Conducting an interview - MIT style.

Found this very interesting resource through Michael Driehorst's (Dutch ancestors Mike?) blog; guidelines for journalists on writing and interviewing from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Media Lab.

 

The "On conducting an interview" chapter is a very interesting read for a PR person. Under the "be prepared" chapter is reads as follows:

 

"Once you have decided to interview someone, call in advance to make an appointment.  Identify yourself by your name and the name of your publication.  If you feel the need to do so or are asked to describe what the story is about, be brief and general."

 

From the PR side I would advise clients to do their "homework" as we say;

• ask for the name of the reporter, the publication he/she writes for
• ask for contact details up front (phone, e-mail)
• ask about the purpose of the interview - i.e. a general feature, a news story etc?
• what is the deadline ?
• general subject matter ?
• outline of questioning/first couple of questions ?
• who else is being interviewed - eg competitors ?

When you read through the guidelines from the Media Lab you can see that the media relations and Journalism world are not that different from each other and that we both strive to get an interesting story out there.

Technorati Tags : MIT, interview, journalism, michael+driehorst, media+relations, media+lab

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Comments

[Mike Driehorst]

Philippe,
Thank you very much for the link. Is citizen journalism popular or at least done somewhat in Belgium?
Regardless, excellent points to turn the citJ information around for PR professionals. You can best serve your employer or your client by best preparing him/her for any media contact.
Hope your 2006 is off to a great start!
-- Mike
P.S.
Actually, I think Driehorst is Deutsch.