Bryce Harper didn’t become a major league hitter without batting practice. Olympian Katie Ledecky didn’t smash world-swimming records without hours in the pool. Why do politicians think that they can win the media war without any training?
They can’t. But it’s a battle that candidates need to win.
Media training is an integral part of the process of getting a candidate ready to run for office — at all levels of government. Some people have the charm factor down and don’t need polish. But anyone considering a run for office needs to understand the ebb and flow of media today.
An interview done poorly one day lives on through social media and viral posts forever. A bad quote 10 years ago can be dragged up and used today. It’s a changing world for candidates and media training gives them the confidence and the tools they need to face the media on solid ground.
Here’s the amazing part: media training can usually be done in a day. Candidates need to take that day to practice tips, tricks and tools that can help them for a lifetime.
Some people call training an art form, but it’s more like a science. Art is more arbitrary. No one wants to leave their candidate communications up to chance or interpretation. Like science, go in knowing that adding A to B will equal C.
So what is media training? It’s the opportunity for candidates to practice, ask questions and try techniques in a “real world” setting without the pressure of a live camera or an undercover Snapchatter.
A training day should be structured so it has parts that speak to the candidates sense of curiosity, but also their ego. Start with a look at the media itself: What’s news? What do reporters want? Want do reporters want from you? Media is a business, and right now it’s a rapidly changing business.
The next step in the day is understanding the idea of messages or key concepts. A media training should be personalized to go through what candidates need to say and how they need to say it. Reporters want to draw the candidate away from his or her talking points. Media training needs to show candidates how to take a question and bring it back around to fit their strategy.
Then there is the act of actually interviewing. But there are many types of interviews for which to prepare. How do you handle a reporter who has accusatory questions? What about an ambush – when the candidate is least expecting a reporter? Maybe the interview is just for information gathering.
Moreover, candidates should be shown that even in a radio interview it makes a difference how they’re sitting. If you sit up and the diaphragm is open and free, you’ll sound better. If you slouch, listeners will hear a change in your voice, which has much less authority. Most people don’t think about posture and poise on the radio, but it changes your presence.
Television is no longer just about the image on the screen. It’s all about sound bites and making sure the TV clip can become the nightly news clip, which can be posted online and tweeted and sent over Instagram.
It’s amazing today that candidates think they can go out and own the media without any practice. We have more communication today than at any other point in history, yet no one knows what anyone is saying.
If candidates want to win the message war, they need to master media training so they can master the media. We’ve always been told that practice makes perfect and stars that have staying power aren’t created overnight. Put the time in to do a media training and, as a candidate, you’ll see the positive results.
Carrie Giddins Pergram is a political consultant and professor of political communications.