Table Of Content

PENGUIN BOOKS BODY LANGUAGE IN THE WORKPLACE Julius Fast lives in New York City. In addition to his exper- tise as a writer and researcher, he has spent many years in the business world, having held positions at Smith, Kline & French, Perdue Fredericks, and the publications Science and Medicine and Medical News. He has also given numerous seminars to businesspeople and lawyers. Among his books are Body Language, The Body Language of Sex, Power, and Aggression, Talking Between the Lines, and Sexual Chemistry. BODY LANGUAGE IN THE WORKPLACE J u l i us F a st PENGUIN BOOKS PENGUIN BOOKS Published by the Penguin Group Penguin Books USA Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, U.S.A. Penguin Books Ltd, 27 Wrights Lane, London W8 5TZ, England Penguin Books Australia Ltd, Ringwood, Victoria, Australia Penguin Books Canada Ltd, 10 Alcorn Avenue, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4V 3B2 Penguin Books (N.Z.) Ltd, 182-190 Wairau Road, Auckland 10, New Zealand Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England First published in the United States of America as Subtext by Viking Penguin, a division of Penguin Books USA Inc., 1991 Published in Penguin Books 1994 3 5 7 9 1 0 8 64 Copyright © The Philip Lief Group, Inc., and Julius Fast, 1991 All rights reserved Grateful acknowledgment is made for permission to reprint "Prologue: The Birth of Architecture" from "Thanksgiving for a Habitat" from W. H. Auden: Collected Poems by W. H. Auden. Copyright ©1963 by W. H. Auden. Reprinted by permission of Random House, Inc. THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS HAS CATALOGUED THE HARDCOVER AS FOLLOWS: Fast, Julius. Subtext: Making body language work in the workplace/Julius Fast. p. cm. Includes index. ISBN 0-670-83238-3 (he.) ISBN 0 14 01.7815 5 (pbk.) 1. Communication in personnel management. 2. Interpersonal communication. I. Title. HF5549.5C6F37 1991 650.1-3—dc20 90-50466 Printed in the United States of America Set in Bodoni Book Designed by Beth Tondreau Design/Mary A. Wirth Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher's prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser. FOR BARBARA A C K N O W L E D G M E N TS I would like to express my debt and gratitude to the many people who have helped me so generously with their time and knowledge. They are too many to list individu- ally, but among them, I must thank the following: Edward Lubell Walter Pfister Joyce Grillo Anthony Thompson, OBE Deborah Howard Ingrid Ehrenberg Edward Jaworowski C O N T E N TS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS • vii • INTRODUCTION SUBTEXT • 1 • WHAT YOU SEE IS NOT WHAT YOU GET SUPERTALK • 38 • • i x CONTENTS 3 TOUCHY SITUATIONS • 48 • 4 BODY LANGUAGE: THE EYES, THE HEAD, AND THE HANDS • 58 • 5 BODY LANGUAGE: GESTURES, POSTURE, AND SPACE . 79 . 6 INSIDE OUT . 92 . TRUTH AND CONSEQUENCES • 120 • 8 ASPECTS OF POWER • 135 • 9 THE JOB INTERVIEW • 157 • 10 THE MAGIC BEHIND THE SALE • 175 • • x • CONTENTS 11 DANGEROUS LIAISONS • 192 • 12 WHEN WORLDS COLLIDE: SUBTEXT AND THE GLOBAL WORKPLACE • 204 • AFTERWORD . 229 • INDEX • 233 • x i