All In on Tells? What Poker Players Can Teach Workplace Investigators

When my daughter was a teenager, I once told her that I always knew when she was fibbing because she had a “tell” – a little flicker that signaled her deceit.

She immediately asked me what it was.  She was fascinated.

I refused to tell her. I didn’t want her managing it.

Suffice it to say, I don’t think she ever fibbed again.

(She’s an adult now and I still won’t tell her.  She’s also a very honest person.)

What is a tell?

“Tell” is a slang term for what researchers might describe as behavioural indicators, non-verbal behaviours, deception cues or, my favourite, emotional leakage.

For most of us, tells can take many forms. Poker players, of course, have made a sport out of watching for them.

In the workplace, a tell might be physical: fidgeting, shifting in a chair, leaning back, crossing the arms, furrowing the brow or taking seemingly endless sips of water.

It might be behavioural: becoming unusually quiet, avoiding eye contact, changing the subject, becoming defensive or suddenly unwilling to answer a question.

It might be vocal: speaking noticeably louder or softer, a change in pitch, frequent throat-clearing or becoming tongue-tied.

Or it might be linguistic. One of the more interesting tells I’ve encountered is someone who suddenly can’t stop talking – offering an unusually high level of detail when it wasn’t previously necessary.

But here’s the important part:

A tell isn't necessarily behaviour that is unusual. It is behaviour that is unusual for that person in that moment.

In other words, context and baseline matter.

So, what do tells have to do with workplace investigations?

First, let’s get one thing out of the way.

Do people look up and to the side when they’re lying?

No, they don’t.

There is no universal physical cue that tells you someone is lying. And a nervous behaviour is not necessarily a deception cue.

A tell does not confirm that someone is lying. It tells you that something may be happening – but it does not tell you what that something is.

A tell may appear because someone is lying. It may also appear because they are nervous, uncomfortable, feeling vulnerable, worried about betraying someone, under pressure or simply unsure of themselves.

And sometimes a tell accompanies a positive emotion, such as excitement.

I once worked with a person who would lean back in his chair, cross his arms and furrow his brow whenever he felt insecure. I knew when I had him on the ropes!

Another person would close his eyes and flutter his eyelids when he was unsure about something. For me, that was a useful signal to stop, reframe what I was saying and make sure we were back on the same page.

I have a tell that appears when I am either nervous or angry. Many people have mis-stepped on that one and learned the hard way!

The point is that a tell does not necessarily signal a particular emotion or response. It is a signal that something may be worth noticing.

What do you do when you notice one?

That depends on what you are trying to understand.

In an investigation, I might change my questions when I notice a tell.

I might ask:

“Can you tell me what you’re feeling right now?”

Or:

“Can you tell me what you were thinking about just now?”

Sometimes the answer leads me to explore the subject more deeply. Sometimes it tells me that I need to ask a better question. And sometimes, if appropriate, I may increase the pressure rather than reduce it.

A person’s tell can also change my behaviour.

If I think someone is becoming nervous or vulnerable, I might soften my voice or slow things down. If someone appears overwhelmed, I might offer a break.

The tell isn't giving me the answer.

It is giving me information that may help me decide what question to ask next – or how to ask it.

Ultimately, I ask myself two questions:

What might this signal be telling me?

And:

What do I want to do with that information?

A tell is not evidence.

This is where I see investigators sometimes get into trouble.

A person shifts in their chair when you ask about an incident. They avoid eye contact. They suddenly become very talkative.

It can be tempting to attach meaning to the behaviour:

They're lying.

They're uncomfortable because they know they're caught.

They're not credible.

But the tell itself doesn't establish any of those things.

A tell is not evidence that someone is lying.

A tell is not evidence that someone lacks credibility.

It is simply a sign that something may be worth exploring.

Think of it as a road sign along the investigative path. It may point you toward something interesting. But you still have to follow the trail and determine what, if anything, is actually there.

And sometimes the answer is remarkably simple.

The person is shifting in their chair because the chair is uncomfortable.

Ask the question.