Poker Face
Remember Casino Royale? In the 2006 movie, James Bond makes it seem like winning at poker is about decoding the opponent’s “tell”: the subtle twitch of the eyebrow, the cough, the tiny involuntary gestures that betray that someone is trying to hide something.
In his book One Plus One Equals Three, Dave Trott tells the story of a professional poker player who’d won millions over the years. She was asked in an interview whether spotting her opponents’ tell was the secret of her success. She said it was nonsense. A tell doesn’t reveal the truth about someone’s hand. It reveals what they think about their hand.
Early in her career, she was playing for a quarter million dollars. She’d read her opponent’s tell across the table. She could see it clearly: he was confident he had great cards. She looked at her own hand, knew it was weak, and folded. When the cards were revealed, his hand was garbage. Hers would have won easily.
That was the last time she ever trusted a tell. Because a tell is not a fact, it’s only someone’s opinion about their cards. From then on, she played the numbers: the cards that had been dealt, the cards left in the deck, and the odds—the facts. She stopped playing the opponent’s confidence and started playing the cards.
Opinions aren’t facts
If you’re like most executives I coach, you answer with “I think it went well” and then launch into a detailed analysis of the interviewer. You replay their facial expressions frame by frame. That slight pause before they answered your question: what did that mean? The way they glanced at their notes when you talked about your turnaround strategy: were they impressed or skeptical? They said they’d be in touch “soon,” but their smile seemed forced, didn’t it? You turn yourself into a forensic analyst of someone else’s poker face.
And just like that poker player folding a winning hand, you’re drawing conclusions based on someone else’s performance, not your own. Worse: the conclusions you’re drawing are about your value. And that’s a confidence killer for any leader in transition.
“How did your interview go?” actually means:
Did you show up as a Leader or as a Candidate? Did you tell your story with the clarity of someone who knows what they’ve built, or did you perform a version of yourself you thought they needed to see? Did your questions reveal you were evaluating fit as much as they were, or did you wait politely for permission to speak?
Those are facts. Facts that tell you how you showed up.
Their reaction? Processing. Their brain trying to match what they heard against what they need, forming an opinion in real time. An opinion that might shift when they meet the next candidate, or talk to their CHRO, or redefine the ideal profile for the role.
How did the interview go? Stick to your facts, and to what you can control.
What you actually control
You don’t control whether the hiring manager had a fight with a peer that morning. You don’t control whether they’ve already decided on an internal candidate but have to interview three externals to satisfy the Board. You don’t control whether your background triggers their insecurity about their own future in the company.
You control how you walk in, as a peer or a supplicant. You control whether you leave the room thinking, “I showed them exactly who I am and what I bring,” or “I hope I said the right things.”
When I ask my clients how their interview went, they don’t start with “I think they liked me.” They start with “I told them about the turnaround I led in 2023” or “We had a real conversation about their go-to-market challenges” or “I realized halfway through that this role is too small for where I am now.”
They’re playing their own hand. Looking at their own facts. Not trying to read someone else’s opinion.
The real tell
A former client, a brilliant operator who was part of the Uber story, was interviewing for a COO role. After the first interview, she told me she was certain she’d blown it. She said the interviewer seemed unengaged in the conversation, and looked eager to end it as quickly as possible. She was not expecting much. She made it to the next step. And the next one. Until 11 interviews later, (yes, 11…) she got the job.
The only tell that matters is yours. That interviewer’s poker face might mean they’re impressed. Or it might mean they’re intimidated. Or distracted. Or … You’ll never know. And it doesn’t matter.
What matters is whether you played the game you came to play. Consistently. That’s what preserves your confidence. That’s what keeps you showing up as a leader. That’s what gets you hired.
