model. Now I feel like everything, that pause has come off and everything is almost, heightened. My thought leadership question to you is, when you look at how Elon Musk's X is a mirror to society, we talked about this in the debrief, it's holding a mirror to society, I find it quite ugly. I don't like what I see. I don't like being a part of it. And it has a very negative impact on me. And I don't have any anxieties or depressions or anything like this. So imagine somebody who does have anxieties and depressions where this would have a greater impact on that individual. And then you weigh into that, the knowledge that security professionals have around geopolitics and hostile threat actors. And you think you can't help but think we're moving into a very acerbic. bitter disenfranchised society that is even more susceptible to the hostile threat actors. So if it was hard to find somebody who was going to turn on their country 30 years ago, it's going to be very easy now because their people are not. As loyal as they would have been. What do you think to that?
JulianWow. There's quite a lot to unpack there.
YoyoYou get that on the security.
JulianIndeed. Uh, I mean, that is sort of a potted threat assessment by the security service and in one, one or two paragraphs, say you landed. Where to start? I. Sort of agree with you about COVID, but I also disagree with you in a profound way. I think one of the problems, whatever the rights and wrongs of lockdown, and I really don't want to get into that, but what it did was it forced us into this sort of arrangement. Teams meetings and zoom meetings, which are great, but they're nowhere near as great as the real thing, which is face to face meetings. And I think a lot of the problems that we now face, particularly young people are related to that. The. I say to people, IT is fantastic. Technology is fantastic. Communications systems are wonderful, but remember that's all they are. They are communication systems. They are a way of connecting you and me quicker and more efficiently than might've been the case previously. So for the way in which we're using those communication systems now, you and I, Yolanda, it's fantastic. But I have a feeling that some people during COVID and before then, and after then have become too reliant on the systems themselves. And so they are mixing up, the medium with the practice, with the users of the medium and losing that vital thing, which is personal interaction. So if we take, I have never used Twitter, or I've never used X and I never would. I avoid it because I don't see its utility, really. I don't think that you can distill anything important into a few words. And I think the very idea of it was harmful from the outset. I wouldn't control it. I wouldn't censor it. I wouldn't do anything with it. I just allow it to be what it is. But what I would do is particularly for young people is. Urge them to lift their heads from it and to do the most important thing that we can all do, which is interact in real life with other people and establish communication and connection in real life. And it's those connections, it's when you get to know the other, that the fear of the other begins to dissolve. You don't get to know anybody really. Through a screen. You certainly don't get to know people when you're obsessed with how many followers you have on, whether or not it's Twitter or blue sky or LinkedIn. Even you get to know people by sitting down with them face to face, reading their emotions, engaging with them, being tactile if you need to be tactile. And that's what dissolves conflict. So yeah, it is fantastic. Communication technology. Wonderful. But use it as. what it is, a tool, and don't make it a central part of your life. That's what I implore everybody, especially young people.
YoyoOh, it's interesting that you use the word dissolve conflict because Gene Roddenberry prophesizes this in Star Trek and talks about how the technology, It doesn't give an opportunity for conflict to dissolve. Do you remember the episode where, people wore bracelets and if their bracelet was activated, they had to go and walk into a device and Jim Kirk learns, because obviously Jim and I would be friends for years now. We're on first name terms. But Jim Kirk realizes. Oh, good old
JulianJim. I
Yoyowas just at the
Julianpub with him the other day.
YoyoHe's a top bloke, he's been to space. These people, they just voluntarily go and walk into this capsule that ultimately kills them. That's the technology doing nothing to resolve conflict. And I always remembered that, even though, the wood and scenery and the, but it was great principle.
JulianIsn't it interesting when you look back at some of those, apparently quite fantastical ideas, whether it's Star Trek or 1984, Philip K. Dick's books and actually how much of it is coming to pass. It's scary. It is quite scary. I remain optimistic because one of the things that worried me, let's go back to COVID.
YoyoIt makes me laugh that you're a former spy, but you remain optimistic. I think it's almost healing to hear that.
JulianYeah. I think it's important to get out of that world actually. It's important, whatever you do to lift your eyes from the immediacy of your day to day work. The reason I'm positive is because I did worry during lockdown that we were going to enter an era when people were atomized. There's a great book called, The Future is Analog. David Sachs, I think wrote it. And I recommend it again. As he puts it, we dreamed of this future and everything would be online. We dreamed of this future where all of our lives would be managed through IT. And then overnight, we had it. because of lockdown and we hated it. And you know what? I think he's right. I think we were grateful for it. We were grateful for the fact that you were able to make connections, sustain connections, outside of real life. But boy, did we want to run back to interpersonal human connection as soon as we could.
YoyoLet me robustly challenge that, Julian, with a completely different perspective. I definitely sit in the paragraph of people who, were definitely during COVID relieved they didn't have to lie to anyone about why they didn't want to go to an event anymore, because we were quite happy being at home. And for the introverts out there that weren't bouncing off the walls because we couldn't go out, have a run, or we couldn't go around and breathe the same air as other humans, we were incredibly content that we didn't have to breathe the air of other humans and that we could stay away from them and we could live and breathe and smell the coffee, it's definitely a tale of two worlds in the sense of introverted and extroverted. people. But when you look at how Sam Smith was dealing with COVID, a true narcissistic approach to where I can't do this because I need to be around people to validate my existence. Yeah. Those people really struggled on the extreme end of the spectrum. Yeah.
JulianI think I can see it from both sides., I'm an introvert. Actually, I know there's nothing I enjoy more really than periods of introverted reflection. And that's where I get my, that's where I recharge my batteries. But I think there's sometimes a bit of a misunderstanding about introversion, which is this idea that introverts don't want to engage with people at all. I'm certainly not going to speak for you, Yolanda, you look at you, you're engaging with a lot of people, professionally and personally, even. To create these podcasts. So protest all you like, but I would say this about, introversion, my understanding of it is about the need sometimes to withdraw from society, to recharge your batteries so you can go back out and re engage. And that re engagement thing remains as important to me as an introvert as the periods of introverted reflection.
YoyoA lot of people ask me why I do the podcast and I can only say, and I'm going to base this on something we talked about. You said that the book is aimed at younger people, but I can't help but think having spoken to you and listened to you and reflected that you kind of need to be of an older age to appreciate why you need this book.
JulianIt's a wonderful thing. What a shame it's wasted on the young. It is. I have. Well, first of all, I have to say it's not just for younger people. I think there's something in it for everybody. You also said that your listeners are lifelong learners and there's, I hope there's material in here, which lifelong learners will benefit from as well as people entering the workplace for the first time, for instance. I think you're right that sometimes younger people don't necessarily, they're not necessarily going to gain as much as. somebody who's a bit older and had a bit more life experience. And that's where, actually, what I'm saying in the book is go and find mentors, go and find guides, go and find allies, because the book itself, important though it is actually only a guide, a manual, a kit. To a kit of skills to do the thing I keep coming back to, which is building relationships. And for younger people, the most important thing I think is building relationships with mentors, older people who can help them to understand and navigate the world a bit better. And that's probably more important now than it's been for as long as I can remember.
YoyoI think sometimes when I look at the geopolitics of the world, and I'm only touching the tip of the iceberg of it in my knowledge and understanding and the holistic security knowledge we collectively have as security professionals. I think the benefit I have to this experience is surrounding myself with an echo chamber of incredibly smart, intelligent, optimistic people who constantly learn. I think that's why I do this. And I wonder if that's why You write Julian.
JulianI think there's something in that. Let's go back to very briefly to lockdown because actually one thing I did during that was write a novel. And I'm sure I'm not alone in that. Sadly, it wasn't to be published, but, it was a, I think a worthwhile endeavor because it enabled me, I think one of the important things about writing fiction and nonfiction is it gives us an opportunity to think about our place in the world. And to think about the importance of human relationships. In the end, if you think about it, every story is about interpersonal relationships. So writing feels like it's a solitary, introverted activity. And indeed, of course it is by necessity, but it is also impossible to do well, unless you have a curiosity about the world and a curiosity about interpersonal relationships. And here's the thing about storytelling. I'm reading the book, Christopher Booker's seven basic plots at the moment. And what it comes down to is it is every story is about As far as I can see, a version of recruitment. And I write, whether that's recruitment of self or recruitment of the other, or recruitment of an alter ego. And I write a substack, Julianfisher. substack. com, which explores this. Because I'm fascinated by that question of why we're all so fascinated by espionage. I think I've arrived at the answer with the help of Christopher Booker's work, that it's because, actually, at the heart of espionage is one very important thing, and that's interpersonal skills.
YoyoYes.
JulianThat's where all drama comes in, really, it's not about car chases. It's not about the world blowing up. It's about the management and the blow ups within interpersonal relationships. That's where we really find drama. That's why writing, I think is about learning because it's about reflection on precisely that. The role that you play. Of us, our own role in the world and that as a people with which we engage.
YoyoThen you add into that the chess game, the strategy, the intent, the purpose, and then you've got yourself a healthy combination of attributes, haven't you?
JulianI like to think so. Yes. But crucially again, and maybe this is the note on which I want to end it. It's a combination that is available to everybody if they want to stop and think about how to develop it.
YoyoJust reading this book alone, it says at the back here, discover the secret skills of influence used by spies and learn how to adapt them to win people over and achieve your goals. Apply it in your everyday working life. Julian Fisher, what can I say? Think like a spy. Thank you so much for coming in, sharing insights about your book and also letting us understand a little bit more about the author as well.
JulianThank you so much, Yolanda, I say think like a spy and I thank you for getting me to think more about what I'm writing about as well. That's why I think these sorts of podcasts are so vital because they get everybody to get everybody's intellectual juices flowing and that's, that can only be a good thing.
YoyoCheck out our transactional relationship.
JulianYeah. Look at that. Yay. Us.
YoyoBoom. Thanks Yolanda. All the best.
JulianBye for now.