THE DEFENSIVE INTERVIEW

This is the situation where a journalist has got hold of a negative story, phones you, and asks you to confirm it and/or give him more details.

A negative or defensive interview can quickly change from a mildly awkward situation into a PR disaster if it’s not handled well. Fortunately for most of us, really defensive interviews are quite rare birds, but be very aware that they can happen and be ready to deal with them smoothly.

Example 1: A journalist phones: ‘There’s a rumour going around that your company’s hit a bad patch and you’re going to make a lot of people redundant. Is it true?’

Example 2: Journalist: ‘George, my wife was in Tesbury’s yesterday looking for your Premier Frozen Fishcakes, and they told her they’d stopped selling them. Has Tesbury’s chucked you out?’

Example 3: Local journalist phones: ‘I’m sorry to hear that your church might be closing because of falling congregations. When is it likely to happen?’

Your first reaction to the call is important. If you really and honestly have absolutely no such plans for closure or redundancies, or there’s a perfectly good commercial reason why Tesbury’s have withdrawn your Premier Fishcakes (like, they’re moving upmarket and are going to stock your new Organic SuperFishcakes instead), fine – no problem. Say so (if that’s OK with Tesbury’s, of course).

However, if you do have closure or redundancy plans, or Tesbury’s have given you the big heave-ho in favour of a competitor, you may experience an instant urge to fudge or delay the issue by saying something like ‘Who told you that?’ (or worse still, ‘That doesn’t sound right’), usually said in a somewhat indignant tone of voice. Resist that urge! It will only encourage the journo to think that he’s on to something, and he won’t reveal his sources to you anyway.

If you, as the corporate media contact person, have been forewarned of a possible problem (like the examples above), you will be able to prepare an answer in advance. So get all departments primed to contact you as soon as they know of any possible negative situation, so that you aren’t caught on the hop.

However, let’s imagine the worst happens – you are taken by surprise. Don’t panic or bluster. Try to gain thinking time. If appropriate, you might say that you haven’t heard about this personally, but you’ll look into it right away and get back to him, and what’s his phone number and his deadline? Then, as quickly as possible, you get together with everyone concerned in the affair and get all the facts, if you haven’t got them already. Then very carefully prepare and agree a statement, get back to the journalist, read out the statement to him, and stick to it through thick and thin, no more and no less. ‘I’m sorry, but I can’t say anything further at this stage’ is a useful standby in case of further questioning.

When you have to confirm a negative situation, always try to make a positive point with it. This may not be easy, but please do try. For example, if you’re having to get rid of people, you may have to confirm some big numbers but try (if appropriate) to emphasise that you’ll be relying mainly on natural wastage, and any necessary redundancies will be kept to a minimum, etc.

And finally... Some PR folk have actually been known to try to kill a potentially negative story before it comes out in the press by contacting journalists and denying it in advance. Deliberately drawing attention to a negative rumour is like shooting yourself in the foot. Example: ‘If you’ve heard that stupid story going around that we’re making lots of people redundant, forget it – it’s definitely not true.’ After your call a bright journalist will think, ‘Well, well, that’s interesting. I haven’t heard the story, but there’s no smoke without fire’, so he starts doing a little digging...