PR Essentials (Periodic Musings on What’s Worked For Me): #1: Framing the Public Discussion

fWhether you are a client organization or a PR counselor, it's easy to overlook the opportunity to frame the public's perception of, and ensuing discussion of, whatever major communications issue you or your client may have at hand.

Example: A strike by nurses at a local hospital can be perceived as either the last-ditch efforts by professionals to get better wages OR as an irresponsible work stoppage that threatens the health of the local community. Union leadership will do all it can to frame the issue as economic justice while hospital managers/trustees have the option of framing the issue as an "irresponsible work stoppage".

Public perception of the above example will depend on which side does a better job in "framing". Here's what I mean:

The union wins the framing contest if it delivers killer points such as how their members are significantly underpaid in comparison to their peers at other hospitals and explains that the hospital management refused to go to mediation/arbitration.

Management wins if it delivers winning points that speak to wage parity with nurses at other hospitals as well as the need to curtail specific elective services during the work stoppage.

It's helpful to view the public as a blank chalkboard and the news media as the piece of chalk you will influence as the message is written on the board. It's best to assume that the public at large will have little if any prior awareness of or interest in the vast majority of issues you or your client will have to bring before the public. And, while it is the job of the news media to present all sides of the story, the reality is that not all sides of an issue are created equal... meaning if your facts and figures, reasons and rationale etc. are stronger and better, or delivered sooner and more consistently, chances are the public's going to accept your framing of the issue.

Remember, you cannot frame the issue by merely uttering the way you want the public to see it. You have to prove it, early and often.

This is where facts and figures and clearly understandable rationales are essential. Certain rules apply here:

• Facts and figures must be easily understood.
• They must be attributable to a credible source.
• They must be deployed in a way that supports whatever the rationale of your side may be. It's all about developing a "logic tree".
• They must be available at the very beginning of the process….it's hard to introduce new facts midway through a very public debate or discussion.
• They must be repeated at every opportunity to ensure that they are getting "heard”.

Here's the payoff: in the example above, if the union has won the framing game, the headline in the paper may read "Striking Nurses Document Lower Wage Base". Or, if management has won the framing contest, the headline may read "Hospital Managers Document Wage Parity; Warn of Service Curtailment".

If you lose the framing contest, you are figuratively swimming against the tide, as a certain percentage of your effort and results in print/broadcast will have to be expended in refuting the framing from the other side. More often than not, you will lose the public debate.

So, be prepared to frame... at the outset, authoritatively, and consistently... over the duration of any public communications event.