WITH SO MUCH litigation and so many warrants of arrest involving high-profile individuals, there has been a shift in the professional background of designated spokespersons. Increasingly, these have now come from the legal profession rather than media or corporate PR.
Is passing the bar a good qualification for public engagement?
Lawyers don’t shun the spotlight, perhaps even seeking their glare to achieve a high profile that improves the prospects of winning new clients. This is a profession, after all, that is discouraged from hawking its services. When a case involves a team of lawyers, one of them may be designated as the spokesperson.
There are challenges for a lawyer acting as a spokesperson for his client.
Legal training is adversarial. Arguments are arrayed to defend or attack (or prosecute) a personality or position. When media (including online influencers) are asking a question, the lawyer/spokesperson tends to be argumentative and even condescending. (Do you even understand the issue?)
This adversarial exchange can pit media against the lawyer/spokesman in a battle for argumentative points. While ideal in a courtroom when two sides try to convince the judge of the merits of their positions, an aggressive tone comes across as too defensive. Is this good for the client?
The advocate/spokesperson tends to dismiss any facts that do not support the position being built up for the eventual trial which may be covered by media. Even seemingly hard-to-contest CCTV footage or documents pertaining to seemingly improbable surnames can be dismissed as irrelevant if the evidence erodes the lawyer’s position. (Those names can be found in the Chinese directory.)
An implicit rule in designating a spokesperson is “deniability.” Clients are advised, even if sorely tempted, to refrain from speaking for themselves or their companies. Public tantrums from the CEO (I don’t like your question) can affect the price movement of a listed company — the intransigence of the government on this issue is driving away foreign investors.
While a statement may be true, direct attribution to the CEO defines the statement as the company’s (or group’s) formal position. Better if a lower ranking spokesperson delivers precisely the same statement. He can be corrected later by a higher up — Mr. Foot-in-mouth does not represent the company’s official position. He has asked to be relieved of his job due to hypertension.
The lawyer’s misstatement in a press conference is likely to affect the client’s case in court. There will be videos of the interview to highlight a position taken by the lawyer-spokesperson.
Surprises, which media can sometimes spring in an interview, including new witnesses or the uncovering of new facts, are best handled by a non-lawyer spokesperson — that new development in this case needs to be evaluated by the legal team on its relevance. This allowance of a fallback position leads to fashioning a new spin in the narrative.
The communications skills of lawyers may be too focused on making legal arguments for the client. The narrative may be hedged with all sorts of mitigating or aggravating conditions more appropriate for a court of law. Is this same skill and manner of presentation required in engaging the public for its sympathy and understanding?
Lawyers can focus on their cases rather than explaining their legal strategy to the public. Being a spokesperson requires humility and not always having the answers to a question.
Online podcasts now have legal luminaries analyzing precedents for an ongoing investigation or trial. Some esteemed symbols of integrity in the legal profession may take an unexpected position defending a case, perhaps for a yet undisclosed client.
With so many opinions being proffered on all sorts of issues, it’s no longer easy to distinguish independent perspectives from client-oriented representation.
The lawyer as spokesperson and advocate can even undermine the position that the assigned lawyer for the case may be arguing for the same client.
Legally speaking, the spokesperson can get away with not giving an immediate reply to a difficult question — We’re still looking into that and will get back to you once we finish our investigation. (Next question, please.)
Tony Samson is chairman and CEO of TOUCH xda.
ar.samson@yahoo.com