"Well, I guess it's time for my root canal."
That was the most memorable thing that Ed would say to me
all day. Ed (not his real name) was the number-two
executive at a major U.S. financial firm, and first in line
to succeed the soon-to-retire CEO. He had been through the
wringer with a number of media trainers, and it showed.
We had been introduced, and Ed just didn't want to be with
me. There was a seemingly permanent scowl on his beefy,
reddish face. He had a perfectly pressed shirt and great
gold cufflinks, but his collar was a couple of sizes too
tight.
When it came time for our mock interview, Ed spoke to me in
a laconic monotone, scattered with eminently quotable
moments like: "yes," "no," and "I dunno, about six or seven
people." It made me wonder how he had gotten as far as he
did. The fact is executive suites of the world are mostly
populated with middle-aged men and women not unlike Ed. In
an era of 24-hour business news, it's these individuals -
many of whom have had little to no media exposure for most
of their careers - who are increasingly called on to be the
public face of their company.
Contrary to what some corporate watchdogs would argue, I've
known the vast majority of these people to be bright,
ethical, and highly capable. But media communications is
just not their bailiwick. They do not teach these skills in
business school.
And, so, admired as they are in the country club - and
feared as they might be in the boardroom - these captains
of industry tremble at the prospect of spending a few
minutes with a wet-behind-the-ears reporter who is often
barely old enough to work for them. As a result, forays
into the realm of interviews become, for these type-A
personalities, remarkably type-B.
They speak in sentence fragments that have to be spliced
together, electronically or in print, to be even marginally
usable. (No wonder executives often feel misquoted or taken
out of context.)
They listen, sometimes against their better judgment, when
legal advisers tell them to think of media appearances as
if they were depositions. They are instructed to say as
little as possible, to fill in the gaps with plain vanilla
messaging, and to approach every reporter as an adversary.
Of course, with most reporters, this advice has an opposite
effect of what the executive wants.
An effective relationship with journalists - be they print
reporters, TV broadcasters, or even bloggers - has nothing
to do with creating an adversary. It has everything to do
with correctly understanding journalists and their needs.
The supposition that reporters are always looking for their
subjects to simply "answer the question" is fundamentally
wrong. Sure, sometimes they need those answers. But at
their core, good reporters aren't just looking for "yes" or
"no."
They are looking for a narrative. They long for the
unexpected. Their pulse quickens at information that
surprises them, intrigues them, moves them. They want to
satiate the basic curiosities that led them to become
journalists in the first place.
It's why the definition of news is so often summed up with
the phrase "man bites dog." It's no accident that Don
Hewitt, the creator of 60 Minutes, titled his memoir, Tell
Me a Story.
This imbalance between the demand for good narrative and
the limited supply of compelling material is a big reason
why much of today's news cycle appears so tediously
dysfunctional. It's why what you see, read, and hear often
seems sensationalistic on the one hand; repetitive, trite,
and boring on the other.
But therein lies an opportunity. The people who know the
secrets to filling these voids - and filling them well, as
opposed to poorly - get called to appear in media, again
and again.
One day, if he can overcome his self-defeating mindset and
wipe that sour puss off his face, Ed might take his
training to heart and become one of those people. But that
seems unlikely. Shortly after agreeing to begin an
intensive program with us to remediate his media skills,
Ed's board decided to do a little remediation itself by
bypassing him for the post of CEO and handing it to someone
from outside the company. They also decided that improving
Ed's media skills wasn't worth the time or cost.
Ed can take comfort in this stark fact: When it comes to
his own media unpreparedness - and by extension, his
company's - he is far from alone.
----------------------------------------------------
As CEO, Linda Passante has been the engine driving The Halo
Group's consistent growth and evolution into a finely tuned
Brand Development Agency. Visit The Halo Group's blog, The
Halo Effect, for more tactical ideas and tips for CEOs,
CMOs and VPs of Marketing and Advertising.
The Halo Group homepage: http://thehalogroup.net/
The Halo Effect blog: http://thehalogroup.net/blog/
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