What spies can teach us about persuasion
November 13, 2025
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Forget the fancy cars, futuristic gadgets, and martinis “shaken, not stirred.” In his book "Sell Like a Spy: The Art of Persuasion from the World of Espionage", Jeremy Hurewitz argues that intelligence officers are a lot more like therapists than James Bond-style action heroes.
“They are the world’s best salespeople,” Hurewitz told GZERO. Spies master the hardest pitch imaginable: convincing someone to commit treason. And the skills they use—empathy, curiosity, and what he calls “the art of elicitation”—are just as valuable in boardrooms and negotiating tables today.
However, those abilities are also experiencing a societal recession as political polarization grows, and screens and devices threaten to erode the “soft skills” spies, and the rest of us, can use to get what we want.
Watch Hurewitz’s interview with GZERO’s Tony Maciulis for more on what world leaders can learn from spies, what he thinks of President Donald Trump's skills as a salesman, and how artificial intelligence is impacting the traditional world of espionage.
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