Thriller at the Savings Bank Forum

What a secret service agent can teach about trust

At the Sparkassenforum, a refined talk show, rhetorical fencing. And suddenly, 260 listeners find themselves in a spy thriller, where an interrogation specialist exposes the spy. BERSENBRÜCK. With the topic "Trust: The art of binding a person to oneself," the Kreissparkasse Bersenbrück hit a nerve, pleased their boss Bernd Heinemann with the record number of visitors. This is not surprising, as German Chancellor only needs to say, "The time when we could rely on others unconditionally is over." And everyone knows who is meant. As a moderator with plenty of television experience, Andreas Franik then introduces the two conversation partners on the stage. Bernhard Pörksen is a professor of media studies who can completely do without the lofty language of his field and instead vividly describes how he motivates young people to peak performance with a good deal of trust. The relaxed professor is supposed to theoretically underpin what the practitioner Leo Martin has to say. Introducing himself as a pseudonym, he is a criminal scientist who worked for the intelligence service for ten years. A James Bond? "Beautiful women and fast cars were involved," Martin laughs. But typical intelligence work consists of collecting information to piece together a picture from these puzzle pieces. Martin infiltrated the secluded world of organized crime, recruited informants, led these confidential informants. "If you want to gain trust, you must show yourself to be trustworthy," he says. And then he springs out of his chair and demonstrates the techniques that are equally useful for recruiters, agents, and interrogation specialists: precise observation of unconscious signals. "We humans are walking signal systems," comments Professor Pörksen on the demonstration in which a randomly assembled quartet of participants draws black and white balls from a bag and hides them from Martin. He chats with them, observes their reactions, changes the subject. And he repeatedly guesses the color of the ball that his conversation partners are hiding behind their backs. Johannes Koop, Rita, and Christian Klütsch are so amused by it that they seem to be open books to Martin. But Sonja Hormes, responsible for personnel in the family-owned company, clearly tries to counteract and manipulate in turn. In the end, Leo Martin resorts to a hypnotic trick to be sure of his case. In between, he openly reveals to the audience how he proceeds, with which questions he explores the character of his conversation partners, and how he cross-checks his findings with a change of topic. Whoever this man may be, he is credible in his actions. And so his masterful demonstration of manipulation ultimately leads to an appeal to give trust, at least in personal relationships. The Kreissparkasse benefits from the fact that they now delegate responsibility for customers to their trainees at a very early stage, Heinemann concludes the evening.