If a news story about your organisation has the potential to break, make sure that you’re the one telling the media about it.
This is one of the top tips suggested by Wendy Jarrett, associate director for press and issues management for public-health watchdog, the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE).
Addressing IOSH members at the IOSH 10 conference in Glasgow today, Wendy offered her insights on how to build relationships with the media in order to promote a positive message. Stressing the importance of managing and owning your own news, she gave an example of where NICE had done this and where it hadn’t, and highlighted the very different results in the press that arose in each situation.
In one example, she explained how a newspaper journalist had found a recommendation on minimum pricing on alcohol among some wider draft guidelines posted on its website for consultation. Because the recommendation was found on page 78 of the document and hadn’t been highlighted to the journalist via NICE issuing a press release, a negative story broke with no comment featured from the watchdog.
Explaining how NICE had learned lessons from this, Wendy then described how, in another case relating to draft guidelines on pregnancy advice also available on its website, she had managed the news story more effectively. On this occasion, a press release was sent out, with some positive messages aimed at busting some of the myths about pregnancy.
“It’s up to communications people and the press office to provide journalists with stories and information that works for them,” said Wendy.
“The media doesn’t like the nanny state but they do like ‘shock, horror – I didn’t know that! You have to accept that good stories don’t get column inches.”
Suggesting how this might apply in the case of health and safety, she advised releasing a press release saying “how many people will die if action isn’t taken. So, in the case of asbestos, do the maths, and do a report that shows that thousands of people will die in the workplace unless action on asbestos is taken.” She added that if good-quality information is provided to journalists, with facts and figures packaged in, “not even Richard Littlejohn would be able to pick holes in it”.
Wendy also underlined that people expect progress, and pointed out that health and safety press releases and comments citing the UK’s improvement in health and safety since 1974 are not likely to be seen by journalists as a story for this reason. The real story, argued Wendy, might be how the UK’s record compares positively with its European counterparts.
Other tips she gave on how to work with the press included: packaging information for journalists that they can use easily; providing the press with interesting quotes where it looks like people “actually said something, rather than looking like they have been drafted by committee”; useful background information, such as facts and figures; and making spokespeople available when a story breaks.
Wendy also suggested that embargoed press releases should be used to give journalists more time to investigate the story and write it up.
She concluded by saying that organisations can never win all the time, and there will always be instances when health and safety has its name dragged through the mud. However, the more positive messages that can be promoted via the means outlined above, the more balance of positive and negative stories will appear in the media.
