19. You Don’t Have to Answer Every Question
Sometimes a reporter will ask a question he or she knows most sources will never answer. But they ask anyway. Sometimes they get lucky. Years ago, a common example of this was, “When are you going public?” But there’s an answer to every question. In this case it was usually something such as, “We’re on plan; we’re meeting our own internal milestones; we’re happy with the pace of our business and will take next steps as they are appropriate,” etc etc. The wrong answer is. “How is that any of your business?” or any variation of that hostile theme. It is even better to say, “I give you a lot of credit for asking that, but I’m quite sure you don’t really expect a specific answer.”