Farmscape for April 30, 2019

The author of "When the Headline is YOU" suggests, when being interviewed by the media, it's critical to be sensitive to public emotion and to remember your own values.
"When the Headline is You" was among the topics discussed last month as part of the 2019 London Swine Conference.
Jeff Ansell, with Jeff Ansell and Associates and the author of "When the Headline is YOU," says, when going into an interview with a reporter, you need to know what message you want to share and to be prepared to address the emotional aspects of the conversation.

Clip-Jeff Ansell-Jeff Ansell and Associates:
If it's a good news story you want to make sure you have your messages ready to go and you want to make sure you deliver those messages in a credible fashion.
If it's a bad news story, because your company perhaps has been involved in something suspect, I think the first thing you need to do is invoke what I call the value compass which I write a lot about in my book.
In its simplest form the value compass represents a collection of words we use to describe how we want to be seen at a time of controversy.
Presumably some words would be upset, genuine, trustworthy, honest, empathetic and then the idea is to take every single word you say, every policy you talk about and to filter it through that value compass sentence by sentence, action by action.
It gives you a plan, it gives you a path, it gives you a direction and it reminds you what you claim is important to you.
If you're in a bad news situation you're likely in a battle between fact and emotion.
The way you're running your farm may fully comply with all the guidelines and regulations so, from a fact perspective, you're bang on.
But, if there's a perception that something inappropriate is taking place, the emotion can very easily overcome the facts and in the court of public opinion, if it's a battle between fact and emotion, emotion is always going to win so we need to be sensitive to the emotion.
If we ignore emotion we do so at our peril.

Ansell notes as Mark Twain said over 100 years ago, a lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is still putting on its shoes, so imagine what it's like today with social media.
For Farmscape.Ca, I'm Bruce Cochrane.

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