Clueless Spokesmen

Dec 3

When there is a disaster happening, the affected agencies always seem to appoint a spokesman. And that spokesman always seems to have no idea what is going on. Is it really that hard to have a spokesman with a little bit of knowledge?

I am rather tired of hearing the endless stream of:

• “I do not have that information”
• “We are not aware of that at this time”
• “I cannot say whether that is true or not”
• “I do not know the answer to that”
• “We have not heard of that rumor”

I do not understand any of the people that are involved in putting these spokesmen out there!

If you are the agency or group that is being spoken for, I would think that you want to seem competent. You want to put out someone who is excellent because they are going to be the face of your group. You do not get that if you present someone who cannot even answer the questions that they field.

If you are the person who is to be the spokesman, I would also think that you would want to be knowledgeable of everything that you are supposed to know. Otherwise, as so often happens, you will get roasted by the questions that the audience has. They are going to ask you about what they have heard and apparently their sources are better than yours. So you will sound clueless and lost. Who wants that to be them?

And me? Yeah I just want someone who will give some answers. I can get tired real quickly of hearing people avoid the questions that they just don’t know the answers to. No, lame answers are not better than no answers.

On another note, salesmen are just specialized spokesmen that are trying to get your money. Time to get those salesmen up to speed on what they’re selling, huh?