The Crisis Management Memo

Preparation is key to good interviews

In our media training workshops, we go over the need for preparing for interviews over and over again. I tell students you probably wouldn’t try to give an important speech without at least some degree of preparation, so doesn’t it just make sense that you should prepare for an important interview with the news media?

Most students thoroughly agree with the need for being prepared, but in their first mock, on-camera interviews, they often find they weren’t as prepared as they thought they were. It can be embarrassing.

Something like that may have been going through Vice President Joe Biden’s mind recently after he told The Today Show’s Matt Lauer what he thought people should do about traveling during the Swine Flu threat. He honestly answered the question saying he didn’t think people should travel on airplanes or subways. That wasn’t exactly what the Obama Administration had in mind and they’ve been trying to “re-spin” Biden’s comments ever since.

The vice president’s episode of “misspeaking” certainly wasn’t his first, nor will it likely be his last. He’s historically had a penchant for speaking his mind without assessing the potential consequences. He’s not alone. A lot of us wish we could have “do overs” when it comes to media interviews. Most of us just don't like embarrassing ourselves in front of millions of television viewers.

Too often, political and corporate spokespersons engage in media interviews without being as prepared as they ought to be. I’m not sure whether they feel they don’t have the time; that they don’t feel the interview is important, or they have seriously misjudged their ability to communicate without preparation. To my way of thinking, all media interviews are important, particularly in a crisis.

In a crisis situation, it is not unusual for a spokesperson to have to speak to the news media with very little time for preparation. There is pressure to get information out quickly. But that doesn’t mean you should speak to the news media without a game plan. In a crisis, you may not have as much time as you would like to have for preparation, so you take the time you do have, even if it is only a few minutes.

For as long as I’ve been doing media training, I have told students that they should never do an interview unless they know their message, package it in a way the news media can use it and can deliver it with conviction.

I also tell them that they should never do an interview unless they are prepared. That includes anticipating questions and knowing how you will answer them.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the Obama Administration isn’t saying something similar to the vice president these days.

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