Remember the RTQ Rules to Live By? Good.
An easy thing to do is to have your organization follow a guide for answering queries. It’s great because everyone speaks a common language.
“What step is the Washing Post RTQ on?” “Step three Freddy.” “Great work.”
Now Freddy knows his guy already did step 1 and 2 and he is on track to complete this RTQ correctly.
Here’s a simple but thorough step by step guide – the challenge for you is to adapt this to your organization and environment:
1. Anticipate: Be so tied in with operations and the security, political and information environments you know which queries are in-bound before they have formed in reporters’ minds. Be assessing the implications, best course of action and responses while others are still trying to get the facts.
2. Own: 1) Receive, 2) log and 3) acknowledge every query – to the journalist, in the trackers and to your colleagues. Be sure it’s accessibility and helping your team. Forgetting to answer queries makes me physically ill.
3. Call: E-mail sucks. We’ll never build required understanding by using it. We might on a phone call. Be human and pick up your phone and find out what the reporter needs to know and how it fits into their story. The reporter will love this and so will you.
4. Build: Grab the experts with the brainpower you need to create a better message and story. You can’t know everything. You can know everyone. But beware, experts often speak in jargon, with a limited perspective or unfounded optimism. Use them but never forget it’s OUR credibility on the line.
5. Align: Know the history and context of the story you’re wading into. What did our leaders say last time? How receptive are our audiences? Would a response from a partner have more credibility? The more you know.
6. Respond: Our responsibility is to be timely, accurate and contextual. If you don’t call (step 3 and 6), we are none of the above.
7. Record: Somebody else is going to get a similar query – in five minutes or five months. Record your process and response. This goes beyond archiving e-mails. If you respond with a call – and you should – log it. Wouldn’t you love to know what we said last time? Now you do.
8. Expand: What’s next? Who else needs to know? Which reliable partners can help? Who is roping in the right subject matter expert? Who has called the unit PAO? When will someone next respond to the reporter?
9. Not Done: Log what you did and then communicate with staff members about what actions need to happen next. Focus on future effects not past efforts. Who needs to know outside of PAO about the query? Designate someone to look for the article to publish, and who needs a link? When are we following up with the reporter? 99% complete is not complete.
Responding to queries is not just a rote thing you are required to do, it’s an engagement. It’s a date, a romantic walk in the information park with a journalist you may or may not know. Invest. Understand. Get a second date. They don’t have to call you and if you suck, they won’t.
Photo by Dustin Senger
