The "Eat Mor Chikin" Proposition
Chick-fil-A has spent decades teaching Americans to "Eat Mor Chikin."
Maybe it's time its CEO learned that sometimes you need to say more, too.
I'm sure the corporate media team popped a few bottles of bubbly after landing CEO Andrew Cathy a seemingly benign feature interview on NBC's TODAY show.
But I suspect that excitement quickly turned to horror once the interview aired.
America's chicken sandwich giant, known for its Sunday silence, courteous employees, and ubiquitous cows, also has a controversial history dating back more than a decade, when former CEO Dan Cathy ignited a firestorm with his public comments about same-sex marriage.
The company took a significant PR hit, and the controversy became part of its corporate identity.
Apparently, lightning can strike twice.
Andrew Cathy's tone-deaf response to questions about the company's position on LGBTQ+ rights and inclusion demonstrated just how quickly a friendly interview can go sideways.
I'm going to give Chick-fil-A's media team the benefit of the doubt and assume they prepared Cathy for his conversation with Craig Melvin. I'll also venture to guess they discussed the importance of "blocking" and "bridging" to key messages.
For the uninitiated, key messages form the backbone of your story.
Media trainers generally advise our clients to develop three to five of them, supported by specific proof points.
But here's the thing: If you can't deliver those messages naturally and appropriately, they're nothing more than vapid verbiage.
Judging by Cathy's responses, his key messages appeared to be:
We make tasty chicken sandwiches.
We deliver great hospitality.
OK, great. That's the marketing pitch.
But it's not an answer to every question.
When preparing clients for interviews, I ask them to identify three questions they want, three questions they expect, and three questions they fear.
In a perfect world, they'll only get the first two categories. But if they haven't prepared for the third, they're setting themselves up for failure.
And that's precisely what happened to Cathy.
During my more than 20 years as a television reporter, I often saved my toughest questions for the end of an interview.
Why?
For starters, opening with a confrontational question can cause an interviewee to shut down, become defensive or end the conversation altogether.
I also found that beginning with easier questions helped build rapport and put my subject at ease before I went for the jugular.
Melvin followed a similar playbook.
He eased into the conversation with questions Cathy likely expected and welcomed. But when he finally dropped the hammer, asking how Cathy would respond to people who believe Chick-fil-A doesn't support the LGBTQ+ community, the CEO fell back on his marketing messages.
He talked about welcoming everyone, serving great food and providing hospitality.
There's nothing inherently wrong with those messages.
The problem is that they didn't answer the question.
Instead of immediately pivoting to chicken sandwiches and customer service, Cathy should have acknowledged the criticism and then bridged to a different set of key messages his media team should have prepared him to deliver.
And there was material to work with.
Over the past several years, Chick-fil-A has established executive leadership focused on inclusion, publicly articulated nondiscrimination protections covering sexual orientation, and gender identity, and invested in educational and economic opportunities for employees and communities.
Those are tangible proof points that could have helped Cathy explain the company's position, rather than simply asking viewers to take his word for it.
Here's how I might have coached him to respond:
ACKNOWLEDGE:
"I recognize that Chick-fil-A has faced criticism over this issue, and I understand why people have questions about where we stand."
BRIDGE:
"But I think it's important to look at what we're doing today."
KEY MESSAGE AND PROOF POINTS:
"We've taken meaningful steps to foster a more inclusive workplace, including nondiscrimination policies that explicitly protect employees regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity. We've also invested in initiatives that promote belonging and expand opportunities for our employees and the communities we serve."
BRING IT HOME:
"We know people will judge us by our actions, not just our words. And we're committed to treating everyone who works for us or walks through our doors with dignity and respect."
Would that answer have satisfied everyone? Of course not.
And viewers are perfectly capable of deciding for themselves whether Chick-fil-A is walking the walk.
But at least Cathy would have answered the question, acknowledged the controversy and offered evidence to support the company's position.
Instead, his attempt to steer the conversation back to food and hospitality made him sound more like a used-car salesman than the leader of a multibillion-dollar corporation.
The lesson for anyone preparing for a media interview is simple:
Bridging isn't a license to dodge a question. It's a tool to help you answer it while reinforcing what matters.
And when the question is about whether everyone is welcome at your table, talking about what's on the menu just won't cut it.
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