trumps-ten-commandments-skills

Use when the user is working for, advising, evaluating, or deciding how to engage with an organization where authority radiates from a single person at the center — lieutenants report directly to them, jurisdictions overlap by design, real power does not live in any institution. Triggers on phrases like "my boss runs everything through himself", "this company is a one-man show", "the CEO won't delegate", "I'm stuck advising a strongman", "how do I survive under this kind of leader", "how do I influence a leader who trusts no one", "should I take this role under X". Do not use for: conventional hierarchical orgs where delegation is real, early-stage founder-led startups where centralization reflects genuine one-person bandwidth (the pattern looks similar, the prescription differs), or purely interpersonal bad-boss situations without the structural features below.

Use when a confidently-stated falsehood is being repeated so often that it is on track to become conventional wisdom — in politics, in a market, in a company, in a relationship. Helps the user recognize the mechanism (the "sleeper effect"), understand why well-intentioned fact-checking often fails, and structure a response that can actually hold the narrative. Triggers on phrases like "this lie keeps spreading no matter how many times we correct it", "how do I fight a false narrative that's becoming conventional wisdom", "my opponent's confident assertion is winning the argument", "they're defining me before I can define myself", "the facts aren't landing", "how do I counter someone who just repeats untruths with confidence". Do not use for: genuine factual disputes where reasonable people disagree; ordinary marketing spin; situations where the user actually holds the weak factual position.

Use when you, your group, or someone you advise is being attacked with calculated personal insult, mockery, nickname-branding, or ridicule — not as a loss of temper by the attacker, but as a calibrated political or media tactic. Helps the user recognize the insult playbook and respond in a way that doesn't legitimize it, mirror it, or walk into its trap. Triggers on phrases like "they've given me a nickname that keeps sticking", "I'm being mocked publicly and I don't know how to respond", "the attacks are cruel but also effective", "my allies keep saying 'just ignore it' but it's working on the audience", "they made a joke at my expense and now it's a meme", "how do I fight mockery without looking humorless". Do not use for: legitimate policy critique expressed sharply, comedy at the user's expense without a strategic frame, or ordinary workplace rudeness without public stakes.

Use when the user is trying to predict how a dominance-seeking leader will sort people in their orbit — who gets kept, who gets rehabilitated after a rift, who gets quietly dropped, who gets actively attacked. The sort logic is not moral or loyalty-based; it is constituency-based, and this skill makes that logic explicit so the user can forecast decisions and, if they are themselves in the orbit, move their own standing. Triggers on phrases like "why did the leader drop X and keep Y despite Y's disloyalty", "am I about to be discarded", "will this person be rehabilitated", "who will the leader go after next", "why does the leader forgive some critics but attack others", "how do I preserve my standing", "is it safe to leave quietly". Do not use for: leaders with conventional loyalty-based retention logic; ordinary HR decision-making; personal-friendship dynamics; situations without a public constituency angle.

Use when the user is dealing with a leader — a CEO, political figure, boss, business partner, negotiating counterparty — whose self-presentation is larger-than-life in a way that feels like armor over insecurity: everything is the biggest/greatest/best, name plastered on everything, monuments and ornament everywhere, "I alone can fix it" framing. Helps the user tell armor from genuine stature, predict which kinds of criticism will land vs. harden the leader, and recognize early warning signs that institutional constraints will be treated as obstacles to personal glory. Triggers on phrases like "this person inflates everything", "is their bravado real or compensatory", "how do I criticize a leader who can't take criticism", "should I take this leader's grandiose claims seriously", "they treat their office like personal property", "they are claiming unlimited authority — how worried should I be". Do not use for: leaders whose high self-confidence is backed by commensurate accomplishment; ordinary strong persona

Use when the user is evaluating a deal structure — investment, partnership, joint venture, contract, sale — and suspects the structure is designed so the other side keeps the upside while someone else inherits the downside. Helps identify "heads I win, tails you lose" arrangements before the user signs and becomes the bag-holder. Triggers on phrases like "this deal looks too good", "they keep insisting I personally guarantee it", "I'm one of several creditors and it feels weird", "they're offering their name but no capital", "something about this capital structure feels off", "how do I know if I'm the one who'll be left holding the bag". Do not use for: straightforward commercial deals without exotic structure, deals between parties of roughly equal leverage, or pure bargain-hunting advice (use ordinary deal-structuring or valuation resources).

Use when the user is part of a group — firms, universities, allies, institutions, industry peers, a coalition, a family — that is being targeted by an adversary picking members off one at a time, rewarding early defectors, and punishing hold-outs. The skill helps recognize the divide-and- conquer pattern early and hold the coalition together. Triggers on phrases like "we're being picked off one by one", "my industry peers are caving", "the attacker is rewarding people who settle first", "our alliance is splintering under pressure", "how do we stand together when there's pressure to cut our own deal", "the attacker is driving a wedge between us". Do not use for: ordinary market competition among peers, internal disagreements unrelated to external pressure, or purely bilateral disputes where "coalition" doesn't apply.

Use when an opponent is generating a constant stream of distractions, outrages, provocations, and news-cycle-dominating announcements — overwhelming your attention and your coalition's capacity to respond — in a way that is clearly designed to exhaust you rather than to convey information. Triggers on phrases like "they keep manufacturing new scandals to distract from X", "I don't know what to respond to first", "the news cycle is impossible to keep up with", "my coalition is exhausted chasing every provocation", "they just tweeted something outrageous right when their bad news was breaking", "how do I stop taking the bait". Do not use for: ordinary fast-moving news environments, legitimate breaking news that happens to coincide with something unfavorable to one side, or any situation where the "flood" is in fact individual-event coverage without a single orchestrating source.

Use when the user is facing, or about to face, a negotiation where the counterparty's first move is shock-and-awe — a maximalist demand, a public ultimatum, a surprise threat, or a legal/media ambush — rather than the trust-building opening most negotiation training assumes. Triggers on phrases like "they opened with an outrageous demand", "I'm being ambushed in a negotiation", "the other side is using lawsuits as pressure", "they just declared a deal that doesn't exist", "they keep threatening and backing down", "how do I not concede in the first 60 seconds", "I'm going into a meeting with a bully counterparty". Do not use for: good-faith negotiations where aggressive opening positions are normal bargaining theater, litigation strategy (use a lawyer), or interpersonal conflicts without a real transaction at stake.