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Checklist For Preparing A Crisis Management Team & Crisis Centre

Crisis communications, Expert Guide, Help For Communication Directors / By
Know That When Crisis Strikes ... … it is a time of high emotion and confusion. Initially you will lack accurate information but will need to act and communicate swiftly. In such situations, being able to rely on processes and training will enable you and the crisis management team to act calmly and with purpose.

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How To Explain A Complicated Thing Like Blockchain In A Media Interview

Media Training, Presentation Skills / By
How do you communicate complex or technical topics like Blockchain in a media interview simply, easily and in layman terms? This is the type of challenge we address in our media training. At the heart of good communication lies simplicity. Which is not the same as 'dumbing down'. Simplicity allows the audience to understand you

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Frustration Boils Over In Oxfam CEO Media Interview

Case Study, Crisis communications, Help For Communication Directors / By
What was the low point in Oxfam's response to its reputation crisis? It was frustration boiling over for Oxfam’s CEO, Mark Goldring, when he gave a media interview to the Guardian and said that criticism of the charity was “out of proportion to the level of culpability”, that no one had “murdered babies in their

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Should Company Spokespeople Expect More Hostile Media Interviews In 2018?

Case Study, Media Training, Reputation Management / By
Hostile media interviews. Was the Peterson-Newman Channel 4 interview a watershed moment? Business has an image problem. Whether the focus is on its role in society, levels of executive pay, the privatisation of public services or the alleged behaviour of some of those attending the Presidents Club charity dinner, corporations are under greater scrutiny than

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Tackling The Fallacy That 93% Of Communication Is Non-verbal

Expert Guide, Media Training, Presentation Skills / By
So Many Trainers Get This So Wrong Many people misunderstand Albert Mehrabian's research if they think he concluded that people’s first impressions are based 55% on how you look, 38% on how you sound (i.e. the 93% total) and only 7% on what you say. If someone was to give you the spoken instruction “Evacuate

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Why does a story go viral – like United Airlines bumped passenger?

Case Study, Crisis communications, Reputation Management / By
Why does a story go viral? The United Airlines bumped passenger story offers us a nice insight into the power of communications. I suspect that this situation doesn’t make an appearance in United’s crisis manual. But then, it’s not a crisis. It’s a poorly handled issue - at the moment. Much like when two weeks

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Is There A Legal Duty To Maximise Profit?

Expert Guide, Help For Communication Directors, Media Training / By
Let us examine the oft-repeated claim that the directors of (especially listed) companies have a legal duty to maximise profit and to minimise tax for the benefit of their shareholders. Under Section 172 of the UK’s 2006 Companies Act, company directors merely have a legal duty to promote the success of their company. Specifically, directors

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nervous speaker

Expert Guide: How to Deal With Nerves Or A Phobia About Public Speaking

Expert Guide, Presentation Skills / By
If You Have A Phobia About Public Speaking ...   ... then you’re suffering from ‘glossophobia’. It’s from the Greek - ‘glosso’ meaning tongue. Fundamentally, the phobia of public speaking comes from a fear of being judged. So how can we lessen it? First, take comfort in your expertise. You would not have been invited

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Expert Guide: How Architect Firms Can Win More New Business Pitches

Expert Guide, Presentation Skills / By
The remarks below are extracts from a presentation by our Managing Director, Andrew Caesar-Gordon, at the Royal Institute of British Architects, about how architecture firms and builders can pitch their designs more effectively to clients. Electric Airwaves train architect firms to win new business pitches. And many other professional service firms too. We help them

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Expert Guide: How to Practise Good Issues Management

Crisis communications, Expert Guide / By
To ignore an issue is to invite a crisis. So when is an ‘issue’ an issue?  When do you need to practise good issues management? An issue occurs when there is a gap between your policies, performance, products or public commitments, and your stakeholder expectations. It usually threatens reputation damage. The issues management process seeks

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Crisis communications plan

Expert Guide: How to Practise Good Crisis Communications

Crisis communications, Expert Guide, Media Training / By
A crisis is defined as: “an intense, unexpected and unstable state that disrupts normal operations and risks highly undesirable outcomes that requires extraordinary measures to restore stability”. Crisis communications management therefore involves the extraordinary measures that are taken to restore stability. A crisis may arise when an issue is ignored or issues management fails or when

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Off the record interview

Expert Guide: How to handle on or ‘off-the-record’

Expert Guide, Media Training / By
Electric Airwaves is the UK’s largest communications training company and the most frequent question we are asked by participants on our courses is whether they should ever go ‘off-the-record’. Implicitly linked to this is the question ‘do journalists honour such conversations?’ So is there such a thing as ‘off-the-record’? The answer is – ‘yes’ with

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TV Interview

Expert Guide: How to Manage ‘Down the Line’ TV Interviews

Expert Guide, Media Training / By
As broadcasters’ resources are stretched, ‘down-the-line’ TV interviews are increasingly common. Interviewees in one location talk to a camera, listening via an earpiece to the journalist who is questioning them from the studio. The most difficult type of interview Spokespeople often find these interviews unnerving. It is unnatural to be talking to a camera rather

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soundbite media interview

Expert Guide: How to devise soundbites and get quoted

Expert Guide, Media Training, Presentation Skills / By
Many participants on Electric Airwaves’ media training courses ask how they can ensure that they don’t get unfairly edited by a journalist and can get their soundbites broadcast or published. Why was I misquoted? For busy journalists in a busy newsroom, confronted with something new, a few minutes on Google can often be the totality

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nervous speaker

Expert Guide: How to Avoid “Um” and “Er” and “YKnow” when public speaking

Expert Guide, Presentation Skills / By
There are around 230,000 words in the Oxford English Dictionary. ‘Um’ and ‘Er’ and ‘Y’know’ are not listed. Over-use of these so called ‘spurious spacers’ are at best annoying to the audience and at worst can damage your credibility and dilute your message when public speaking. Y’know The liberal use of “y’know” can signal pleading

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select committee appearance

Expert Guide: Handling Appearances before a Parliamentary Select Committee

Crisis communications, Expert Guide, Presentation Skills / By
Introduction Select Committees were established and expanded during the 1970s and 1980s to ensure that Parliament could better scrutinize the Government and hold it to account. Most Committees perform without fanfare most of the time. But in recent years, some Committees seem to have come to see their job as holding the wider world to

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Conference moderator

Expert Guide: Moderating Conferences and Panel Discussions

Expert Guide, Presentation Skills / By
Just as there are few ‘naturals’ when it comes to media interviewees, there are few ‘naturals’ when it comes to moderating conferences and panel discussions. The good ones you see are the ones who have practiced – a lot! As a moderator or conference chair, your job is to make the speakers look good and

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