To equip participants with the skills needed to be full or part-time PIOs, including oral and written communications; understanding and working with the media; and basic tools and techniques to perform effectively as a PIO, both in the proactive/ advocacy times and crisis/emergency response.

Selection Criteria: This course is intended for newly appointed emergency managers from Federal, state, local, tribal, territorial, and emergency management agencies, and prospective professionals transferring from another discipline to emergency management.

Course Objectives

• Using the strategic communications planning model, develop a public awareness campaign (95%)
• Using the strategic communications planning model, develop an incident communications strategy (5%)
• Indicate the purpose of a public awareness campaign
• Identify the steps in developing a public awareness campaign
• Develop a strategy for an awareness campaign on a selected topic
• Change the method of developing a plan to follow the 8-step StratCom process
• Demonstrate the role and function of the PIO in both day-to-day emergency environments
• Compare actions PIOs can take to work with the news media during day-to-day and emergency situation
• Describe different public information written products
• Apply effective news release writing guidance
• Adapt or repurpose written media products for social media
• Describe what types of impressions specific body language might convey during an interview
• Identify elements of an interview the PIO should consider ahead of time
• Identify steps a PIO needs to take to prepare for and conduct a news interview
• Demonstrate effective techniques for on-camera interviews

Mission Areas

• Common

Disciplines

• Emergency Management

Primary Core Capability