From security personnel to the receptionist, these individuals are the front-line for organizations during a time of crisis, but are they trained to manage media inquiries?
Prepared organizations have placed the media spokesperson(s) and senior management through formal media training to prepare for tough interviews during a serious incident. A crisis may impact brand reputation, stock price, customer confidence and employee morale, as well as instigating strict regulatory oversight of plant operations. So why do most companies not train the people who will have the first interactions with media, first responders and the public?
A formal non-spokesperson media training program avoids a lot of grief for the actual media spokesperson as well as the organization. This is important, because many of the individuals may not even work for the company, and may be employed by other organizations, such as security personnel.
The result of a non-spokesperson training program builds confidence in front-line workers, and gives an individual the ability to answer without leaving the narrow lane of an appropriate response. It could be as simple as saying, “Yes, the organization has had an incident, but I don’t have all the details and I’m not the right person to ask. You’ll want to talk to ‘John Doe’ the company spokesperson for the accurate information.”
It is only two simple sentences, does not give any incident details and provides a response and the contact information to the formally trained media spokesperson for the company. It also generates a little extra time for the spokesperson to gather facts and formulate key messages.
One important element to consider when training contractors is the issue of co-employment. It is extremely important to work through the human resources department on guidance for training these individuals, and it may require an agreement with the contractor company.
With a little effort and training, a company may avoid a huge headache by providing non-spokesperson media training to those front-line employees and contractors.
To learn more about implementing a non-spokesperson media training program, contact Kinetic Communications Marketing.
About the author:
David J. Roznowski, APR, is founder and chief consultant of Kinetic Communications Marketing, a crisis communications, issues and reputation management firm based out of Metro Detroit. Kinetic serves clients across the nation with a team of senior communications professionals, all with more than 20-years of experience. Visit Kinetic Communications Marketing, LLC to learn more.