Articles

One of the most common mistakes made during interviews is to bluff your way through a response to a question you were not expecting and really don’t know how to answer. Bluffing almost always makes you look bad and often leads to sound bites that obscures key messages. You can avoid this pitfall by starting your response with something like, “I...

One of the most common mistakes made during interviews is to bluff your way through a response to a question you were not expecting and really don’t know how to answer. Bluffing almost always makes you look bad and often leads to sound bites that obscures key messages. You can avoid this pitfall by starting your response with something like, “I...

Swivel chairs may be comfortable and useful in an office or at home. But they can be your nemesis in an interview or any setting where you’re trying to communicate key messages. Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff provided a perfect example of this during a remote interview about is wife, Vice President Kamala Harris, and her views on the Israel/Hamas...

When Hurricane Beryl slammed into the Texas Gulf Coast, it left more than two-million CenterPoint Energy customers in the Houston area without power. It took several days, in some cases longer, for CenterPoint to restore electricity. That left customers without lights and air conditioning in sweltering heat far longer than anyone expected. The...

It’s not unusual for some public officials to openly disagree with each other on a variety of issues. It goes with the territory. But it’s just not smart to use interviews or social media posts to take unnecessary potshots at each other. Two Houston politicians, Mayor John Whitmire and Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo, have made it clear there’s...

Have you ever attended a presentation that you assumed would be boring? Or have you been asked to deliver a presentation that you feared would put your audience to sleep? Well, we can say with confidence that a creative opening, one that surprises and even entertains the audience, can turn a mundane topic into an informational masterpiece that...

It is a standard and often annoying habit of television reporters to ask questions, then constantly interrupt people before they can finish their answers. Reporters will do this when they don’t like the answers or think the responses are going on too long. It’s a method reporters use to control the interview. If you are being interviewed,...

Reporters love to put negative words in the mouths of people they interview. Why? Generally, this practice gives control of the interview to the reporter. More specifically, those negative words often lead to a great soundbite or quote for the reporter but one that doesn’t play well for the person being interviewed. It’s one of the media traps...

In our media training workshops, we stress the importance of taking control of an interview from the beginning. This is done by thanking the interviewer for the invitation to speak, expressing empathy when appropriate and immediately launching into clear, concise messages that you have planned to deliver. We found an excellent example of this...

The partial collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge is a human and economic disaster. The ramming of the bridge by a container ship has led to multiple fatalities and the temporary closing of the Port of Baltimore. As families mourn the loss of loved ones and the shipping industry copes with catastrophic disruptions to transportation, someone...