Selling Yourself in Confrontation and Media Interviews 119
- Prolonged silence
A lot of reporters will leave the microphone pointed at your
face after you’ve finished. They’ll intentionally delay bringing the
microphone back to themselves. For you, it becomes a long, ago-
nizing pause. The key is: Don’t say another word. Once you’ve
finished, stop. A prolonged silence won’t make it on the air unless
you “cooperate” by falling apart. Remember: You’re simply being
invited to say something you’ll regret in the stress of the silence.
If the pause seems to be getting absurdly long, you only have to
smile and say, “Did you have another question?” or “Was there
something else you wanted to talk about?” or “Didn’t you under-
stand what I said?” The audience is bright enough to know that
you’ve answered the original question. Your job is to call atten-
tion to the fact that you’re refusing the obvious invitation to put
your foot in your mouth. Quite often, it’s what’s said after you’ve
finished that causes all the trouble.
- Persistence
More and more we’re being victimized by reporters asking
the same question, or a slightly different version of the same ques-
tion, endlessly. The design here is to exasperate you, to get you to
the point where you’re so frustrated that you blurt out something
you later wish you’d never said. And, of course, that’s the re-
sponse that makes it into the story or on the air. The intention is
to get you to lose control for a moment. The public likes it when
you politely and warmly remind reporters that you know what
their game is and that they aren’t going to win by getting you to
break down under artificial pressure.
- Agenda
This can really be called “Persistence with a specific goal.”
Instead of “let’s see where this will take us,” the agenda says “let’s
get there at any cost.” The reporter is working to get you to make
a specific statement. Your comments will help make the story
“correct” from the reporter’s standpoint, give the story the right
slant. In this case, the reporter’s need and goal is to get you to say
it. This relieves the reporter of having to say it—you already did.