As an HR professional, would you like to know who is being genuine and who is lying to you? Would you like to start navigating the dicey waters of office politics a bit easier?

Body language may point the way. It has important applications in many HR settings, including interviewing potential hires, convincing management to support a proposed change in benefit programs, mediating conflicts and negotiating with unions.

Deftly interpreting body language can help HR professionals understand human nature, hire trustworthy individuals and resolve conflicts successfully, according to Greg Hartley, a former U.S. Army interrogator and author of "I Can Read You Like a Book" (Career Press, 2007) and "How to Spot a Liar" (Career Press, 2005).

Conversely, if HR professionals ignore body language or misinterpret it, they could hire a poor employee, send the wrong message about company culture and be unaware when morale and employee engagement are low, Hartley notes.

Unfortunately, "few people today can read body language well. Most of the time, we don't even know what our own bodies are doing," Hartley writes.

"Most people simply do not pay attention to subtle pieces of daily communication. Many people can see body language on a subconscious level, but they override their perceptions. Turn off your biased, over-analytical brain and observe the way a child observes."

Reading nonverbal cues

That kind of careful observation will tell you a lot.

For example, nervous laughter, hand wringing, neck rubbing, toe curling, massaging the muscle between the eyes, touching the nose, fidgety hands, picking at fingernails and pointing the feet toward the door reveal that someone is feeling uncomfortable or anxious, Hartley observes.

Depending on the context, this behavior could indicate that you have broached a sensitive subject, perhaps because someone feels guilty, is lying or has something to hide.

Typical signs of rage include balled fists, clenched jaw, contracting pupils and rigid back.

If you read those signals early and well, you can prevent the situation from escalating and avoid a full-on episode of rage.

Eye motion can be revealing, too, according to Hartley.

People tend to do an upward eye movement when recalling an image and a sideways eye movement when recalling a sound.

They often show a downward-left eye movement when calculating or analyzing something and a downward-right eye movement during emotional states, such as at a wedding or funeral. An eye twitch or eye droop indicates stress, while one eyelid shut expresses disbelief. Enlarged pupils show interest or fear.

Chewing on the side of the mouth, licking lips, biting a lip and twisting the mouth to the side indicate the mind is completely engaged. That won't happen when someone is pretending to think about something you said.

Inside interviews

To read body language during job interviews, it's important to ask open-ended questions that expose what's important to the job candidate and what motivates him or her, Hartley says.

He recommends staying fresh and innovative in your questions because a wooden questioning style is likely to produce wooden answers, since people tend to mirror the authority figure's body language.

When there's too much eye contact from a job candidate, that could mean he or she is offering fake, rehearsed answers or trying to sell you on something, Hartley warns.

Likewise, a suddenly pinched voice can reveal a person who is unusually nervous or stressed. "The voice can give away liars quicker than anything else," Hartley says.

Dealing with conflict

HR professionals often find themselves in the middle of an argument between a supervisor and an employee, or a company and its union.

In a heated situation, such as a dispute over a vacation request that was denied, you can use body language to diffuse the emotion and get all parties to think and talk more logically.

By moving part of your body or taking a few steps, you can get people to move their eyes up and to the left, which engages the logical part of their brain, Hartley says.

By rounding your shoulders, you can seem less confrontational to someone when you're discussing a sensitive or fiery topic. Another strategy to diffuse anger is to ask someone to remember a fact or a number, such as the date of a product launch or the location of a recent conference. That diverts attention from controversial matters and provides a brief moment to calm down.

Cultural differences

Growing trends toward globalization of U.S. firms and immigration to the United States "absolutely make body language more important" as a universal language, Hartley says.

Culture and context are essential to reading body language, just as they are in verbal language. "You cannot hope to read body language well unless you take culture into consideration," Hartley writes.

If your company has a lot of workers from a certain culture or nation, it would be helpful to learn more about the nonverbal signs and body language common in that culture. One example of cultural differences is that British and American men tend to gesture with their arms below the shoulder level, while Mediterranean and Latino men tend to gesture with their arms higher, Hartley points out in the book.

However, there are few absolutes in body language, and reading too much into small signals can be a mistake, he adds. - L.C.S.