TJ Walker explains why "no comment" backfires with reporters: it sounds defensive, gets quoted anyway, and makes you look guilty. Instead, offer to talk after litigation ends, go off-the-record, say what you can discuss, or highlight what you're doing right.
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Don't ever say no comment to the media. No comment is one of the dumbest things you could ever say. Now, I understand that there are times when you can't comment on something. There's ongoing litigation. A judge could put you in jail for comment. I understand that there may be times when your boss, your CEO, your chief legal advisor has said, look, if we comment on this, it's going to set us up for a lawsuit that will bankrupt the company if one wrong word gets out. So I understand that there are times when you can't comment. However, that does not mean you should ever, ever, ever literally have the words no comment come out of your mouth when talking to a reporter. Here's the problem with saying no comment. It's instantly quotable no comment. It's an absolute. It has an emotional quality to it. It has a defensive quality to it. It evokes mobsters from pop culture. No comment, the crooked politician. So it's got four or five sound bite elements in it and it virtually guarantees you of being quoted. Why would you want to be quoted saying that? It makes it sound like you're hiding something. People associate no comment with criminals, mobsters, corrupt politicians who are saying no comment on the advice of counsel. I don't want to self incriminate myself and send myself to jail. That's what it sounds like. So what do you do? There are a lot of ways of commenting to reporters, or rather not commenting without saying the word no commenter. I cannot comment. You can always say something like, I'd be happy to talk to you about this case in more detail once we have finished the litigation. That does not sound like you're defensive. That doesn't sound like you're hiding something. You can always tell the reporter, hey, I'm happy to talk to you on the record. Can I talk to you off the record then? If you want to say a few things, but be very careful, don't say anything you want to say. Say that's quoted or that could hurt you if it's quoted. And then go back on the record and just say, we'll be happy to talk about this once the judge allows us to. Could be another issue. If it is something of a non legal nature, but still touchy, just talk about what you can. There's always something you can say. If you accidentally burned a forest down, you can always say something to the effect of we look forward to planting new trees in the spring. I realize that sounds vacuous, but you're missing my point. If that's what you see. Focus on what you can say that's positive. Focus on something that you can do that you can say. Don't ever tell people what you can't do. Don't tell people what you can't say that's negative, defensive. Anytime you're defending in the media, you're losing. You need to tell people what you can do, what you can say. In fact, that's a great way of starting off a statement. What I can say is we wish all parties involved future success and speedy recovery might be something applicable in a crisis where your lawyers might want you to not comment so much. I'm going to have more to say in future episodes on dealing with lawyers who also try to run the public relations and media messaging. I'm TJ Walker. See you next week.
