Tag: Watchdog

Posted on

Understanding crisis communication from a journalist’s perspective

PR Week - Burson Marsteller appoints Watchdog producer for crisis comms

Year: 2012. When I made the jump from BBC to crisis communications.

15 years producing undercover investigations for programmes like Watchdog taught me how journalists think, how they work and what they’re looking for when they ask questions.

That’s the foundation of everything I do now. Training spokespeople isn’t about teaching them to dodge questions, it’s about understanding what’s coming and being prepared for it.

The best crisis communicators I work with think like journalists. They know what the story is before the reporter does. They anticipate the follow-up questions. They understand what will get used and what won’t.

That doesn’t come from reading a media training handbook. It comes from knowing how the other side operates.

I’ve now run Mangold Consultancy for over a decade, but this is still where it all started: understanding crisis communication from the journalist’s perspective first.

If you’d like your spokespeople to think the way journalists do, not just prepare for them, get in touch to find out how our media training works, or learn more about the team behind Mangold Consultancy.

Join the discussion on LinkedIn »

 

Posted on

What 15 years at the BBC taught me about crisis communications

Abby Mangold Media Interview

I spent 15 years at the BBC making undercover programmes like Watchdog, before moving into crisis communications.

Programmes that required journalists and lawyers and Directors of Communications all wanting different things. All under deadline pressure. All wanting to protect something – the story, the legal position, the organisation.

That’s not so different from crisis communications. You’re just wearing different hats.

The undercover work taught me how to stay calm when things are moving fast. How to manage difficult conversations with people who are angry or scared. How to balance competing interests when there’s no perfect answer.

In a crisis, you need both sides. You need the journalist’s instinct to know what the real story is. And you need the comms person’s discipline to think about how it lands with your audience.

 

Curious about the team behind Mangold Consultancy and how that background shapes our approach to crisis work? Get in touch, or find out more about our crisis management services.

Join the discussion on LinkedIn »