Freeloaders
As you gain power and notoriety, you will begin to notice that you have more friends and family than you had previously known. Some may be legitimate, but for the most part, these are charlatans. These charlatans are looking for a free ride, and willing to get it any way they can, even if it means supporting a corrupt maniacal dictator like yourself. Since there is no greater enemy than family spurned, you will be forced to accept some of these freeloaders into official positions in your empire.
While these freeloaders are looking for an easy way through life, you are looking for someone who can get the job done. Using the manipulation pattern, and some carefully crafted questionnaire forms, you can easily determine the talents of your supposed friends and family. Trick them into accepting positions that they just cannot stand to see not done. Trick them into doing actual work. This way, they will think they are protected from your murderous rage, and you get something done for relatively cheap. They do not need to know what the going salary is for a particular job.
Something that the freeloaders will not understand, and which you can use to your advantage, is that you have no qualms whatsoever in sending close family members to the rack, or imprisoning them, or any other countless evil things to do. You are after all the Evil Overlord. If one of them starts to get a big head, deflate it. Easy.
That being said, I am always looking for a new court jester.