Ppublished in the National Business Review 30 April 2004

So the majority of PR's are hopeless according to journalists. Well many journalists are just as hopeless. Fortunately not all.

Far be it from me to defend the public relations industry, for I share many of the opinions voiced by the journalists in Jonathon Dodd's survey (NBR 23 April 2004).

When I was running a PR shop our company took the view that our people had to understand corporate and marketing strategy, the dynamics of the sectors in which their most important clients operated, and to possess at least one of the technical skills of the profession - that is writing, design, DM, advertising, the web - to a high degree.

In addition they had to be able to speak, present and service clients properly. Knowledge gaps were met by training. We ran in house courses with an MBA lecturer on strategy and corporate finance. It made a big difference because the consultants' business skills matched those of the clients, and the consultants could talk knowledgably with media and stakeholders.

Equally I would not want to over-praise journalists by comparison. Most are keen to do a good job for their readers, viewers and listeners. But if there is one single common fault among journalists it is that they don't know enough.

What they don't know is how policy regimes, strategies and administrative structures work. That means it's hard to put facts and events in a context that advances the public's knowledge. It's not their fault. You don't get taught that stuff in communications and journalism courses.

Senior business executives and government officials have often remarked to me that reports on the TV news show little understanding of policy issues. "When I know about an issue and see how little of it is revealed in a typical news report, I question how much I am really being told in the other items."

There are exceptions among journalists: Rae Lamb is one because she makes the effort to understand policy issues. Most of the others just deal with the flashpoints.

Recently I surveyed a panel of journalists and public relations professionals - all of them former journalists. I asked two questions.

One, what was the most common mistake people made when they are being interviewed?

The replies were interesting: The journalists talked of dishonesty, evasion, lies, and being deceptive. The communications people talked of lack of preparation. Journalists said "number one would be attempted evasion, closely followed by use of bureaucratic jargon or management talk" and "misleading, obfuscating, failing to give a straight answer, lying, call it what you will."

Secondly, what made a person a good interview subject?

According to the journalists "A good interview subject is someone who can encapsulate information in a very compact format, who speaks with colour and idiom, and who knows their subject back to front." And "having a clear message, with facts and figures to back it up, but more importantly honesty."

The advisors talked of "a good interviewee, in command of their subject, will be able to translate complex issues into very simple language that is accessible to any audience. If it's a TV interview the person needs to look the part, and as preparation referred to "going through likely questions, particularly the difficult ones and settling on some key messages".

Personally as a journalist I always preferred to talk to an interview subject who was prepared, and on radio and television I also preferred people who tailored their answers to my needs. That means that gives bite sized answers which make a point. Long rambles don't do anyone a favour.

Advisors also referred to the pride and arrogance that went with the "I can wing this" attitude, and to the belief of their principals that what they had to say was important to the media. Often it isn't, which I think accounts for a lot of the sheer blather generated by organizational publicity machines.

Journalists and PR people would likely get on better if the PR people could curb their management's will to over-communicate, and to coach them into how to communicate better. Likewise journalists need to learn more about the way industry, government and societal mechanisms operate so they report and interpret more fulsomely.