Author: Rich

Helping you communicate with the written word, the spoken word and body language.
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Exit stage left

Why walking off a media interview is rarely (but not always) a bad idea.


I’ve spent a big chunk of my working life helping people deal with the media. Training them to stay put and stay calm in interviews – even when the questions are tough and the style is adversarial.

Getting up and walking out is never a good look, I’ve always argued. You’ll be remembered for the contretemps not the content. But there’s always an exception to the rule as the death of Sir John Nott, the former Conservative Defence Secretary, aged 92 reminds us.

Here he is in 1982 walking out of a live television interview with Sir Robin Day. A part of me wishes more politicans would do the same. But I guess the fact we’re still showing this clip more than 40 years later proves my point. That leaving the stage risks upstaging whatever it was you were trying to say.

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Care home missed opportunities to protect 88-year-old woman beaten to death by another resident who used walking stick as weapon

When interviewer becomes interviewee

There’s been a saying in journalism pretty much since the invention of the moveable type printing press: “Today’s news is tomorrow’s chip wrappers.”

Although in the post Gutenberg world of rolling news channels, online content and ever decreasing attention spans it’s probably more accurate to say this morning’s news is forgotten by lunchtime.

In fact news cycles are now so fast that you could almost literally blink and miss a story.

But here’s a story those of you who know me will realise I don’t want people to miss. Because it concerns a huge and growing issue – dementia.

On a busy news day, as us hacks call them, I can understand why this story was squeezed out of the mainstream bulletins. So in case you blinked and missed it here it is.

By the way if you’re interested in hearing more about the case you can listen here to an interview I gave to BBC Three Counties radio after the jury returned their verdict.

And you can read the BBC News online version of the story here. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cr4xvlqegp2o

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Who do you trust? And why it’s important in an election super year!

According to the UN 3.7 billion voters in 72 countries are going to or have been to the polls in 2024.

That makes it the biggest election year in human history. Just think of it – a half the world’s population voting. Many for the first time. But I think it’s also safe to say that trust in democracy is at its lowest for some time. Perhaps the lowest ever.

People say they don’t trust politicians.

People say they don’t trust the journalists who report on politicians.

They don’t trust the news.

They don’t watch the news.

They don’t listen to the news.

They don’t read the news.

They’ve become less engaged if not disengaged.

So this feels like a really important webinar. A chance to discuss why trust and engagement with audiences has fallen. And, crucially, how to build it.

Heck democracy depends on it!

So to our guests: Victoria Steveley, deputy chief audience editor at the Belfast Telegraph.Pip Tomson most recently with ITV’s Good Morning Britain and GB News – the latter where the line between journalists and politicians has been especially blurred. Daniel Mollitor, business editor at the German Press Agency DPA and Naomi Owusu co-founder and CEO at Tickaroo the live blogging platform which is helping taking online journalism to new and hopefully more trusted levels.

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When saying you’re being respectful is, in fact, disrespectful

Saying you’re being respectful to an interviewer or co-contributor in a media interview can come across as the exact opposite – disrespectful – as the UK’s Minister of State for Illegal Migration, Michael Tomlinson, demonstrated in an excruciating interview on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.

He was being interviewed by Mishal Husain the day after the British government’s Rwanda bill under which illegal migrants could be sent to the African country passed in the House of Commons. The full exchange is at the bottom of this post. But first ACM Training’s head media trainer, Richard Uridge, deconstructs the interview for the benefit of anyone who finds it difficult to deal with interruptions in this the latest episode in the Z to A of Media Training.

With thanks to the Conservative MP for providing an object lesson. Or should that be an abject lesson?

Here you can listen to the full interview. Copyright, of course, resides with the BBC. It’s nearly 11 minutes long but both educational and, if you’re into politics, entertaining.

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No interview is an island

Why it’s important to keep an eye on the bigger picture

Being aware of what’s going on elsewhere in your sector is a vital part of preparing for media interviews.

Here’s an example from the world of politics. The UK Defence Secretary, Grant Shapps, had been asked on to BBC Radio 4’s Today programme to talk about Israel’s response to Iran’s attack and the involvement of British forces in that. But no interview is an island, so to speak. And Mr Shapps is asked first (more usually it’s last) about a much less important but more immediatey topical issue from the narrower – and in this case murkier – world of party politics.

The lesson? Make sure you know what’s hot in your world and know how you’d respond to questions on these tangential but topical issues always striving, of course, to steer the interview towards what you were initially invited to talk about.

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World’s oldest living conjoined twins die

Sad to hear that Lori and George* Schappell – the world’s oldest living conjoined twins – have died in America aged 62.

Our paths crossed twice. First in 2002 when they featured in a two part Channel Four programme “Joined: The Secret Life of Siamese Twins” produced by ACM Training‘s sister company ACP Television. Then, a few years later, in Still Joined, a documentary for BBC Radio 4 produced by Richard Uridge.

Despite being joined at the skull they were both determinedly individual: George as a country singer; Lori as ten pin bowler. Filming them at their home in Reading, Pennsylvania, was a fascinating priviledge. You can listen to the full radio documentary below this short television clip.

Here’s Still Joined which was first broadcast on BBC Radio 4 and was recorded before George* had transitioned and was called Reba.

*George was named Dori at birth. She changed her name to Reba in honour of her country music hero Reba McEntire and transitioned in 2007.

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Dr Marianne Wade speaking about the Shamima Begum case on LBC

Always good to hear our media training alumni putting their newly acquired and validated skills to the public test. So here is Dr Marianne Wade, Reader in Criminal Justice and Director of the Institute of Judicial Administration at the University of Birmingham Law School, being interviewed by Jim Diamond on the case of Shamima Begum.

Dr Marianne Wade
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Police lost control of media in Nicola Bulley case report concludes

ACM’s media trainer, Richard Uridge, reflects on the College of Policing report into Lancashire Constabulary’s handling of the media in the sad case of Nicola Bulley – the woman who was at the centre of a missing person’s inquiry in early 2023 after she disappeared on a walk along the River Wyre in the North of England.

The report is comprehensive. It’s constructive. And it makes lots of really insightful recommendations about how to improve the sometimes difficult relationship between the media and the police. In particular it highlights the need for media training. But it also poses an important question for everyone working in media and communication around the role that social media plays. Can the beast be tamed, Richard asks? He doubts it. But it has a huge and growing influence on policing.

You can read the full report here. And here’s what Richard was saying about the case at the time.

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Keeping your eye on the big picture in media interviews

What happens when journalists focus all of their attention on one aspect of a story? Their readers, viewers and listeners – your audience as an interviewee – can lose sight of the bigger picture.

So Richard Uridge has recruited a very famous pair of hands to help him explain how you can avoid being driven solely by the questions you might be asked during a #mediainterview

He’s used the controversy over #ULEZ and an interview given by the Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, as a case study.

Look out for the enigmatic smile in this the latest episode in the Z to A of #mediatraining which, we should add, is equally applicable to the Q and A element of a #presentation

Here’s the full interview with Sadiq Khan that I refer to in this video. It was first transmitted on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme and the copyright remains with the BBC. Khan does successfully steer the first question towards the bigger picture. But his opening response, timed at just over a minute, represents only 11% of the interview. He did try to return to the bigger picture towards the end but he was talking about the compelling health case for ULEZ only 18% of the whole interview – too little time for what is literally a life and death issue.

The interviewer is Mishal Husain and in her opening question she’s referring to Irene Bacon, one of those who drives an older, non-compliant car, is in a lower paid job and is struggling to pay the ULEZ charge or switch to a less polluting vehicle – even with the incentive scheme.

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Don’t dumb down wise up

There’s often tension between academics and journalists when it comes to communicating science and technology to a lay audience. “You’re dumbing me down,” cry the scientists. “Your’e making it all too tricky,” counter the hacks. There is a middle way as media trainer and broadcaster, Richard Uridge, suggests in this e the latest episode of the Z to A of Media Training: W is for Wising Up.