One, frankly quite easy trick trips up interviewees time and time again. It’s something that should be obvious to anyone before they agree to be interviewed. Yet in practically every media training course we do, it’s easy to bring a bluff interviewee crashing to the ground with one simple tactic. And it happened on GMTV this morning.
Health Secretary Andy Burnham appeared on the early morning sofa to reassure concerned parents after scientists warned that children should not be given Tamiflu. He’d been well briefed, and he was eloquent and convincing. Until presenter Andrew Castle described what happened when his 16 year old daughter, who has asthma, took the Tamiflu handed out to every pupil at Alleyn’s school in south London. “She nearly died”.
No doctor would come near. A&E would not take her. Castle faced losing his child. And Burnham was clearly shaken by the blast of reality in the face of Government spin. So remember, the journalist is a human being and will trump your card with his or her real-life ace.
And the trick? It’s usually the last question such as when I asked a politician who was extolling the virtue of the city’s park and ride scheme “How did you come to work today?” He drove right in, and told me so. Or the chemical factory health and safety expert who lives 30 miles upwind of the factory. A co-incidence? Nobody believed him. So the message is think whether you practice what you preach – and if you don’t, prepare a plausible answer because you’re sure to be asked.
Posted in Latest Media Training News | 1 Comment »
August 19th, 2009 at 2:15 pm
Nothing better than watching MP’s squirm on national TV!