One of the most powerful ways to learn and grow is through comparative analysis.
Especially when it comes to improving your communication and presence, being able to analyze and measure the way you show up and communicate under different scenarios is a powerful tool in understanding yourself, and gaining control over the impression you are sending others.
Virtual Sapiens makes this all possible with our three distinct ways of getting immediate feedback. We wanted to show you a compelling example of this in action with our Video Upload product.
Context:
Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF) was recently found guilty on 7 criminal fraud charges. We found a public video interview with SBF from before the hearings, and were curious what our software would pick up on.
What we found is fascinating and indicative of the major differences of impression people can send even throughout a single interaction.
You can see the full video here for yourself. We have highlighted two distinct segments which seem to divide the content. Segment One: SBF when he is pitching about his vision/selling his ambitions vs. Segment Two: SBF when he is backtracking his involvement/absolving himself from being implicated in the fraud that transpired and lost investors billions of dollars.
Let’s take a closer look…
Above is a screenshot of SBF’s Virtual Sapiens results from a time slice of him pitching his company. You can see the clip for yourself here.
When SBF is pitching his company and vision, he exudes confidence, trustworthiness and energy. It’s interesting to note that SBF was very successful in convincing a huge number of very smart people to invest with his company and trust him with their significant assets. Clearly the way he would deliver his messages under this context was compelling and we can see that Virtual Sapiens confirms this.
Now let’s take a look at Segment number two.
This is a screenshot of Virtual Sapiens’ analysis of SBF during a clip of the interview when he is trying to defend his ‘lack’ of involvement and knowledge of what was happening ‘under the hood’. You can see the excerpt for yourself here.
What. A. Difference.
Here, we see his presence plummet. We see his markers of trustworthiness significantly decline as well as his impression of authority and energy. Even SBF’s framing changes because his posture shrinks and he takes up less space within the frame and shows up in the lower half of the frame instead of the upper third as best practice prescribes. Watching this clip also makes me think we should develop some models around leg shaking/bouncing…
What does this tell us? Importantly, we are not claiming that Virtual Sapiens is a lie detection software. However, what this analysis highlights is the following:
❗This type of analysis can be especially effective in establishing a baseline, from which you can track changes in impression management based on changes in specific behaviors.
❗ Virtual Sapiens is an effective tool in comparing the same individual across multiple scenarios or communication events.
❗ While this is a drastic and somewhat dramatic example based on the subject matter and individual, this type of exercise is exceptional when you think about the applications for refining pitches, presentations, and analyzing the impression you are sending through your presence and communication.
To note, this analysis focuses more on how SBF is showing up, rather than what he is saying. The added context of course is critical and our new suite of tools allows users to specify which analysis is tied to which scenario and includes transcription.
If you are curious about your own performance, reach out. We’d be happy to get you set up with a trial account!