The danger of mixed messages

NZ's Red Cross is facing awkward questions about why, after two months, it has given out only $4m of $21m donated by the public for devastating floods in February.

The predicament has arisen because of a clash of expectations that the organisation did not correct with communication. It is a lesson about the need for absolute clarity in times of high emotion and pressure.

Pressed for an explanation, Secretary General Sarah Stuart-Black says the organisation wants to give money where there are gaps and unmet needs, and wants to avoid duplicating funding from other sources. She says the organisation learned from the Christchurch Quake that rapid distribution of funds without coordination with other agencies meant money sometimes went to things that had already been funded or supplied by others.

That sounds fair enough, but it is probably not what people wanted when they gave money. Critically, it is not what donors thought they heard Red Cross say at the time.

The public largely gave money because they wanted to do something to help - and to them, that meant help relatively immediately with the awful problems they were seeing on TV and hearing about.

I think that Red Cross saw itself as a reputable organisation able to step into the high emotion period to take the donations people wanted desperately to give, and to distribute them.

But Red Cross was not clear enough about its approach to distribution.

Media reported from the Red Cross website that the money would go toward practical help such as stretchers, beds, blankets, satellite phones, and generators. As these things are needed straight after an emergency, the public would think that meant funds would be spent immediately.

Indeed, NZ Secretary General Stuart-Black told NewstalksZB's Kerre Woodham that "one of the benefits with this fund is that we're able to look at some of those immediate needs, but..."

The second half of that sentence signalled a longer term approach that matches the Red Cross explanation under pressure two months later: "but also in the medium and long term... we don't want to duplicate effort... or provide things that have already been provided. If [immediate needs] are already covered off, then we'll use the fund for other purposes."

This is not audience-aware communications. People are more likely to hear what they want or expect to hear. The public heard the first half of her sentence but not the second half.

To counter the heavy expectation of immediate payouts, she needed to REVERSE the order of explanation. Her answer should have been "This fund will be used over the rest of this year to help families recover, although some will be available to meet gaps in urgent needs right now."

The weight of audience expectation is a strong force.

Consider what Stuart-Black replied when Woodham spotted her implication of long term distribution and asked if they were going to "keep it in the kitty"; "No, not at all, not at all. We're going to spend it quickly as possible, but..."

Under the pressure of the question, she was forced to imply it would be spent quickly, and placed her main point as an easily unheard qualifier.

For another example, consider what people thought Stuart-Black meant when she said they would address people's needs in the "weeks ahead." At that time, people would have interpreted her to mean, maybe, 3-4 weeks.

A problem of audience interpretation also arises from Stuart-Black's tone of definitiviness, and care. "We want to provide support for all those people who are doing it tough, and being able to really use this money to provide that direct support if it is going to help, but...". Again, the implication of tone and words suggest to the audience that organisation is acting quickly on the real immediate experiences of affected people. The qualifier comes afterwards.

The danger of leaning into audience expectation is well demonstrated in the photo, above, on the Red Cross website about disaster and emergency support. A Red Cross worker is standing next to a slip. That suggests practical assistance that is quite some distance from what Stuart-Black explains they are doing with the flood fund.

The Red Cross approach in the Newstalk ZB interview was consistent across other media; a qualified and ambiguous message, delivered with many, many words.

Given the strong emotive reasons why people were donating, succinct clarity was needed.

It is possible that such a message would have discouraged donations. But perhaps that is better than disappointing donors so seriously that they give to other funds in future emergencies, or maybe not at all.