Reporters spend their careers developing strategies and tactics to extract information from people and organizations. And it’s shocking how many organizations use spokespersons who don’t understand how reporters actually ply their trade.
We’ve been training spokespeople for more than 25 years. We’ve trained CEOs, Olympic athletes, marketing professionals, attorneys, HR specialists and more. Although our training focuses on managing difficult news, many clients report that the processes and approaches we teach help them get better results from friendly media encounters, too.
About our process:
The training we provide is intense – and intensive. We start by helping trainees understand what the new media actually is these days (hint: it’s a lot different than many people think). We help trainees understand reporters as people, and how to optimize encounters. This centers on helping them understand the tools at their disposal:
- “Must Air Points” (forget talking points. Must Air points are exactly that – the three key messages you need to get across).
- “Perfect Quotes” (yes, you actually CAN be quoted the way you want to be, as long as you know how to do it).
- “Cans and Can’ts” (managing expectations is key. Making sure reporters know up front what you can’t discuss, and why, is one of the best ways to avoid the fatal “no comment”).
- The Clock (you control it, not the reporter. But the reporter needs to understand the time constraints)
We train participants how to anticipate questions, so that they’re not surprised by a line of questioning, and which helps them be ready for even uncomfortable questions. We provide guidance on how to manage interviews, and how to conduct a press conference. And more.
When discussing media training with clients, we evaluate their operating schedules and make recommendations as to how many spokespersons should be trained at that organization. Redundancy is important, because your desired #1 might not always be available.
On that note, we encourage clients to invite other team members to attend this session at no extra charge. That’s because properly preparing a spokesperson for a difficult interview is best done as a team. Additionally, it’s often a good idea for the organization’s CEO to serve as spokesperson, at least in the early stages of an event. Considering all of the demands on the CEO in an emergency situation, other team members need to pitch in and prepare the CEO, who simply won’t have time to do their own homework.
All of the above is done in a classroom setting. Once the classroom setting is complete, the full trainees undergo a four-hour one-on-one session in which scenarios are presented, the trainee preps for the interview, the interview is conducted, and then reviewed. A comprehensive report on each trainee, identifying strengths, areas to work on and suggestions for further skills development, is subsequently provided to the organization’s leadership team.