I was having a drink at a bar near my loft and struck up a conversation with a guy who said he was retired after 30 years with the CIA. He said his specialty was interrogation and he now works in the security business.
His message: No matter how direct a questioner is, the person being interrogated usually is off in La-La Land. He hears the noise, not the signal, because he thinks he is smarter than the questioner and simply does not listen to the questions asked.
His solution was to have the person being interrogated write down what the questioning had covered. He would then go over it with the person. Usually, he said, this needed to happen two to three times.
How did this work at the CIA posts where he was stationed? Message: Please don't ask. He didn't need to ask me to write him a summary. Signal received.
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