70: How to Conduct an Astronomically Bad Press Conference

Imagine planning a press conference to address a situation that brought a lot of negative publicity to your organization. Your baseball team was accused of cheating and now you need to answer to it. Spring training is right around the corner. So the purpose of the press conference is to acknowledge the cheating scandal and get past it once and for all. The goal of the press conference is to rebuild the team's reputation. People needed to hear from the Houston Astros front office. You assemble the press, you set up a live feed, you have a principal member of the organization kick off the presser, two popular players set to speak, and your brand new skipper. Everything is in place. All the Astros need to do now is offer a well crafted and well planned mea culpa. Swing and a miss this week on the podcast how to Conduct an Astronomically Bad Press Conference. Pardon me for the obvious film cliche, but Houston, we have a problem. That problem was a press conference likely organized to rebuild the team's reputation. Now let's go back to November 12, 2019. That's when the website the Athletic published a report that the ball club stole signs illegally, you know, trash cans during its 2017 championship season. This press conference was held last week in February of 2020. That's a lot of time to plan a response. A lot of crisis management brainstorming sessions that ended up resulting in even more damage to the team's reputation. How is that even possible? Well, a guess attitude for starters. Time and time again I see this particular attitude rear its head and it never nets a positive result. It's a mix of dismissal, arrogance and a little okay Boomer tossed in for good measure. Now let me explain. A person dismisses an allegation, the pushback, or any person or group raising a question and I don't even understand what the big deal is over this issue type of an attitude. The problem you see is them. The accusers. It's not me in arrogance brings on a dismissal that the person or organization knows better than the accusers. The rabble rousers is a term I often hear from these folks. Now the okay Boomer touch. That's the out of touch, close minded opinions associated with the baby boomer generation. That is not to state that people in the baby boomer generation are out of touch. Not at all. Many boomers I know are very social media savvy and definitely know their way around a crisis. I work with them, I see them, I know them. I know them on Twitter. However, the OK Boomer viral meme, which I love by the way, is a that really captures a category of people who I deal with a lot. It's the concept of viral sharing on social media that is completely lost on them. They don't factor it in when it comes to managing an event. Or in the case of the Houston Astros, a press conference and also an okay, Boomer moment may happen with a member of Gen X or even a millennial, but it's mostly with someone who grew up in a day and age where they weren't learning things on social media, they weren't using technology, they weren't digital natives. Thus, okay Boomer now. The level of scrutiny at the press conference for the Houston Astros and those watching it live was very high. I cannot even begin to understand how any of the talking points managed to make it out of the building, much less make it to air. Now on today's podcast, Podcast tips for Organizations that Plan to Conduct a Press Conference from the Angle of How not to do it I'm going to talk about the planning, the optics and the messaging that should go into a press conference, with examples on how to fail at all three, courtesy of the Houston Astros. Let's start with the planning. The first question people from within the organization need to ask themselves is this. Do we even need to hold a press conference? In most cases, the answer is no. The press conference is a media relations tactic from the past. Yes, I said it the past. Press conferences, news conferences, they were scheduled at a time before social media, so the presser was an event that required reporters to leave their desks to cover an unveiling or remarks or whatever important news the organization had to share. That's not to say that the press conference is obsolete. There are plenty of reasons to hold one. Still. Nowadays, however, due to social media, the leaders and other members of organizations can get by with remarks on the fly or after the games. Proof. Ask yourself this question. How many White House press secretaries can you name? Now, for some of you, let me throw out some guesses. Ron Ziegler, Marlon Fitzwater, Mike McCurry, Sean Spicer, Sarah Huckabee Sanders. All press secretaries who worked for an administration when events of national significance were happening, or if they were a contestant on Dancing with the Stars. Now name the current press secretary. My guess? You couldn't come up with the name. Why? Because leaders nowadays, whether it's business or politics, they deliver their own news. And the answer to the question? It's Stephanie Grissom. Did you know she was a press secretary? Many of you probably didn't, because she hardly gives any press conferences. She's basically there in name only. President Trump, he likes to make his remarks in person or online in tweets. A lot of professional sports teams, the pros, that's where you'll mostly see a lot of press conferences happening nowadays in the category of sports. That's because there's always a game and there's always an event or a championship. Usually if there's a new player to introduce, you'll see a table set up at the stadium. The sports reporters were all convened there, and you'll see maybe the owner, but it's likely the gm, the skipper and the player. So in the sports world, there is the case for a lot of press conferences. And in this case, there should be a press conference as well. Though if I worked for the Houston Astros, I would have made it much, much smaller scale because I got too unwieldy. Here's why. My guess for why they held the news conference at the team spring training facility in West Palm Beach, Florida. This is just before the pitchers and catchers begin to practice. They wanted to capitalize on the optics. They wanted to get away from Houston, the scene of the crime, and place the team in a sunny locale representing a refresh or a reset on the upcoming season. One last little piece of housekeeping from last year's season that they wanted to get behind them as they prepared for the new season. So I get it. I get why they would have that press conference. Hey, fun fact. The facility for the spring training for the Houston Astros also belongs to the 2019 World Series champions, the Washington Nationals. Now, a media relations query for you. You should ask yourself if you are in charge of creating a press event, a news event. Ask yourself, what does the event call for? Is it a broad scale press conference like the Houston Astros? Is it a small scale news conference? Is it a spokesperson? Or in front of a mic at a podium or a table, a statement's made and then a few questions from the press. Is it a media statement? Is it a press release? Or is it a video statement shared on social or a written statement just designed for social. Now, the last three options are the ones that you're going to see nowadays more often than not. Why? Because they're one way. You, you write a statement, you put it out there, you create a video statement, you share it, a written statement, you share it. You can get feedback, but you're not going to get real time feedback. As in a reporter is in the room. It's a one way statement. All right, next, the optics. Now, if you plan to go ahead with a press conference, you need to think about how it will play out on camera. And I mean everywhere. Like 360. Not just one camera in front of the table, but all the cameras behind the bank of cameras, all the people holding cell phones. When people are planning conferences, they don't think about that. It's not just one camera person. It's not just the credentialed press. It is every single person holding a cell phone. Now, do you have a good backdrop for the cameras? What's behind the scene? Where will your spokespeople sit or where will they stand? Do you have a contingency plan for outdoors? What happens if it rains? What happens if it's windy outside? I'm getting ahead of myself here, but when one of the people spoke at the press conference for the Astros, they were handed a piece of paper that almost blew away because it was so windy. Now, the Astros three ring circus was held outside. They should have put it under a tent. My favorite viral moment of the entire event was when the VP of Media relations, who after his remarks start the press conference, exited the podium by tramping through the bushes behind him. He did not come up with an exit plan. He walked through the bushes.

Get you there as soon as some of the principals take their place. And it looks like Gene is just kind of setting the story and then walking through a bush and exiting the that was odd. Bush league. I mean, I could have walked through the gap. Gene, what are we doing now?

That's bush league PR right there. Other Unfortunate optics from the press conference Search Google Images for Alex Bregman and Jose Altuve sitting in silence, stunned, waiting to speak. At the press conference, you will see two players looking down on the ground and looking like they would rather be any other place in the world but sitting at that ballpark. They likely both knew at that time that they were tasked with an impossible task of telling a story about not cheating when they knew they were cheating while trying to keep their reputation and the reputation of the ball club intact. Dead Men Walking the most difficult story to tell at a press conference is the story that never happened. Next, the messaging. If you've listened to this podcast before, you know my framework for responding to an issue or a crisis. 1. Acknowledge, apologize, accept your role in the event or the incident. 2. That allows you to put your role into context. How were you involved? What were the circumstances? This is your chance to explain the why. 3. You'll lay out your plans, your promises, any changes you plan to make. Having gone through this event or incident Follow all three in order and you can move to the bonus round. Say it on camera, write it in a statement or film a video, share it on a website or social media, you will be given the opportunity to stay. If you do all three in a row, stay in your job, stay in office, or stay in the game, it's your moment of redemption. Fail to deliver all three, ideally in order, and chances are you will not be given the chance to stay for the bonus round. You're out. Now back to the Astros. The three people we'll focus on for now are the three people who spoke primarily at the press conference. The Houston Astros owner Jim Crane, pitcher Alex Bregman, second baseman Jose Altuve, Dusty Baker. He's the new manager. He spoke at the press conference as well, but he wasn't a part of the shenanigans, so we're going to leave him out. Another fun fact. He used to be the manager for the Washington Nationals, then they canned him, then they won the World Series. Now, the owner, Jim Crane, he started out well, okay. He wanted to start explaining what what happened and why it was never going to happen again. However, his comments were the ones that kind of rattled the ballpark and also reverberated online. Take a listen, Jim.

When talking about the Yankees there, did you say you feel like this didn't impact the game? And what do you mean by that? I didn't say it didn't impact the game. Basically, you know, as the commissioner said in his response forward, he's not going to go backwards. It's hard to determine how it impacted the game, if it impacted the game, and that's where we're going to leave.

It, hard to determine. Instead of taking full accountability for the team's sign stealing methods, or even any accountability whatsoever, he went out of his way to say that the cheating didn't impact the game. It's a complete contradiction. One thing you never want in a media statement involving cheating is a contradiction. It's the owner who lost it right from the get go. Now, we're going to give them a little bit of a break. An owner isn't necessarily going to be on camera a lot. The owner is not going to be a team spokesperson. Usually you're going to hear from a gm, the manager and the players, not the owner. But this owner, Jim Crane, had a lot of time, a lot of money and a lot of resources to come up with a good message, and we didn't hear it, so we'll leave it at that. Next, Alex Bregman and Jose Altuve then stepped up and gave brief statements to the media where they sort of apologized for the team cheating in 2017. And they kind of imply that they learned from their mistakes. Let's listen to Bregman.

I am really sorry about the choices that were made by my team, by the organization and by me. I've learned from this and I hope to regain the trust of baseball fans.

All right, so if we're looking at the formula, Bregman said he was really sorry about the choices that were made by the team and the organization and about himself. And he was, you know, pointing to himself as he said that. He said he learned from it and that he hoped to regain the trust of baseball fans. All right, he kind of follows the formula there. But if you watched his statement, his body language, his tone, you could even hear it in the clip, told the viewer and the listener everything you needed to know that not only was he uncomfortable with what he was saying, but he didn't mean one word of it. So it's not just what you say, it's how you say it. Jose Altuve, the second baseman. Oy, even worse.

I also will be brief. We had a great team meeting last night and I want to say that the whole Hasros organization and the team feel bad about what happened in in 2017. We especially feel remorse for the impact in our fans and the gain of baseball.

Okay, we're going to give Altuve a slight pass for the statement because he was saying it in a second language. However, a language barrier is no excuse for a barrier to the truth. You can hear it in his voice. He was forced to say those words. And Altube, he could not put any conviction behind them whatsoever. Another swing and a miss. There you have the making of an astronomically ruinous press conference. The media relations, horrible. The media's take, brutal. Social media's take, scathing. If you find your organization is in a fix, this is what should happen at your press conference. First, the opening statement should be a shot out of the ballpark. A grand slam home run that silences a stadium, boom, it shuts it down. All the questions a reporter can ask have already been answered because you already front loaded it in the statement. So when the follow up question is asked and if it's already been stated, the person can say, as I said in my statement, that open will be in the front of every single question you need to repeat. Second, the team needs to be playing for the same team. Everyone needs to read from the same page. The language does not need to be identical because then it's too contrived. But the sentiment does People can sniff out a well crafted talking point when a crisis team is brought in. You need to speak from the heart and you need to speak in your own language. However, the point of what you're saying needs to be the same. The Astros gave the perception that they weren't even in sync with their statements, or even prepared for that matter. I had mentioned earlier that when the staffer handed Alex Bregman his talking points on a sheet of paper, he did so halfway through his statement. And Bregman doesn't even reach for them and the staffer just takes it away. Makes me wonder if Bregman was just speaking off the cuff or if he was going down a road and someone said get him those talking points immediately. Or if someone noticed, you know what? He doesn't have his talking points, go get it to him. But it all happened on camera. No preparation whatsoever. Next, you should never count on an attitude of happenstance as your narrative as it happens, because that's not news. The news becomes that you don't think it's news. The press conference was set in motion to acknowledge your role, explain what happened, and then you have to convince everyone that it's not going to happen again. And then you have to make sure that it doesn't. Do not use the Houston Astros media event for your crisis communications playbook. The moral the stories that are increasingly difficult to manage are the ones that are not true in the first place. Start with trust and the details will sort themselves out. The benefit of being truthful is that it will. Again, here comes a cliche. Set you free. Literally. You are free to go about your business because you have to leave all the unpleasant stuff behind you. But if you lie, obfuscate. Another way to say a lie, you will carry it around with you. It sticks to you and you can't shake it. Telling the truth ain't easy, but it feels so much better when you do. It's good for a press conference and it's good in life as well. If you are interested in more information on media relations or public relations, you can download Writing a Press Release for the Digital Age. It's on my website and I've also include a link to it in the show notes. So that's all for this week. Thank you so much for listening and I hope to see you again next week. Sam.