“Controlling” An Interview

By Eric Seidel, CEO

The Media Trainers®, LLC

A reporter may be having a bad day, may not feel well, may not like you or your company, may have had an argument at home, or may be under the pressure of multiple stories and deadlines. These are things you cannot control.

There are two things you have absolute control over in an interview: your emotions and the words you speak. Always make sure you understand that and are consciously aware of it the entire time.

Get angry or belligerent with a reporter and you’ll be giving them a story they didn’t anticipate and one you’d prefer they couldn’t report.

That’s where RIM (Research In Motion—the people who made your BlackBerry) co-CEO Mike Lazaridis finds himself today. Reports I’ve read seem to agree that Lazaridis is a genius when it comes to technology, but much less so when it comes to being the company’s public voice.

And right now RIM has a lot riding on the line today. Its tablet product, dubbed “Playbook”, is due out soon. RIM also has some issues with countries in the Middle East and with India. They want more access to RIM’s tight security.

BBC technology reporter Rory Cellan-Jones interviewed Lazaridis recently, first about the new tablet, and then moved on to the security issues.

And Lazaridis lost it.

“That’s just not fair. Because first of all, it’s nuts. We have no security problems... we’ve just been singled out, because we’re so successful around the world. It’s an iconic product, used by businesses, it’s used by leaders, it’s used by celebrities, it’s used by consumers, it’s used by teenagers, we were just singled out.”

“Alright, so it’s over, [the] interview’s over. Please, you can’t use that word, it’s just not fair… We’ve dealt with this, this is a national security issue, turn that off…”

Mike Lazaridis’s over-reaction was completely unnecessary. He had a perfect opportunity to take the security issue and present it calmly and concisely on his (RIM’s) terms and from his perspective.

Indeed, if you listen to him in the video below, his voice remains steady and controlled, almost contradicting his anger. That tone, with a reasoned explanation, would’ve been much more productive and helpful to both he and his company. But, he’s now provided the media a distraction at a time of great business risk for RIM.

AntennaGate, continued

By Eric Seidel, CEO

The Media Trainers®

Steve Jobs has generated a fair amount of reaction over how he conducted his news conference on the technical glitches suffered by Apple’s new iPhone 4.

In a recent post (Steve Jobs & His iPhone 4’s Worm), I took Jobs to task for failing to open up his briefing to live broadcast coverage and for defaulting the agenda to networks like CNBC.

Since that post, I’ve received some interesting, and compelling, reaction. One on BusinessInsider.com’s War Room page (4 Presentation Lessons From Steve Jobs' iPhone 4 Press Conference) looks at Jobs’ presentation through the prism of social media, definitely a valid perspective. That post summarized lessons to be learned:

1. Focus just on what your viewers came to hear about. Jobs spoke directly to the concerns and issues about iPhone 4 that had been raised by the media -- who were also the individuals in attendance.

2. Give the audience new, relevant information. Zarella points out that Jobs didn't waste time re-hashing what the company had already said on the matter; instead, he supplied new data on how the company tests its phones and how many phones had actually been returned. Not surprisingly, that was the information that got tweeted out, blogged about, and searched for afterwards.

3. Make your slides concise. Jobs' signature presentation style is simple: one image and thought per slide, which is conducive to repeatable sound bites.

4. Repeat your most important messages. Just count how many times Jobs uttered a variation of the phrase "We love our users," or it appeared on-screen.

Number two is interesting in that Jobs apparently successfully played to his social media audience. Also, I agree with number three that his slides were clutter-free and easy to remember. He is an accomplished, slick presenter.

Another perspective, however, is in a piece by the New York Times Nick Bilton (Fallout From the iPhone 4 Press Conference). Bilton’s opening paragraph definitely gets your attention:

“You are now entering the Steve Jobs Reality Distortion Field.” These were the words I heard from several journalists when I first started writing about Apple for Bits last year.

And he closes with a Slate.com slam calling Jobs’ briefing “overly condescending.”

But the main thrust of Bilton’s column is on the fallout from other smart phone manufacturers reacting to Jobs’ contention they all have antenna problems. And he includes some of the angry quotes that part of the news conference generated.

The more egregious mistake by Jobs was to bring Apple’s image of superiority down to the level of competitors.

Clearly, Jobs created a buzz. Apple’s been a leader in doing that for years now. So, was this yet another, although more subtle, brilliant marketing tactic, or a short-lived mis-step?

Your comments always are welcome!