One of the favourite techniques journalists use to put interviewees under pressure is to ask a seemingly impossible question.
 
Often they do this is by deploying the words “Can you guarantee…?” in the question.
 
These appear in questions such as “Can you guarantee that there will never be a terrorist attack on your premises?”
 

 
If the interviewee gives a simple “Yes or No” response, either way there can be a problem.
 
A “Yes” on its own often doesn’t seem credible and is usually difficult to substantiate.
 
A “No” on its own can make the respondent seem weak or complacent.
 
As a foreign correspondent trained in the art of asking “blowtorch-on-the-belly questions” in the world’s roughest democratic environment – Australian politics – I happily confess to having asked more than my share of impossible “Can you guarantee X?” type questions.
 
Of course I always asked such questions to help elicit valuable reactions that were in the public interest – even if they had the added effect of making a less-than-competent interviewee look and sound uncomfortable, dodgy or worse.
 
I remember in 1988 in the then Soviet Union-dominated Poland asking the Vice-Minister for Nuclear Energy if he could guarantee that there wouldn’t be a Chernobyl-type disaster with the seriously flawed Soviet-made nuclear power technology deployed in his country.
 

Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant: April 1986

 
His bumbling and unsettling answer was broadcast on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and the BBC World Service “Europe’s World” programme.
 
The answer didn’t do him a lot of good.
 
But as there was a real danger posed by the export of Soviet nuclear technology, asking the question was easily justifiable in the wake of the Chernobyl catastrophe which caused both immediate and later deaths, cancer outbreaks and widespread environmental contamination through radiation.
 
Journalists can put you under similar pressure by asking questions like:
 
 # “Can you guarantee that your company’s products will never cause any unexpected problems?”
 
# Or “Can you guarantee that every job in your organisation is safe?”
 
Are you ready for them?
 
 

DEALING EFFECTIVELY WITH THOSE SEEMINGLY IMPOSSIBLE BREXIT QUESTIONS

 
 
Now that I’m a recovering journalist who helps clients and conference audiences deal effectively with tough questions from reporters, I show would-be interviewees how to honestly and effectively answer these kinds of seemingly impossible questions in media interview training sessions and in other “Giving Great Answers” master classes.
 
The demand for the skills to answer seemingly impossible questions about the future has been growing in Britain since the country voted to leave the European Union.
 
If you look closely at news programmes in the UK you can detect a surge of Brexit versions of the “Can you guarantee?” type question now that Article 50 of the European Union Treaty has been triggered by Prime Minister Theresa May – taking Britain irrevocably closer to the exit door.
 

 
As organisations seek to prepare themselves for a post-Brexit future, effectively dealing with seemingly impossible “Brexit guarantee” questions is coming up increasingly by those seeking guidance in my media training sessions.
 
The line of questioning interviewees need to be ready for is reflected in questions like:
 
 # “Can you guarantee that your organisation will survive after Brexit?”
 
 # “Can you guarantee that every job in your company will remain safe after Brexit?”
 
 # “Can you guarantee your company will keep its factories open in Britain if it becomes harder to export your products into the European Union?”
 
The reason people find these kind of questions especially difficult is because the honest straight “Yes or No” response – if you give it – has to be “No”.
 
You can’t in all honesty guarantee what will happen in the future amidst the obvious uncertainties of the Brexit negotiations.
 
But any answer which seeks to give an emphatic unqualified “Yes” to the question risks two things…
 
The first risk is that your answer can be seen as unrealistically reassuring… or to put it more bluntly, it can be perceived as a lie.
 
The second risk is that a “Yes” answer leaves the interviewee and the organisation as a hostage to fortune, because if free trade is seriously impeded between Britain and the rest of Europe then the media can make your “Yes” answer look very foolish in the future when it reports your guarantee wasn’t valid in the face of unpredictable outcomes.
 
And the media just love to replay old answers which are proven to be incorrect by subsequent events.
 
This is why astute organisations are wanting to be trained in the art of giving truthful, helpful answers that will stand the test of time when this kind of Brexit question is posed.
 
There’s more on answering seemingly impossible questions in “Great Answers To Tough Questions At Work”.
 
The publishers will let you read the first chapter free on line at:

Click on this image

 
And there’s more advice on responding effectively to those “Can you guarantee?” questions below.
 
 

FOCUSING ON WHAT YOU CAN GUARANTEE

 
One of the good things to do, so you are effectively addressing the “guarantee” question and getting across a positive message is to say what you can guarantee.
 
It can be something like: “What I can guarantee is that our organisation will do everything it can to thrive after Brexit by taking every opportunity to sell our products in Continental Europe whatever happens in the future negotiations.”
 
One of the fundamental principles of giving great answers to impossible “Can you guarantee?” questions – and others – is to give an honest immediate response, but then to go on to get across a positive, useful and relevant message for your questioner and your wider audience.
 
One businessman who has done this well in the past week is the President and Chief Executive Officer of the car giant Ford, Mark Fields.
 

 
 
I should make it clear that I have not trained Mr Fields, but I can deduce he has had some competent media training from someone.
 
He was effectively asked by the BBC whether he could he guarantee that Ford would keep its manufacturing plants in Britain after Brexit – given that it might become more difficult to export the engines from its production lines in Dagenham and Bridgend to its former EU partners.
 

 
The interviewer doesn’t actually use the word “guarantee” in the questions we hear, but the concept is implied.
 
Mark Fields demonstrates the way you can give an honest realistic answer when he says in part of his reply: “Nobody can guarantee anything over many many years”.
 
He then goes on to get some additional positive messages across which are reassuring to Ford customers, Ford workers and Ford investors.
 
You can assess his answers here:

 The BBC has not made this video available in an embedded format so it will open on the BBC website.so it will open on the BBC website.

 

If you can do as well as Mr Fields does on dealing with seemingly impossible questions about the future then you are doing well.
 
Incidentally Mr Fields’ annual compensation package amounts to more than $US17-million a year in salary, bonuses, incentive payments and stocks, so investing to ensure he’s media fit would seem to a pretty economical and sensible protective measure by Ford.
 
Salary details at:

Click this image for the interactive page

 

TOUGH ROMANIAN QUESTIONS AFTER THE FALL
OF THE BERLIN WALL

 
Meanwhile, back in the time before I became a recovering journalist, I had one of the most surreal moments of a lifetime when I visited a refugee camp in what was then still East Germany.
 
It was soon after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of communism Eastern Europe, and the camp was full of excitable Romanians.
 
They had escaped from the dreadful conditions that had prevailed and imprisoned them in their country until the overthrow and execution by revolutionary firing squad of the infamous ruthless dictator, Nicolae Ceausescu (pictured), on Christmas Day 1989.
 


 

I was fortunate to have as my interpreter an East German who could not only speak Romanian but who had refined it on a student trip to Romania which had been arranged for her under communist rule.
 
As a result her command of Romanian slang was particularly impressive – though she also polished her command of Australian slang while working with me.
 
The surreal aspect of our visit to the camp was that we were quickly surrounded by Romanians who were desperate for news about what options their country had after communism.
 
And while I was there to interview them and bring their stories to the world, our exchanges began with them peppering me with questions.
 
Their biggest question for me was “Would Romania be allowed to join the European Union?”
 
The fact that I was a foreign correspondent from Australia meant that I was somehow seen by them as an influential representative of the outside world.
 
In fact, some of them thought I was so important, their question was framed along the lines of “Please would I let them join the European Union?”
 
It was very tempting to say “Sure guys, Romania can join the European club tomorrow!”.
 
But explaining that as a mere foreign correspondent from a country about as far away from Europe as one could get meant that I didn’t have such powers was a bit of a challenge… even for someone who went on to specialise in how to answer tough questions!
 
Nonetheless the result of the Romanian revolution was that the country did get eventually gain entry to the European Union.
 
My natural modesty forces me to admit that my influence on this momentous European Union decision was admittedly somewhat minimal… though perhaps the European leaders at the time were deeply moved by my reports from the refugee camp.
 
 

TOUGH TIME FOR ROMANIANS IN LONDON 

 
Since that surreal time I have taken a strong interest in the fact that Romanians now increasingly travel outside Eastern Europe which had previously been almost totally forbidden.
 
Many Romanians have used their freedom to come to Britain as workers and as tourists.
 
In the last issue of this ezine, you may recall that I wrote about one of these Romanian tourists, 31-year-old Andreea Crista, who was in London with her boyfriend last month.
 
Andreea unfortunately made news because she was the woman knocked into The Thames by the terrorist Khalid Masood as he rammed his car into pedestrians in his crazed assault which began on Westminster Bridge.
 
I was in Central London on the same day as this attack, but unlike Andreea, I was not one of those in exactly the wrong place at exactly the wrong time.
 
I wrote about her while she was unconscious in hospital being treated for her severe injuries.
 
Andreea was unaware at the time that her boyfriend, Andrei Burnaz, had been planning to propose to her later that tragic day.
 

Andreea Crista and boyfriend, Andrei Burnaz,
before the terrorist struck

 
It’s since been announced that Andreea’s condition became so bad that the medical life support she was receiving in hosptial was withdrawn.
 
Andreea died having never regained consciousness and never getting to hear that marriage proposal.
 
Her family put out this moving statement: “After fighting for her life for over two weeks, our beloved and irreplaceable Andreea – wonderful daughter, sister, partner, dedicated friend and the most unique and life loving person you can imagine – was cruelly and brutally ripped away from our lives in the most heartless and spiritless way.
 
“She will always be remembered as our shining ray of light that will forever keep on shining in our hearts.

“Andreea is now unfortunately not able to have part of the money that was raised for her recovery, so we would like to donate it to charity. She would not have it any other way.”

Here’s hoping the money raised to help Andreea will be put to fantastic use for the benefit of those more fortunate than she turned out to be.