Your Public Best - Lillian Brown [80]
When you are asked a loaded or skewed question, pause slightly before you answer to give yourself a chance to pick your words carefully. If need be, stall for a few seconds of time by repeating the reporter’s question and commenting that “it is a significant problem,” or something similar. Then give a carefully worded answer that you would like to see as tomorrow’s headline.
Try to turn the media encounter to your advantage, and walk away feeling that they never laid a hand on you. You have to give an answer, you have to respond, you have to look the reporter in the eye and say something. Just try to say the right thing, even if it is only that you are sorry you won’t be responding to that particular question at that particular time.
When you have perfected your media skills beforehand, when you know who you are and what is right for you, you can benefit from publicity. Do what you can to minimize exploitation and overexposure.
As I suggested, it pays to become acquainted with individual reporters and to get to know the ones who are most important to you. Lobbyists, public relations people, press secretaries, and the like make an effort to understand the backgrounds, style of reporting, and any possible prejudices of key reporters. Underneath, reporters have their own opinions, attitudes, likes, and dislikes. Professionally, they must try to sublimate these feelings and be impartial. However, there is evidence that they treat some public figures more kindly than others.
Some public persons have reporters as personal friends, invite them to their homes, and obviously enjoy a friendly press. Not only was President John F. Kennedy known for obtaining favorable reactions from the press, he was a man who enjoyed personal friendships with several reporters. Members of the press were often invited to participate in the Kennedy clan’s famous touch-football games on Cape Cod.
Other public figures are habitually hostile and distrustful of the press, and their discomfort is obvious.
You don’t have to cultivate a reporter to the extent that you become friends, but there is nothing wrong with having a pleasant “hallway acquaintanceship” with a number of reporters when you run into each other accidentally or at professional or social events.
Answering Difficult Questions
Consider buying yourself a black looseleaf notebook in which to keep a record of the questions you are asked most frequently and to record some excellent, to-the-point answers that are thought out in advance. In the book, you can also record pertinent facts, figures, and dates concerning the topic you are addressing.
On the front page of the book, fill in the most critical questions a reporter could ask you. List the difficult, mean, hard questions first, the ones you dread, the ones that could have dire consequences if answered incorrectly. Also include questions that require technical data or complicated factual material. If necessary, write an index for the book in the front.
After each question, write a complete and careful answer. You may be an expert in your field, thoroughly familiar with your subject, but in the chaotic demands of the moment, you may not have a chance to think clearly and formulate careful answers. You can review your responses quickly—even in a taxi or an elevator—before an important confrontation with a reporter. Without such a notebook, you may make a misstatement or act hesitant, and on TV this can be disastrous.
Remember, the answers you write down in your briefing book should be formulated for the listener or the public viewer, rather than for the reporter. You are assembling key points that state your position, and you will find various ways to repeatedly include those key points in your message. Depending on the situation, you can make the same points in different ways, but they should remain in the finished article or broadcast.
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