How to Write Effective

Talking Pointsit Lead

Larissa PaschynIMAT External Affairs Officer

Overview Ensure that messages are clear and concise.  Target audiences may not

readily understand or accept complex messages during a crisis.

Be aware that if part of a message arouses exceptionally intense feelings of anxiety, people tend to ignore the remaining content of the message.

Prepare audiences for messages, especially those likely to evoke emotional responses, by providing brief introductory/background information on the subject.

Recognize the emotional impact that tragic information might have on the audience.

Validate listeners’ beliefs or opinions to keep them engaged in the message.

Be direct. Clearly state expected outcomes first.

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Helpful Guidelines Define your main message. Why are you meeting in the first place? To

break the ice and get acquainted?

Keep your talking points short and sweet. Think bulleted lists, rather than novels.

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Helpful Guidelines Cont. Put your best foot forward. Write down all your talking points, and organize them

so the strongest ones are presented first and most persuasively.

Stick to the point. Only use arguments which directly support your case.

Provide specific examples that support your argument. Give concrete examples of how this problem is affecting the community.

Keep your remarks professional. Talking points are not an appropriate venue for calling names, naming names, or blaming blames.

Emphasize win-win solutions. Show how your solutions will benefit the public..

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Bad Talking Points: Slaying The Beast That is Busy Eating an Entire Page The first sign of bad talking points is length, as in too much of it.  

The second sign of bad talking points is more than one line per bullet. The shorthand for this is Talking Paragraphs.

The third sign of bad talking points is burying the main points. Journalists call it "burying the lede,“

  The fourth sign of bad talking points is random bolding and underlining

and exclamation points!!!

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Good Talking Points: Clear and Concise If you only want people to say one thing, what is it? Put that in the

first bullet. Organize it with sub-bullets. Your main point needs support. And people think in three's.

  Anticipate what the press will ask / opposition will say and pre-empt

You don't need talking points for happy news. Something bad or controversial has happened. Be upfront about it. 

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Structure and Disciple Persuasion demands a different format and structure. Yet it's common to see a page of bullets with no structure, no setups, no

payoffs, no climax. Every bullet on a page of talking points is not equal. Therefore, they

shouldn't be the same length and importance. Build a page of talking points like a speech or an oped. There should be one over-arching message on top. Bump up your big message, your Mega Bullet Anything that's supporting your big message should be smaller. Subpoints

beneath those points should be smaller still.

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Utilization and Distribution Talking points are meant to give people a quick and easy way of staying on

track -- and not wandering off topic, or saying something completely different than what somebody else in the same organization is saying.

They're not meant to be read word-for-word, and may not be read at all. You can use them as seed material for other things: letters, speeches, a press release.

Talking points are an internal product. You don't e-mail them to reporters and editors.

Often, you'll pair up talking points with a fact sheet, with the message and theme coming from the talking points and the numbers on a different page.

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The Press ConferenceFigure out your core message

•What do you want people to remember? What message do you ultimately want to be covered and delivered by the press?

•Turn your speech into an engaging narrative. You won’t go far it all you have planned is to read out a list of

•Create the story you want to tell. Make it personal and relatable.

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Press Conference Cont.Anticipate questions that might be askedThink of the questions they’ll likely ask and start practicing how to answer them. Brace yourself for difficult questions.

Regardless of all your preparation, there are things you won’t be able to control or predict. It won’t be unlikely that you’ll get a few questions that are difficult to handle.

You never want to evade questions, but you do have the flexibility to rephrase or modify questions and to answer them in a positive, confident manner.

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Review of Current Talking Points

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Assignment

Your Mission: 

Write some talking points for a FEMA issue that concerns you. Use the above guidelines to get started. Once you’ve written your arguments, organize them so the strongest ones are presented first. Share what you’ve written with the class and get feedback on how your talking points can be improved. (Actually using these talking points in a real meeting is optional!)

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QUESTIONS???