Dr. Robert Cialdini

Tony writes in Awaken the Giant Within:

"...So often people believe something because everybody else believes it. This is known in psychology as social proof. But social proof is not always accurate. When people are not sure what to do, they look to others for guidance. In Dr. Robert Cialdini's book Influence, he describes a classic experiment in which someone yells "Rape!" for a subject's benefit while two people (psychological plants) ignore the cries for help and keep walking. The subject doesn't know whether to respond to the pleas or not, but when he sees the other two people act as if nothing is wrong, he decides that the cries for help are insignificant and to ignore them also."

More on the book Influence from Amazon website


Cialdini defines six "weapons of influence":

• Reciprocity - People tend to return a favor, thus the pervasiveness of free samples in marketing. In his conferences, he often uses the example of Ethiopia providing thousands of dollars in humanitarian aid to Mexico just after the 1985 earthquake, despite Ethiopia suffering from a crippling famine and civil war at the time. Ethiopia had been reciprocating for the diplomatic support Mexico provided when Italy invaded Ethiopia in 1935.

• Commitment and Consistency - If people commit, orally or in writing, to an idea or goal, they are more likely to honor that commitment. Even if the original incentive or motivation is removed after they have already agreed, they will continue to honor the agreement. For example, in car sales, suddenly raising the price at the last moment works because the buyer has already decided to buy. See cognitive dissonance.
• Social Proof - People will do things that they see other people are doing. For example, in one experiment, one or more confederates would look up into the sky; bystanders would then look up into the sky to see what they were seeing. At one point this experiment aborted, as so many people were looking up that they stopped traffic. See conformity, and the Asch conformity experiments.
• Authority - People will tend to obey authority figures, even if they are asked to perform objectionable acts. Cialdini cites incidents such as the Milgram experiments in the early 1960s and the My Lai massacre.
• Liking - People are easily persuaded by other people that they like. Cialdini cites the marketing of Tupperware in what might now be called viral marketing. People were more likely to buy if they liked the person selling it to them. Some of the many biases favoring more attractive people are discussed. See physical attractiveness stereotype.
• Scarcity - Perceived scarcity will generate demand. For example, saying offers are available for a "limited time only" encourages sales.

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Pat Riley

Entering his 12th season with Miami, HEAT President & Head Coach Pat Riley has established a standard of excellence within the franchise, both on and off the court, that has allowed the team to reach unprecedented heights and has positioned it as one of the most successful in the NBA. Never was that more evident then when Riley guided his group of “15 Strong” to the franchise’s first NBA championship in Dallas on June 20, 2006. After the game, Riley commented that he had packed one suit, one shirt and one tie for the trip to Dallas, what he brought back to Miami was one championship, fulfilling a vision he spoke about when arriving in Miami in 1995.
When he returned to the sidelines for his second stint as the HEAT head coach on Dec. 12, 2005, after a two-year hiatus from the bench where he concentrated on building the team from the front office, many experts questioned whether the Miami team that he assembled was capable of reaching the NBA’s ultimate destination. Six months later the answer was a resounding “yes”, as Riley had successfully navigated the HEAT to the pinnacle of the basketball world and added more luster to a legacy and resume that did not need further validation.
In his illustrious career, Riley has guided his teams to at least 50 wins in a season an NBA-record 17 times, four more than the closest coach in league history. He also has registered an NBA-record seven 60-win seasons, accomplishing the milestone with each of the three franchises he guided. When he began the 2000-01 season with an Opening Night victory over intrastate rival Orlando on November 1, he became the fastest coach or manager to reach 1,000 wins in the history of the four professional sports in North America. Not only did Riley break the record, he smashed the mark previously held by Fred Clarke of the Pittsburgh Pirates, bettering it by an astonishing 144 games. Riley recorded his 1,000th victory in just his 1,434th game. On Mar. 11, 2003 with a 77-75 victory in Cleveland, he became the only head coach in NBA history to record at least 350 victories with two different franchises. Riley currently stands as the all-time leader in both regular season and postseason victories for both the Lakers and the HEAT.

More on Pat Riley, visit the NBA site
You may also want to visit the wikipedia

Marva Collins

Marva Collins grew up in Atmore, Alabama at a time when segregation was the rule. Black people were not permitted to use the public library, and her schools had few books, and no indoor plumbing. Nonetheless, her family instilled in her an awareness of the family’s historical excellence and helped develop her strong desire for learning, achievement and independence. After graduating from Clark College in Atlanta, Georgia, she taught school in Alabama for two years. She moved to Chicago and taught in Chicago’s public school system for fourteen years.

Her experiences in that system, coupled with her dissatisfaction with the quality of education that her two youngest children were receiving in prestigious private schools, convinced her that children deserved better than what was passing for acceptable education. That conviction led to her decision to open her own school on the second floor of her home. She took the $5,000 balance in her school pension fund and began her educational program with an enrollment of her own two children and four other neighborhood youngsters.

Thus, Westside preparatory School was founded in 1975 in Garfield Park, a Chicago inner-city area. During the first year, Marva took in learning disabled, problem children and even one child who had been labeled by Chicago public school authorities as borderline retarded. At the end of the first year, every child scored at least five grades higher proving that the previous labels placed on these children were misguided. The CBS program, 60 Minutes, visited her school for the second time in 1996. That little girl who had been labeled as border line retarded, graduated in 1976 from college Summa Cum Laude. It was documented on the 60 Minutes programs in 1996. Marva’s graduates have entered some of the nation’s finest colleges and universities, such as Harvard, Yale, and Stanford, to mention just a few. And, they have become physicians, lawyers, engineers, educators, and entered other professions.

She writes about her education system as below

My educational program and methodology is based on the Socratic Method. Socrates, an Athenian philosopher and teacher, lived from about 470 – 399 BC. The Socratic method teaches by using a series of questions and answers by which the logical soundness of a definition, or a point of view, or the meaning of a concept, is tested. The Socratic method is based on logical analysis, consequently, it develops superb reasoning skills in students.

 Know more about Marva Collins from her website