Wanted: media trainer, experienced....

Media training has become an increasingly popular product for public relations companies and independent consultants. In our new multi-channel, multi-media universe, clients recognize that positive editorial news coverage translates into goodwill equity. And one hopes that goodwill equity will, in turn, lead to more profits and/or greater credibility in the public eye. Accordingly, companies want their spokespeople to be well-trained for encounters with media.

So, how does a company go about identifying the media trainer who'll be the right fit for them?

Certainly, there's no shortage of instructors out there who specialize in teaching people how to do media interviews. They include former reporters, as well as public relations consultants, many of whom have never reported news in their careers.

Are ex-reporters necessarily better media trainers? Admittedly, I'm biased on this point. As a former journalist, I believe a background in news reporting is essential experience for anyone calling themselves a media trainer. Frankly, it takes one to know one.

Media consultants who never reported news will undoubtedly argue the point - but the fact is, former journalists instinctively know what questions to ask and what clips or soundbites a reporter will use.

Good reporters get newsmakers to say what they were not planning to say. So does a good media trainer. Media trainers with reporting experience understand better just how news stories get put together.

Still, journalism experience alone does not make for a better media trainer. When it comes to asking tough, challenging questions in a media training program, it doesn't matter whether the person asking was a reporter in a previous life. What does matter is whether the trainer can help newsmakers learn to answer tough questions in ways that penetrate the media filter.

What to Look for in a Media Trainer

The professional background of the trainer, of course, is just one of the things you should be looking at if you're in the market for media training. Others include:

* A trainer who understands the issues facing your company or your industry

* An opportunity to brief the trainer beforehand on issues and participant profiles

* Realistic interview scenarios to reflect a company's good news and bad news (you don't want media trainers to scare your spokespeople by only asking tough-guy questions)

* Insightful, challenging and/or curve-ball questions and interview scenarios

* Exposure to a variety of interview styles

A comprehensive media training program should provide participants with a good understanding of content and context in media encounters.

By content, I'm talking about the actual message that you want to communicate, beyond just the creation of snappy 10-second soundbites.

Effective media skills for senior executives, spokespeople and newsmakers don't come naturally. In fact, the rules of the road for media interviews contradict dynamics of everyday conversation.

In ordinary chit-chat, people simply respond to questions, without necessarily trying to forward a particular agenda. Good media training teaches newsmakers to be responsive to media inquiries, and to advance their messages at the same time.

Even in the most pleasant, straightforward interviews, it is still a challenge to ensure that you are quoted in context. Sometimes, reporters and editors manipulate news stories to serve varying agendas, and truth and perspective can become casualties.

Mastering the media encounter is best achieved by understanding how reporters edit stories.

At the simplest level, journalists interview newsmakers and then decide which quotes to report. In some cases, we get insightful, informed reporting.

In other cases, however, we get reportage that bears little resemblance to the story newsmakers thought they were telling, bolstering the oft-heard criticism that reporters are people who separate the wheat from the chaff in interviews, and then report the chaff.

Many people in the news complain that they have been wounded by journalists. But the truth is most of these injuries are self-inflicted.

Controlling the Interview

With that point in mind, here are 10 basic tips to better control content and context in media encounters:

1 Know beforehand what you want to say in interviews

2 Keep your language simple

3 Use facts to back up your points

4 Tell the truth

5 Admit bad news, and explain how you're fixing the problem

6 Speak in short sentences

7 Keep your comments positive

8 Don't repeat negatives

9 Never speculate

10 Don't wait for the right questions to be asked

Media training workshops work best when the programs are custom-tailored to a client's needs. Companies that don't already have a media strategy in place can use media training programs to help identify weak spots, and develop strategies, tactics and messages.

Meaningful media training programs feature realistic interview simulations and quality analysis of interviews. Participants ideally should be learning how to credibly articulate their values to a skeptical community.

Media training is, of course, not a substitute for positive public policy - but good public policy by itself won't do the job anymore. Media now demand greater private and public sector accountability and today's spokespeople had better be astute communicators.

No amount of spin can turn bad news into good. However, a strong understanding of the way news is gathered and edited can help spokespeople become more effective at managing encounters with media.

Good media training programs demystify the news-manufacturing process and equip newsmakers with skills to visualize their every word as a headline in tomorrow's Wall Street Journal.

What's Good, What's Not

A recent front page article in the Waft Street Journal, was headlined "Pollution from PCBs Keeps GE in Trouble with Pittsfield, Mass." The lengthy article, written by staff reporter William M. Carley, documents how PCBs used by General Electric Co. contaminated soil in the community.

To read the article, one gets the distinct impression that GE cares little for the concerns of its neighbours, who fear the potentially harmful effects of PCBs, or polychlorinated biphenyls.

GE's spokesman flirts with indirect self-vilification in the Journal article. Stephen Ramsey, the company's vice president for environmental programs, told the newspaper, "This thing has been blown way out of proportion."

GE's critics could argue that Ramsey's quote reflects contempt for worried folks in the community. As one housewife told the Journal, "My kids are playing out there. I don't want them dying of cancer."

In fact, even GE's advertising in local newspapers dismisses the community's concerns. Many scientists believe that PCBs are a probable cause of cancer in humans because of animal tests, yet GE disagrees. According to a full-page ad in the Berkshire Eagle, PCBs may not be so dangerous after all. The ad, placed by GE, said that "there is no direct scientific evidence that PCBs cause cancer in humans."

What words in that sentence stand out? For most readers, the prominent and memorable words in that sentence are "PCBs cause cancer in humans." Why did GE perpetuate the negative and deliberately use the "c" word in denying a PCB connection?

GE might also consider that in disputes with angry people, it's often beneficial to at least acknowledge other people's concerns - even if the company disagrees. Then again, maybe in the full interview with the Journal, Ramsey did say the company understands the community is upset - only that remark didn't make it past the edit.

The Journal report goes on to say "GE won't comment on any allegations of document coverups." If GE wants the community's trust, "no comment" answers won't do. At the very least, GE should emphasize it has been open in this process - if it has - and that the company is sensitive to the concerns of the community.

Instead, GE's VP for the environment defends the company's plan to cap PCB lots with three feet of clean earth, a relatively inexpensive remedy. To critics of the capping plan, Mr. Ramsey is quoted as complaining of "a misperception that it's a cheap, cheesy remedy that doesn't work." Very quotable - except it re-enforces the negative. How about an answer that simply says "the capping plan will work" - again, providing it's true.

The article does quote GE as saying it has complied with all applicable federal and state reporting requirements. Generously, the Journal does allow GE spokesman Ramsey one positive quote. "We have done everything we agreed to do, on time," said Ramsey.

Only Ramsey's quote is in the second to last paragraph in the article. Most people never make it to the end of a newspaper story.

Admitting bad news is often a challenge for companies. J.P Morgan & Co. recently suspended two traders under investigation for possible manipulation of stock prices.

The Wall Street Journal account of the article featured one quote attributed to Richard Mahoney, a spokesman for J.P. Morgan in London. "This is a matter we take very seriously. We are cooperating fully with the regulators."

Mahoney's quote is effective because it has the company admitting its concern and addressing the action it will now pursue.

When companies are mired in bad news and the public will find out about it anyway, the best policy is to admit a problem and offer a solution - all in one sentence, so newsmakers can affect the edit.

Controlling off-the-cuff remarks is paramount to a spokesperson. For example, a representative of the Canadian banking industry recently made an offhand comment to the Toronto Star in a story on bank profits. Traditionally in Canada, when banks announce their profits, a huge public outcry often erupts with special interests complaining of banks that gouge consumers.

Asked about profits, the spokesperson for the association that represents the Canadian banking industry said "the numbers are large and hard to grasp for some people."

No doubt that during the course of her interview with the Star, the bank association spokesperson used messages about how Canadians do well when banks do well and how banks pay billion of dollars in taxes, etc. Yet the reporter chose not to use those quotes and focused instead on the interview's chaff, as opposed to its wheat. The reporter did nothing wrong. The fact is the newsmaker did make the comment.

As did Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien, reacting recently to an investigative panel's report into whether the military mishandled the shooting of an unarmed civilian in Somalia. Responding to a reporter's question, Chretien said "there's been no cover-up," when perhaps he might have responded that the military dealt with the probe openly - again, providing it's true.

When preparing to encounter media, newsmakers should build quotes that focus on the one message they want reported in the news.

David Komansky, chairman of Merrill Lynch & Co. was quoted for one sentence in a recent Reuter's report announcing Merrill's purchase of Britain's biggest fund manager, Mercury Asset Management. "We believe that the acquisition of Mercury will leave us uniquely positioned to capitalize on the substantial growth opportunities that we see ahead in the asset management business." That one sentence said it all.

One sentence may be all you get when you're in the news - don't let yourself be misunderstood.

Jeff Ansell is a media, crisis and speech consultant. He heads Jeff Ansell & Associates, headquartered in Toronto.