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Media Training 18: Practicing for the Big Negative News Story

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By Gerard Braud

www.braudcommunications.com 

So far we’ve discussed what an ordinary media training program includes and we’ve discussed the need to practice before every interview. But if you are being interviewed about a negative issue by an investigative reporter or a major publication or network news magazine, you need more than your average media training and quick practice session. You need to prepare as though you are going to war.

There are two main steps you need to take:

1)  Your PR or communications team needs to become the investigative reporter

2) You need to train until you know the answer to every question.

Let me explain what I mean.

When I’m asked to prepare someone for such an interview, we usually have one to two weeks to prepare. Major publications and networks often spend weeks and months working on a story.

Preparation includes numerous phone calls with the reporter or producer to find out exactly what their story is about and what they want to know.  Reporters are very coy and really don’t want to tell you too much about the story. Ideally, they want to catch you off guard because they think you will be more honest if they catch you unprepared. In most cases reporters are very vague.

If you are a retailer, for example, the reporter may tell you they are doing a story about computers, when really the story centers on allegations of questionable behavior by your computer sales team. If you are with a non-profit, they may tell you the story is about donations and how the money is used, when the real story is about high executive compensation and justifying a 6 figure salary funded by donations. If you are with a government agency, the reporter may tell you the story is about helping tax payers, when the real story is about a long list of tax payer complaints.

The first rule you should apply is to look in the mirror and to realize that the good Lord gave you 2 ears and 1 mouth and that you should use them in that proportion. In other words, you should be asking the reporters more questions than you answer. You need to learn to ask them probing questions about the possible report, then stop talking and start listening. Listen for not just what they say, but what they don’t say. You must become an expert in reading between the lines.

Among the questions you should ask are:

• Tell me a little about the genesis of the story?

• Is the story about something that we do well or something that you think we could do better?

• Ultimately, what do you want your audience to take away from the story?

• Who else have you talked to?

• What have those people told you so far?

I have a total of 3 pages of questions like these that I provide privately to my clients. It would be a disservice to print them here and tip our hand to the media.

After you ask the question, sit back and listen. Too many people think they need to do all the talking when dealing with a reporter. In this case, you want the reporter to do all the talking. And on the topic of talking, be aware that even though you may be doing advance work for the primary spokesperson, everything you say can be used in the final news report.

After doing exhaustive questioning of the reporter, the next step is for you to write the story the way you think the reporter would write the story at this very moment in time, based on what they said and didn’t say. Be brutally honest, cynical and sarcastic as you write the story. Next, share the story with your executive team to get their attention and commitment to do whatever it takes to fight the good fight, including more research by a team of people, designating a spokesperson, and a full commitment from the spokesperson to clear his or her calendar for media training.

With the executive team you should then pick apart the story to separate fact from fiction and perception from reality. Quickly identify where the reporter is off base in his or her assumptions. Identify the source of the story and what you know about the person or persons who may have given the story idea to the reporter, as well as what you know about the other people the reporter has already interviewed.

Next, develop a long list of questions that you think the reporter might ask. Do not be kind in crafting these questions. Make them very direct.

After that you’ll need to research the true answers to each question, gather background material to support your position, then begin writing answers to every question. The answers must all be quotable and written in the key message tree style that I described in lesson 9.

Media training for this type of interview may take 1 or 2 days. Generally such training will include a 45 minute role playing interview recorded on video, followed by an extensive critique and then more long interviews. This goes on non-stop until we’ve flushed out every question and until the spokesperson has perfected every answer. Remember, this is serious stuff that could affect your business and your bottom line.

Often I run into cynics who say you can’t possibly know every question you’ll be asked, nor can you know all the answers. I beg to differ with them. I have and you can.  In fact, the greatest compliment I get from clients after their interview is, “Gerard, you nailed it.”

You can nail it too.

If you get in a jam, you can always send an e-mail to me and track me down at www.braudcommunicaton.com

In our next lesson we’ll examine media training for a desk side visit.

Media Training 16: Practice, even if you only have 5 minutes

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By, Gerard Braud

www.braudcommunications.com

In our last lesson we talked about how to structure a media training class and how I always tell the executives I train that they must practice before every interview, even if they only have 5 minutes.  I’d like to expand on that and explain why this is so important.

I was training an executive who is the CEO of a Fortune 100 company. As I often do, I asked to see some video tape of his previous interviews so I could know more about the person I was training and his natural strengths and weaknesses.

A video tape arrived at my office, featuring the CEO conducting a news conference at a major trade show for his industry.  It was downright painful to watch. This executive was rambling extensively. There was little or no emotion in his voice. He seemed to be reading a long laundry list of accomplishments and corporate goals. For all practical purpose, the news conference had no focus.

At the start of our training session I pulled out the video tape and suggested we watch it.

“Oh you don’t want to watch that,” he said. “I was terrible in that. Trust me… I did that presentation 3 times that day. The third time I was great.”

So I asked him to break down who was in the audience for each of the 3 presentations. As it turns out the first time he did it, the audience was composed of stock analysts. The second news conference was held for mainstream media. The third news conference was held for trade publications.

As he explained who his audiences were, he quickly realized that his worst performance was for his most critical audience. He failed to perform at his best for stock analysts who can potentially have the greatest positive or negative impact on his company. If you think back to lesson 2 you’ll remember my admonition – If you could attach a dollar to every word that you say, would you make money or lose money.

I asked if he practiced the news conference at all on the day before. He told me no, because he didn’t have time. I then pointed out to him that if he had practiced 3 times the day before, his would have done a great job in front of his most financially critical audience.

Practice makes perfect and even if you have only a few minutes before heading out to talk to the media, you need to practice and role play with a colleague or coach.

What we want to say, what we think we’re going to say and what actually comes out of our mouths when we start talking are all very different.

A “back stage” practice changes all of that. It only requires someone to ask you a few questions, starting with the very basics. You really want to make sure you can nail your opening lines and command the audience’s attention. You want to make sure you can eliminate any of the stutters, stumbles and misspeaks that often happen in the first sentence.

I find that if a spokesperson can have 2 good practice sessions, their third time – which is the real event – will go smoothly.

Obviously, in an ideal world I would like to see the spokesperson practice for more than just 5 minutes, but 5 minutes is better than nothing.

So often, spokespeople fail to spend any time in preparation, especially if it is a good news story. As often happens, they attempt to “wing it.” As a result, their good news story may get little or no coverage because they failed to deliver a great opening statement and then failed to really clearly state their key messages in great quotes. Generally, the spokesperson who does not practice in advance will have a monotone delivery and like my CEO friend, will stand at the podium and offer a long laundry list will very little focus

The bottom line is, you need to always carve out time to practice, because what you say will affect your organization’s bottom line.

In our next lesson, we’ll take a closer look at good news stories and how you can get the media to say Wow!

Media Training 15: How to Structure Media Training

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By Gerard Braud

www.braudcommunications.com

One of the most difficult challenges I have in my job as a media trainer is to get executives to carve out time in their schedule for training. As mentioned in lesson 2, some don’t see the financial benefit. An even greater percentage are afraid of what ever embarrassment they may go through during the training. 

Admittedly, it is difficult for high powered people to intentionally put themselves in a vulnerable position.  But media training requires an executive to exercise a little humility and to recognize that training is a great time to learn a new skill or perfect an old skill.

So here are some suggestions whether you are the executive who needs to be trained or whether it’s your job to convince an executive that he or she need media training.

Everyone needs to understand up front that the day needs to be fun and that they need to be ready to laugh at themselves and their mistakes. Making mistakes is part of learning, i.e. you learn from your mistakes.

Just the same, I try to create a safety zone for the student. If the person being trained is the CEO I prefer that we are the only two people in the room. At a minimum we can expect the class to take 4 hours. And as a sign of good faith, I always promise to destroy the video tape that we used to record mock interviews during the training.

Basic media training familiarizes an executive with the concept of media interviews, I’ll generally conduct 3 interviews during the course of the training. The first interview is a simple baseline interview. It let’s me gage the executive’s natural skills and personality type. I’ll determine quickly if the student is prone to give too many details, for example. I’ll also test their ability to stay on topic or whether they are easily distracted and get off topic easily.

The interview is recorded on video so it can be played back, evaluated and critiqued, even if you are practicing for a print interview.

I’ll then introduce the concept of using key messages to stay on topic and control the interview, then we will do a second interview on camera, followed by another evaluation.

My third interview begins to introduce negative questions and is designed to teach the concept of blocking a negative question by bridging back to one of the key messages and then hooking the reporter with new information.

I conclude the training with four things.

  • First, I let the student destroy the video tape as promised
  • Secondly, I give the student instructions that in order to truly master the skill they must begin using key messages every day in ordinary conversations.
  • Thirdly, I tell them they must role play with someone before every interview. Even if you only have 5 minutes, you need to get your head in the game and your mouth in gear.
  • Finally, I let them know that media training is not a one time event in life, but something that requires practice and more training.
Hopefully top executives understand the concept of having personal success and life coaches. I suggest an ongoing approach to media training with a refresher course taught ever 6-12 months.

For groups of vice presidents, managers and directors, the choice is yours as to whether you offer them a private 4 hour training, or whether you combine them into small groups for a full day of training. It is my personal preference to have no more than 4 people in a full day training program. When you add additional people you may need to add a second video camera and interviewer in order to complete all 3 role playing interviews in the allotted time.

In some cases, clients will ask for a training program to familiarize large groups with media training and the do’s and don’ts of media interviews. Such classes are possible. I’ve conducted programs with hundreds of people in the room. You can teach them all of the same lessons you would in a small media training class, but you are obviously unable to do personal role playing interviews  with everyone. Generally I’ll bring a volunteer to the stage to show everyone how an interview should be conducted. Then I ask the audience members to partner with the person next to them to conduct an interview. The audience members each take a turn to ask questions and to answer questions. Then I lead them through the process of giving each other an evaluation.

Finally, one way to get hesitant executives to train is to incorporate presentation training into the program. Many of the skills used to make a good presentation are some of the same skills used in an interview.

I always remind my students that Michael Jordan did not become the best basketball player of his day after a single practice, nor did Tiger Woods become a great golfer after taking a class at a Putt-Putt course. Likewise, to truly master the skill of being interviewed, you have to practice on a regular basis and find a coach and trainer who is a good match for your organization.

In our next lesson we will look at the big difference a little practice makes.

 

 

Media Training 14: Reporters like to Speculate

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By Gerard Braud

www.braudcommunications.com 

What’s the worst that could happen? How much worse could it get? But what if… ? Oh, those great “what if” questions.

Reporters love the what if question. Why?

Well, reporters lover a great story and sometimes the story doesn’t materialize the way they hoped it would. Remember all the lessons on selfishness that we discussed in lesson 3? Well all of that comes to fruition and is personified by the what if question.

Such questions indicate that the reporter is as disappointed as a 4-year-old who was hoping you would stop to buy them ice cream, but you didn’t.

Beware of reporters who ask you to speculate because you are heading into very dangerous territory. If you do speculate, you’ve made the story bigger than what it is.

The most important phrase you can use when addressing such questions is to say, “I couldn’t speculate on the, but what I can tell you is…”

Another variation of that answer is to say, “It would be inappropriate for me to speculate on that, but what I can tell you is…”

Such answers apply the block, bridge and hook technique we discussed in lesson 12. In this case you block their speculations right up front with the phase, “It would be inappropriate for me to speculate…” , then the phase, “but what I can tell you is…” should bridge of redirect the reporter back to one of your key messages and one of the facts that you have previously confirmed. Ideally you should create an additional hook that keeps the reporter from asking another speculative question as a follow up. But the most important thing that you are doing is immediately putting an end to the speculation and sticking to the facts.

Akin to this is when a reporter will ask you to speak for someone else. The proper response should be, “I can’t speak for them, but what I can tell you is…”  You then use the same block, bridge and hook techniques we discussed previously.

One more lesson we should also address here is how to handle the reporter that misstates certain key facts in their question.

It has been my experience that most spokespeople try to gingerly work their way back to a key message and the correct facts without every clearly telling the reporter they are wrong. Well my friends, that seldom works.

If a reporter misstates a fact in their question you have permission to stop them dead in their tracks if necessary and say, “I’m sorry, but you misstated a key fact in your question.” At that time you should give them the correct fact. Another variation is to use the phrase, “I can’t agree with the premise of your questions.”

Over the years many spokespeople have confessed to me that they are afraid that such an approach could be perceived by the reporter as hostile. I personally think you can do it without being hostile. In fact, I have found that the dynamics of the interview or news conference will change in your favor because the reporter sees that you are in charge and that you are holding them accountable. The reporter will not only choose their words more carefully in the remainder of the interview, but they will also choose their words more carefully when writing their script.

Ultimately you must realize that you are in charge of the interview. Don’t relinquish control to the reporter.

In our next lesson we’ll examine how a spokesperson can get the most out of a media training class.

Media Training 13: The Vote of Confidence or No Confidence

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By Gerard Braud

www.braudcommunications.com

In lesson 11 we discussed the fact that when there is an industrial accident and a spokesperson does not appear in a timely manner, reporters often go looking for facts and quotes from other people, such as the ones with no teeth who live in trailers.

Something else happens, which also ties into lesson 5 on bias.

When a reporter arrives on the scene of a disaster or crisis they immediately began sizing up the situation and deciding whether they have confidence in you or no confidence. I often like it to the European parliaments that will cast a vote of confidence or no confidence in the Prime Minister.

If disaster strikes and no one is around to tell the reporter what is going on, the reporter will cast a vote of “no confidence” in you.

The result is ugly. They question whether you have your act together. They question whether the situation is potentially more dangerous that it actually is. I remember thinking as a reporter, standing outside of a burning chemical plant, “These people don’t have their act together. This is going to get uglier before it gets better. We’re all going to die.”

As a result my cynic filter, as discussed in lesson 12, would be set off and bias would begin to creep into my report. In a live report you might here the cynicism in the tone of my voice or hear a tone that sounds sarcastic. Additionally, the words I put in my script would become slightly more inflammatory.

If I was forced to go for an extended period of time without official information from the company involved, then anger would begin to creep in. I had editors and managers yelling at me wanting me to deliver the facts and no one from the company was actually helping me. Remember in lesson 3 we discussed the fact that it is about me. And when you don’t help men that is also when I would head out to the local neighborhood to begin asking neighbors what happened, whether they were afraid and what their opinion was of the company.

This is when I would usually hear comments such as, “They have explosions over there all the time,” “There’s no telling what’s in the air,” “I’m afraid to live here,” “My eyes are watering and my throat is scratchy,” and my all time favorite quote, “It blowed up real good.” (Yes, I actually had someone tell me that on camera one day.)

Sometimes the no confidence factor went even higher when a security guard would show up and tell us to turn off our TV camera, even when we are standing legally on public property. I’d always make sure we showed the security guard on the evening news because his actions or words clearly said this company had something to hide.

The ugliness of no confidence continues because when the official spokesperson finally comes forward, the reporter’s question will be far more negative, sarcastic and downright lethal.As a corporate coach and trainer I understand that perhaps no one came out to speak to me when I was a reporter because everyone in the facility was busy fighting the fire. But let’s be honest. I don’t care. One person needs to be designated as spokesperson. It is part of your corporate responsibility to have a well trained and well qualified spokesperson, just as it is your corporate responsibility to have a well trained and well qualified team of emergency responders to fight the fire.

On the other hand, if I arrived on the scene of a burning factory and was met promptly by a courteous spokesperson with only the most basic facts, my confidence in the company went up astronomically. I immediately thought, “wow, these people have their act together.” That would make me cut them some slack and grant them some forgiveness. The questions to the spokesperson were much kinder and gentler. The tone of my voice in the live report was more fair. Sarcasm was removed from my delivery. Additionally, because I had facts and quotes from an official source, I had less need to knock on doors in the neighboring community to ask ill informed eye witnesses what they saw, heard and feared.

So in summary, be ready to have your spokesperson on the scene quickly with a well worded statement as part of your crisis communications plan, as we discussed in lesson 11.

In our next lesson we’ll look at how to deal with reporters who want you to speculate.

Media Training 12: Passing the Cynic Test

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By Gerard Braud

(sign up for the free audio version of this program at https://blog.braudcommunications.com/?p=397)

Reporters are among the biggest cynics in the world. They doubt everything you tell them and you have to prove everything to them. This is especially true if you are trying to promote a good news story.

I have found over the years that reporters are quick to believe something negative about your organization and slow to believe your positive side of the story. We discussed some of these issues in lesson 5 when we talked about opposition groups and NGOs.

Reporters are always wondering what you are trying to hide and what you are not telling them.

We walk a thin line sometimes, because while I am in favor of always telling the truth, I do agree that there are times when you need to practice the sin of omission. At no time are you obligated to go to confession with a reporter just as you are not obligated to tell a competitor all of your secrets, as we discussed in lesson 2.

As a Catholic, I learned early the virtues of going to Confession. But while we are taught that when you go to Confession in the Church you receive absolution and forgiveness, I can assure you that if you go to confession with a reporter you will go to hell.

I know because there were many days when people went to confession with me, only to end up on the front page of the paper the next morning or leading the newscast that evening.

I have two rules as it relates to passing the cynic tests. The first rule is to write well worded key messages using simple language that everyone can understand. Those key messages need to be void of any flowery words that would be construed as heavy on PR (public relations) or full of BS (the stuff that you find in a pasture near a cow).  PR and BS stink a mile away and cause reporters to become very cynical.

My second rule is what I call the “3 Bucket Rule.”  Imagine three buckets sitting in a row.

  1. In bucket number one I would put all of the positive key messages that I need to say in an interview.
  2. Bucket number 2 would be filled with well worded key messages about a vast number of negative things the reporter may ask me about. I label bucket number 2 as things I will only talk about if asked.
  3. Bucket number 3 will be the smallest bucket and it will contain things that I cannot talk about.
Such issues might be confidential employee information, confidential corporate information, or private medical information. Various laws by various governments may prohibit you from discussing these private details.

As you share the key messages from bucket number one you should be telling a logical story using the reporters own inverted pyramid style. The facts should fall logically into place. At the end of each key message you should create a “cliff hanger,” as we discussed in lesson 6, designed to make the reporter ask you a logical follow up question. This natural progression will make the reporter feel as though you are being open and honest with them, because you are.

Should you be asked something that is in bucket number 2, you will follow the same procedure of giving a well worded, pre-written key message using the inverted pyramid style. The facts should fall logically into place. At the end of each key message you should create a “cliff hanger” that helps the reporter craft a logical question that you can answer. In the process, you should be guiding the reporter back to more of the positive key messages from bucket number one.

In media training classes we teach the technique of block, bridge and hook. This technique traditionally teaches that when you are asked a negative question, you block the negative by bridging to something positive and hooking the reporter with new information. The technique is designed to distract the reporter with perhaps something that is more appealing and has more wow.

The danger with the block, bridge and hook technique is that the redirect or bridge, is so overt that you never answer the reporter’s question and that makes the reporter even more cynical and skeptical. It may actually anger the reporter and cause them to become hostile.

The approach that I teach is to answer the question with a well worded key message, which serves as a “block” because it gives enough information to answer the question without exposing more vulnerabilities. That key message from bucket number 2 is then followed with a bridge back to more positive information, which is then followed by a fact, statistic, story or example that might contain more wow than the line of questioning the reporter was previously persuing.

The block, bridge and hook is a difficult task to teach without actually role playing and it is difficult for me to do true justice to it in this forum. To truly learn the technique you should really schedule a training class with extensive on-camera role playing.

And remember, as we learned in lesson 8, the faster you get to a quote, the faster the interview will end. Make sure your key messages are full of quotes.

In our next lesson we’ll go deeper into crisis communications and examine how those cynical reporters quickly cast a vote of no confidence in you when you don’t respond in a timely manner.

 

Media Training 11: Why do they interview people with no teeth who live in a trailer (with all due respect to trailer dwellers)

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By Gerard Braud www.braudcommunications.com

Let’s be respectful here and realize that many poor people don’t have either dental insurance or the ability to pay out of pocket for dental care. And let’s realize that while hoping to someday fulfill the dream of home ownership, many people live in an affordable alternative – a mobile home.

Let’s also recognize that many of these people are in lower income brackets and therefore also tend to live near industrial facilities where the more affluent members of society may work, but do not live.

With all of that out of the way, let me acknowledge that when I was a journalist, people would actually ask me, “how come reporters always interview people with no teeth who live in a trailer?”

The answer was, because when the industrial facility blew up, no one from the company would agree to an interview with us. The people living near the facility were the only eye witnesses and they were willing to speak.

If you work for a company that has a crisis, you have the responsibility to provide a spokesperson as soon as the media arrives. Usually the media will be on site within 30 minutes to an hour, depending upon the crisis. And as more media outlets become dependent upon web based audiences, their need for news is even more immediate.

Reporters need facts and quotes and they are going to get them from somewhere. It is their job to get interviews and their job is on the line if they do not deliver.

If you don’t give the information to the reporter, the reporter will go get it from someone else and that someone else will likely not represent your point of few.

And as the age of Social Media and web based tools expands, more and more media outlets are depending upon digital photos and video taken by eyewitnesses. A simple cell phone is capable of doing an enormous amount of reputational damage by providing the media with pictures and video.

So what do you do?

First you need to establish policy and practices that insure you have a spokesperson ready to respond at a moments notice.

Secondly, you need to have a crisis communications plan that contains a vast array of pre-written statements designed to address all of the many crises your organization could face.

With those two things, a spokesperson should be able to pull a pre-written template out of the crisis communications plan and walk out to the media to deliver that statement. It also allows your organization to post the template to the web, e-mail it to the media, employees and other key audiences.

Even if you only have partial facts, your organization still needs to make a statement. And it is critical that the statement is delivered by a person and not just issued on paper or via the web. The human element is critical in gaining the trust of the media, employees and other key audiences. A written statement is simply a cold cluster of words.

In my world, the spokesperson should be able to deliver the statement live within one hour or less. It should never be longer than an hour and hopefully much sooner than an hour.

One of the biggest delays in issuing statements is the lengthy process of waiting of executives and lawyers to approve a statement. This delay should be eliminated with the pre-written statements. The statements should be pre-approved by executives and the legal department so that the public relations or communications department can issue statements quickly.

Creating such a template is a timely process that I take organizations through when I help them write their crisis communications plan. The process is too lengthy to discuss here. But certain portions of the template must be fill-in-the-blank, and the communications department must be authorized to fill in the blanks with information such as time, date, and other critical facts. Executives and lawyers need to establish a trusting relationship with the communications department so that they help speed up the process rather than hinder and delay the communications process.

When you follow these simple steps, you begin to manipulate the media because you are meeting their wants, needs and desires.  You also become their friend. The more you can provide the media with information, the less need they have to interview an ill informed eyewitness who is thrilled to have their 15 minutes of fame. The more you can occupy the media’s time, the less time they have to spend interviewing people with no teeth who live in a trailer.

In our next lesson we will discuss whether or not you can pass the cynic test.

P.S. To this lesson — at www.crisiscommunicationsplans.com and www.schoolcrisisplan.com I have posted dates and details for my  crisis communications program that lets you write and complete an entire crisis communications plan in just two days. The plan was first created to avoid the types of situations described in today’s lesson. It is a very affordable and effective way to complete months worth of work in just 2 days.

Media Training 10: What Does That Mean?

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By Gerard Braud

www.braudcommunications.com 

The question I ask most often these days is, “What does that mean?”

I’m relatively well educated. I’m well read. I travel the world constantly teaching media
relations and crisis communications.

But what bugs the ever living daylights out of me is hearing people speak in mumble jumble that they think means something, but it means nothing at all.

The mumble jumble is corporate speak, buzzwords, jargon and government acronyms.

I’m fortunate enough that people pay me an honorarium to speak at numerous conferences, corporate meetings and association meetings every month. I always make a point of listening to what other speakers say so I can incorporate their lessons into my presentation.

But many of the speakers fill their presentations with so many buzz words, jargon and mumble jumble that I find myself sitting in the audience asking, “What does that mean?” The speaker thinks they have said something profound, but they’ve really said nothing at all.

I hear things such as, “If we work in a customer centric capacity to increase productivity and to create a win-win situation for our partners in a collaborative fashion, then we can achieve our goals for the betterment of our strategic partners in the hopes of benefiting those with whom we do business?

  • What does that mean?
  • Were you trying to say put customers first?
  • What is a win-win situation? (with all due respects to Steven Covey)
  • What are examples of collaboration?
  • What are the goals?
  • Who are the strategic partners?

Please, spell it out. Please give me meaningful examples. Please give me tangible examples. Please give me anecdotes. Please communicate with real words. Please put some emotion into your communications. Please make the communications more visual by describing who and what you are talking about.

Let’s go back to lesson one.  Would those words work at career day with a 6th grade class.  A friend of mine uses this test – if you said it to your grandparents at Thanksgiving dinner, would they know what you mean?

Let’s touch on one other important point that I find in the politically correct world, especially among non-profit organizations. There is a propensity to say things in a way that will not offend the people that you serve. However, in the process of crafting your statement with sensitivity, you become so ambiguous that no one really knows what you are talking about, including… and sometimes most importantly, even the people they are trying to help. That’s right, the people you are trying to help don’t know what you mean, because the organization is being so sensitive and so politically correct.

If you keep changing the labels and the terminology out of sensitivity, then the audience, the reporter and the people you serve will be left asking, “What does that mean?”  As we learned in lesson 4, that could lead to you accusing the reporter of taking you out of context. And as we learned in lesson 2, it affects your bottom line when you use terms that your audience cannot understand because of the politically correct ambiguity.

Consultants and trainers are also guilty of trying to coin clever phrases. A few years ago my wife, who works at a small private school, mailed out the class schedule for the fall semester. Her phone started ringing off the hook because after years of promoting the school’s top notch computer lab, computer classes were no longer listed on the class schedule. She told concerned parents she would check it out and get back to them. As it turns out, someone on the school staff had taken the term computer class off of the schedule and replaced it with the term “information literacy.” Yes, it seems someone had gone to a summer workshop in which the trainer/consultant preached that “it’s so much more than just knowing the mechanics of a computer, the internet and the programs – It’s really about ‘information literacy.’” What does that mean? It’s a dumb term. Call it what it is. It’s computer class.

If you’d like more examples from my “What Does that Mean?” file I have a great PDF that I’d be happy to share with you so you can share with the offenders. It is available as a download at www.braudcasting.com

In our next lesson, we’ll examine how people criticize the media for what is often referred to as interviewing people who have no teeth.

This is Gerard Braud

Media Training 9: The Myth about 3 Key Messages

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By Gerard Braud www.braudcommunications.com 

So in the last lesson, we talked about not letting facts get in the way of a good story. The secret is to keep it simple.

When you go through media training (which I enjoy teaching more than anything in the world and I would still do every day even if I won a $200 million dollar lottery)… when you go through media training you are always taught the concept of identifying your “3 Key Messages.”  In other words, what are the 3 most important things you need to communicate during your interview with the reporter?

But what is a key message?

  • Is it a bullet point?
  • Is it a talking point?
  • Is it a set of words that incorporate more spin than truth?
  • Is it a set of verbatim words that incorporate both truth and quotes?

In my world, it is a set of verbatim words that incorporate both truth and quotes. But many media trainers teach only bullet points and talking points.  I call this the myth about 3 key messages.

Let’s put this in the context of a U.S. political candidate in a debate with his or her opponent. The moderator of the debate might ask a question such as, “Please give me your thoughts on education.”

The candidate, whose strategist may have determined that the key messages should only be about energy, the economy and international relations, is left with nothing to say. Hence, the candidate will BS his or her way through 50 seconds of a 60 second answer, then conclude by saying, “education is important and you can get more details on my website.”

That is such bull.

When you give a spokesperson or executive only bullet points and talking points for an interview, you give them license to ad lib. Have you ever seen anyone who can truly ad lib well? They are few and far between. The person who ad libs is doing what? They are winging it. What did we learn in Lesson 2?  When you wing it you crash and burn.

In my world you should start an interview with 3 key areas that you want to talk about. For each of those areas, you should have learned and internalized several pre-written sentences that are also very quotable sentences. Then, each of those 3 areas should have 3 key messages of their own, that are well written, internalized and quotable. And conceivably, each of those 3 key messages will have 3 more messages to go with them.

Think of your conversation as a large live oak tree like you see in the south. Picture that tree with a huge, study trunk and 3 large branches. In my training programs, I teach the executives what I call my tree trunk message, which usually consists of 2 sentences that anchor the entire conversation. These are the first words out of your mouth when the reporter asks the first question. These first two sentences provide context for the conversation you are about to have. Both sentences must be quotable. The first sentence serves virtually as a headline that sums up your organization’s vision, value, mission and belief. The second sentence points to the 3 key areas that the spokesperson is prepared to talk about. The second sentence begins the foreshadowing process that we talked about in lesson 6. It is this type of foreshadowing that will help the reporter develop his next question for you.

Next, I write 2 more sentences for each of those 3 large branches that grow from the tree trunk. Can you visualize this large oak with 3 large branches? The sentences must again be highly quotable. These sentences add a few more overarching facts and point to other important areas that you may want to talk about. Again, you are foreshadowing other areas that you are prepared to talk about.

Again, this is a technique that I usually take half a day to teach in my “Kick-Butt Key Messages” workshop. But if you can visualize a tree with a large trunk and 3 large branches, you begin to understand how the conversation grows. Then add 3 limbs to each of the large branches. Then add 3 twigs to each of the limbs. Then add 3 leaves to each of the twigs. Draw it out if necessary to fully visualize the tree. Ultimately, just as a tree sprouts limbs, twigs and leaves, your conversation needs to sprout additional sentences with slightly more detail.

In our visualization, the leaves represent great detail while the tree trunk and 3 branches symbolize very basic facts.

If you invest time to populate your tree with verbatim, quotable sentences that you internalize, your next interview will be the easiest interview ever.

Basically, your populated tree has created a full conversation and an interview should be a conversation. It should tell a story.

Additionally, our tree analogy has prepared us to tell our story in the inverted pyramid style – the same style reporters use when they write.

Is this easy? No.

Does it take preparation? Absolutely.

How much preparation? An interview is as important as any business deal. If you could attach a dollar to every word that comes out of your mouth, would you make money or lose money?

Bottom line – know what you want to say, know it verbatim, and be prepared to tell a story.

In our next lesson I’ll ask you the question I ask often when I talk to people who use lots of jargon, corporate speak and acronyms. The question is, “What does that mean?”

Media Training 8: The Facts Don’t Matter

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By Gerard Braud www.braudcommunications.com

One day, as a joke in the newsroom, I uttered the phrase, “don’t let the facts get in the way of a good story.” We all laughed. A colleague was pushing for a story to make the evening news, but there were lots of holes in the story and I (who in lesson 3 emphasized that it’s all about me) wanted my story to be the lead story. I won and got the lead story. The colleague’s story was killed.

Over the years we used the joke several times daily just to raze each other. But then we began to realize that way too much of what made the news at our TV station and at those of our competitors, made the news regardless of the facts. Ultimately, it was one of the reasons I left the news business after a great 15-year ride.

But let’s be honest. How many news stories are filled with facts? The truth is, not a lot.  Newspaper stories will always have more details than TV and radio news reports. But TV stories, especially, are driven by visual images. The example that I always use is that if the story is about a brown cow, I need video of a brown cow. If I have no video of a brown cow, I can’t put the story on the evening news.

Another example I always use is the mixed metaphor that says, “If a tree falls in the woods and it is not on video, is it news?”

When I used to cover hurricanes in the ‘80s and ‘90s I was always upset when I didn’t have video of something blowing away. I needed the visual on video to tell the story.

I laughed a few years ago when there was a news report about a landslide in Japan. A highway traffic camera captured trees sliding down the side of a hill. It was only news because there was dramatic video. Trust me, as a guy who has worked around the world and extensively in the Pacific rim, there are landslides all over the world every day. This one happened to be captured on video and therefore became news.

As I mentioned in lesson 4, a print reporter will likely write only a 12-20 sentence synopsis, a radio reporter is only writing 6-8 sentences and a TV reporter is only writing 10-12 sentences.

The average person tries to give way, way, way too many facts in a news interview. Take this comment with a grain of salt, but the reporter doesn’t really care about you or the facts. Sure, they seem interested in you, but their report is more important to them personally than your facts.

A news report is a puzzle. Certain pieces must fit exactly together. In a TV report, quotes make up 1/3rd of the story. The lead and the conclusion together make up 1/3rd of the story. I don’t want to burst your bubble, but can you guess how much room we have in the story for your facts? In a TV news report, that equals 4 sentences. In a print report that equals 8-12 sentences.

If there is no room in the story for a bunch of facts, why would you spend so much time giving lots of facts to the reporter?

So, in conclusion for this lesson… don’t let the facts get in the way of a good story.

In our next lesson we’ll explore the media training myth about 3 key messages