(Primary image credit to CNET)
Last month, we talked about responding to (inevitable) criticism of school policies and decisions. POM Wonderful, a juice company, offered an example of how to respond positively to such criticism, but what about responding badly? School Heads should know just as much about how not to respond to criticism as they do about responding well, to avoid public and private faux pas across the board.
Again, we turn to John Oliver’s HBO satirical news show “Last Week Tonight” for our case study in responding to criticism. This time, we’ll look at how Federal Communication Commission (FCC) Chairman Tom Wheeler reacted to Oliver’s satire—and how it backfired.
During a segment on net neutrality, John Oliver discusses Wheeler’s appointment to the FCC and the potential conflict of interest. Oliver said that “the guy [Wheeler] who used to run the cable industry’s lobbying arm is now running the agency tasked with regulating it.” The whole situation is akin, Oliver claimed, to asking a dingo to watch your child for the night—the baby’s going to get eaten, and no one should be surprised. You can view the full segment below, if you’re interested.
(Please note that since “Last Week Tonight” is an HBO production and not monitored by censors, the language is occasionally coarse.)
A few weeks later, “Last Week Tonight” learned that during a public open meeting, Wheeler was asked about Oliver's net neutrality segment. You can watch Wheeler’s stumbling response for yourself.
You heard him right. He’d like to state “for the record” that he’s not a dingo. In fact, he goes on to admit that he had to “look it up”—just to make sure that he wasn’t a dingo.
So while we examine Wheeler's responses, let's pretend that you've recently heard a disturbing rumor that some members of the school community believe you are guilty of a conflict of interest and have called you some rather unflattering names. Keep Wheeler's missteps in mind while composing potential responses:
- Wheeler is unprepared and speaks off-script. Since the open forum was on the subject, Wheeler should have expected a question on the popular segment. Actually, he had a fairly good canned response (“I think it shows the high degree of interest in this topic in the country”), but then proceeds to go off-script with much stammering and stuttering, making him look inept and unprepared. While you shouldn’t go out of your way to directly address informal criticism in such circumstances, you as School Head should be aware and have a response ready—just in case.
- Wheeler doesn’t answer the fundamental question asked by critics. Oliver’s main issue with Wheeler was the seeming conflict of interest present by appointing a former Internet-provider lobbyist to the agency tasked with regulating the industry. Wheeler never responded to the criticism itself. By failing to confront the criticism head-on, Wheeler essentially admits that the criticism is true. School Heads must counter criticism with reasoned logic and calm fortitude; Wheeler displayed neither.
- Wheeler protests too much. As Oliver himself points out in the follow-up clip, no one accused Wheeler of being a dingo—just that his behavior reminded Oliver of a hypothetical human-dingo babysitter. Being the comedian he is, Oliver proceeds to insist on a zoologist’s certificate that Wheeler is not a dingo before he’ll believe it. Ridiculous, yes, but the whole silly scenario brings up an excellent point: Don’t protest too much, or people will be suspicious rather than reassured.
Wheeler did not respond well to Oliver’s criticism, opening himself up to further ridicule and continued censure. But you don’t have to follow in his footsteps! The next time someone decides to take umbrage with you or your school’s policies, take a deep breath and remind yourself: You are not a dingo.
Additional ISM resources:
ISM Monthly Update for School Heads Vol. 13 No. 1 Responding to Criticism, Part One
ISM Monthly Update for School Heads Vol. 9 No. 1 Small Talk and Tough Conversations—It's All Human (Resources)
ISM Monthly Update for Human Resources Vol. 11 No. 1 Do You Have a Trusting Culture?
Additional ISM resources for Gold Consortium members:
I&P Vol. 30 No. 1 The Administrative Culture Profile
I&P Vol. 38 No. 8 Predictability and Supportiveness: The ISM School Culture Matrix
I&P Vol. 34 No. 7 Managing Faculty Culture in Times of Turmoil
