Journalists are humans, too
- Don’t be scared, they’re not trying to make you look bad
It’s little wonder people are spooked by active participation in news media. The whole process is the antithesis of button-downed message orchestration and corporate signoff and safety nets.
Control is forsaken and submission and anxiety rule. Careful answers to journalistic questions are scurried back to the factory and smashed to bits, with just the chunkiest shards dispassionately hammered into spaces between advertising.
The process is suspicious and brutal from the outset; like an encounter with a sign writer, who, half way up a ladder calls you on his mobile, asking: “Look, my mobile is about to go flat, what was it you wanted me to write on this billboard. Hurry, I’ve got about 10 seconds.”
Despite all this, few journalists are trying to make you look bad. They’re just working to the rhythm of their own machinery. Don’t take it personally. It’s not about you.
Help yourself by keeping answers short, but colourful. If you don’t know the answer to a question, just say “Right now, I don’t know the answer.” Don’t say anything that you wouldn’t want to see in print. Don’t be drawn away from your position. Be firm and confident. Prepare.
OMG Richard how did you get that picture of me?!
Good post.
Richard, this is excellent advice. I was interviewed once by the Western Leader, and I know what its like to be on the receiving end of a sharp pen. Well done. I like your style. If you would like copies of the Western leader article, these can be faxed. Athol.
I remember it well, Athol. A bloody shocker, it was. Even the barmaid at the Pig’s Bollix, in WInton, was miffed at your treatment. Remember? It was happy hour and you were on your third jug of Lion Brown, waving a cold pie and the Western Leader at anyone who’d listen, yelling like one thing. In a moment of clarity you conjured the ladder story, which has stayed with me ever since. Bless you.