Not long ago -- and not far from the scene of the 1985 airline disaster -- another crash-and-burn scenario occurred in simulation. A PR consultant attempted to teach Fort Worth public school officials how to maintain communications with an irate public. The consultant created a fictional petition from minority constituents demanding the ouster of two minority school board members and the appointment of an African-American superintendent because low ratings showed minority students being undereducated. The exercise targeted the entire staff, to get them to think how they'd respond if something like this really happened.
The fake petition pushed the simulated wind-shear factor to extremes, calling a black man an "Uncle Tom" and a Latina a "coconut," a "brown on the outside, white on the inside" epithet describing someone who doesn't stay loyal to his or her ethnic heritage. The simulation, using derogatory, racially charged terms, did exactly what it was supposed to do. It exposed a sensitivity that the school officials didn't know they had. So they fired the consultant and canceled the rest of the training.
Somebody leaked the training document to the public, thus exposing even more reasons to conclude that the training was effective and appropriate. Quotations in the Oct. 28 article indicate a fractiousness bubbling just below the surface. People in the community apparently still do not know that diversity doesn't mean people of all colors just going along and getting along. It means people from different backgrounds expressing their ideas, revealing their anger and sometimes openly disagreeing with one another on the road to mutual respect. Although many of those quoted seemed to suggest that the scenario was offensive because that's not the way we do business in Fort Worth, it's telling that some of the people who saw the scenario petition believed it was real.
PR professionals often work with simulations, peppering politicians or corporate executives with hostile questions to help them learn to stay focused on what they're trying to communicate. A person's innocent mistakes in presenting information often result in more news coverage and public debate than the information itself.
There are lessons to be learned here. First, PR practitioners should alert management that seminars on sensitive issues, if they are to be effective, will be challenging. Second, role playing or other devices can avoid singling out anyone, either directly or indirectly, by using alternative illustrations that make the same point.
Ultimately, just like the flight simulator, it's the PR professional's job to candidly and forcefully confront clients with their worst nightmares, see how they react in stressful situations, and then calmly and dispassionately steer them toward better, more appropriate reactions.
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OVER & OUT
John Dycus, Fort Worth SPJ
Thank you, Kristin Sullivan, Mary Dulle, Holly Ellman, Gayle Reaves-King, Linda P. Campbell, Kay Pirtle, Larry Lutz, Paula LaRocque and Carolyn Poirot for snagged items for our best-ever holiday raffle. Where else can you plop $1 in a basket and maybe pull out two Southwest Airlines tickets? Everything you need to know is at the top of p. 1. RSVP, please, so we can plant a toothpick flag with your name on it in a plate of larruping Wilson's barbecue. ...
From a recent issue of "SPJ Leads," a new e-update for members, I learned that the Legal Defense Fund backed an amicus brief challenging the secrecy surrounding the energy policy task force formed by Vice President Dick Cheney and his repeated denials of FOI requests, and that SPJ is considering selling items either bearing the logo or of general appeal to journalists (what would you recommend?), and that the Greater Los Angeles chapter blasted California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger for vetoing state legislation that would inform the public about conditions in the state's troubled prison system. Good work compiling this material, SPJ national secretary-treasurer Christine Tatum. While we're praising SPJ national, hope you didn't summarily toss that supplement packaged with the latest Quill. The Journalist is excellent, one of the best, most attractive reads SPJ ever produced, and with a thoughtful cover-page statement of purpose by Mac McKerral, past board president, and Irwin Gratz, current president: "Relentlessly seek the truth and report it. Pry open closed doors. Give a voice to the underserved. Adhere to the ethics code." ...
Deadlines for summer 2005 internships are approaching. Search for openings thanks to the American Society of Newspaper Editors at asne.org/internships. SPJ internships are at spj.org/internships_pk.asp. ... The Sigma Delta Chi Foundation has committed $100,000 to help fund the Minority Writers Workshop spearheaded by the National Conference of Editorial Writers. Mored on the foundation is at spj.org/sdx_main.asp.
Closing words: "The objective of securing the safety of Americans from crime and terror has been achieved." -- Attorney General John Ashcroft in his handwritten letter of resignation ... "I don't think that women's participation is possible." -- Saudi interior minister Nayef bin Sultan, responding to a question about women getting the vote in the country's municipal elections starting in February ... "A woman can take care of the family. It takes a man to provide structure, to provide stability." -- House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, answering a question about absentee fathers ... "If class warfare is being waged in America, my class is clearly winning." -- Warren Buffett, a vocal critic of a number of Bush administration tax policies ... "Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed." -- Dwight D. Eisenhower, 34th president of the United States
Closing words II, elections division: "A little patience, and we shall see the reign of witches pass over, their spells dissolve, and the people, recovering their true sight, restore their government to its true principles. It is true that in the meantime we are suffering deeply in spirit, and incurring the horrors of a war and long oppressions of enormous public debt. ... If the game runs sometimes against us at home we must have patience till luck turns, and then we shall have an opportunity of winning back the principles we have lost, for this is a game where principles are at stake." -- Thomas Jefferson, in a letter he sent in 1798 after passage of the Sedition Act ... "Democracy is a form of government that substitutes election by the incompetent many for appointment by the corrupt few." -- George Bernard Shaw ... "Half of the American people never read a newspaper. Half never vote for president. One hopes it is the same half." -- Gore Vidal
