Dealing with guests who are late.
A recent post on sheunlimited.com carried this information about Jessica Simpson keeping an interviewer waiting for 11 hours:
Jessica Simpson was allegedly 11 hours late for a promotional interview
The actress was due to speak to Lara Spencer of America’s ‘The Insider’ show at 10am.
However, Jessica didn’t arrive until 9pm, leaving Laura - who had flown to Louisiana, where Jessica is currently filming new movie ‘Major Movie Star’, to conduct the interview - waiting for 11 hours.
Jessica’s spokesperson blamed the wait on miscommunication, saying: “Jessica did the interview as soon as she was free from shooting.”Now I think Lara Spencer deserves a special kind of reward for dealing with this and I am sure others would like to give Ms. Simpson a very different kind of reward, but this situation makes for an interesting discussion. How do we deal with guests that are late for the interview?
Certainly prevention is the best medicine here. Keeping in contact with the guest prior to the interview will head off many of these situations or give you more options to deal with the situation.
Speaking of options, here is one I really recommend and that is to have a back up show and/or back up guests ready at all times, so you do not lose the show in the event the guest is so late, deadlines are missed. Being in a siutation in which you absolutely must do that show with that guest is something to avoid at all costs if you can.
I recommend you set up a plan in advance of the show, that gives a time line for what do if the guest is late by how much time. If the guest is 15 min late you will do this, if the guest is 1 hour late you will do that.
I invite you to share your techniques for dealing with late guests, so I hope to hear from you. In the meantime, set your watches and get out there.