Doug Pinkham is traveling this week, so we welcome guest blogger Dana Wilkie. Dana was communications and editorial director for the Council, a freelance writer and a former D.C.-based newspaper correspondent.

November 17, 2010

When wildfires tore through Southern California a few years back, the newspaper I wrote for had questions about the state's fire-fighting aircraft: Why did it take so long for planes to get off the ground? Why weren't there more of them? And why was the state not better prepared, despite weeks of warnings that a record dry spell and approaching Santa Ana winds would render much of the region a tinderbox?  

When we posed those questions to the man in the governor's office handling the media, his response was a case study in "transparency" - a term that now penetrates the public affairs profession. He took every question, no matter the hour. Patiently, methodically, he addressed each one. If he didn't know the answer, he said so. If the answer didn't flatter the governor, he handed it over anyway.  Not once did he try to distract with irrelevant tangents. Nor did he lean on his "message" - however well-crafted and necessary - to evade the question at hand.

As a journalist, I've worked with press secretaries and communications directors in the offices of governors and presidents, candidates and corporations, non-profits and universities - right down to the guy hired to speak for a dozen Native Americans fighting a radioactive waste repository. I've met some marvelous communicators - take our man in the governor's office - and I've also heard every sort of double-talk, fudging, bureaucratese, acronym-laden reply and non-answer "answer" ever dreamed up.

So it gets my attention when someone in public affairs speaks plainly and candidly about something that's neither sunny nor flattering. It got my attention when "outrage expert" Peter Sandman told those at last month's Council board meeting that a company in crisis may as well chuck the victim compensation and company "improvements" if its leaders can't first "apologize credibly." It got my attention two years ago when Entergy CEO J. Wayne Leonard not only told shareholders he was frustrated and disappointed by financial returns, but confessed he could offer few reassuring words about the future of energy in the United States.

Among the many definitions for the verb "communicate" are to "make known" and to "be connected." The root - "commune" - means to "be in close rapport."  Leonard created rapport by being candid. Sandman says you create rapport by being humble. And both men demonstrate what's fundamental to rapport: Respecting your audience.

That may seem like a no-brainer, but for every Sandman and Leonard, there's a spokesman like the one I covered years ago with some mighty strange ideas on "communication."  Had you asked him if a lawmaker planned to sponsor a bill with new taxes - after the lawmaker campaigned against new taxes - you could expect the reply to go something like this:  

The current nature of our state infrastructure necessitated a comprehensive, coordinated and collaborative response at the highest levels of our existing executive, legislative and governmental entities, during which we sought to leverage our considerable resources for maximum impact, with an eye toward sustainability that is obtainable, so as to fulfill our obligations to our constituents.

Absent a translator, we in the press corps might assume this meant a bill with new taxes. But our spokesman had a problem with the "T" word, preferring to use the far more straightforward "revenue enhancement."

Ouch. Breaking a campaign promise is bad enough. Why add insult with words that suggest you think constituents aren't sharp enough to catch on?

Double-talk is just one way communicators show they don't think much of their listeners. Another is leaning on the language of bureaucrats, academics and industry insiders when sixth-grade English would do. It is tempting to endow a message with gravity and sophistication. But packing it with words fit only for legal documents or dissertations veils the commonplace, mystifies the audience and makes one look uncommunicative at best - elitist at worst.

Writing coach Doug Williams reminded us during a Council seminar last week that when White House hopeful John Kerry talked about national security policy, he had the poor sense to call for a "bold, progressive internationalism that stands in stark contrast to the too often belligerent and myopic unilateralism of the Bush administration."

Compare that mouthful with George W. Bush's simpler take: He summed up the threat he perceived from Iran, Iraq and North Korea as the "axis of evil."

Why does one message resonate, while the other falls flat? Because "evil" is something we understand. "Myopic" is something we have to look up.

Respecting an audience also means knowing that while "heart-tugging" has its place, manipulation doesn't.

When former Gov. Pete Wilson used his State of the State speech to reflect on average Californians bowed by recession, he spoke in rich detail about seeing "the eyes of a gruff, gray-haired businessman grow wet" and the "worry in the face of a farm worker." The effect was touching and powerful, as it was designed to be. Until one reporter discovered that the Californians Wilson had "met" didn't exist. No amount of explaining - first, that Wilson created "composites" to reflect many people he'd met, then that his office had hunted down the people he'd met - could undo what became a national embarrassment.

The governor wanted to convey that he was in touch with Californians. But because many Californians probably felt snowed, he only created distance.      

I'll end by describing how - upon hearing bad news - two San Diego leaders revealed through their communication styles just how they felt about their duty to taxpayers.

After the paper reported that San Diego's convention center manager used city funds for personal gain, the man overseeing the convention center called in a fury. The story was wrong, he raged, and he would launch his own investigation to prove it. He told competing news outlets that when the facts surfaced, the paper would be disgraced and the story's reporters out of jobs. In time, the man's probe uncovered more abuses than the stories had and led to the convention manager's resignation. But the overseer had a new problem on his hands: How to convince San Diegans that someone so quick to dismiss the misuse of their money could be trusted to lead.

Compare his approach with that of San Diego's mayor after the paper reported that the city paid contractors far more to clear debris from the 2007 wildfires than was standard in the industry. There was no defensiveness and no finger-pointing, only the instant launch of a city attorney's investigation, as well as unhampered, round-the-clock access to city officials as reporters pursued more questions about the contracts. 

The message: San Diegans elected us to protect taxpayers, not milk them.

It's no small thing to respect the intelligence and instincts of your listeners. Communicate plainly, candidly - respectfully - and while they may be mad or discouraged about the message, at least they won't be insulted by how it was delivered.

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