Time for Company Secretaries to put on their media face.(Company Secretary)

Rare is the Company Secretary who has a mandate to speak to the financial media on behalf of their group. Commonplace is the Company Secretary who is so well positioned in the group's decision-making hierarchy that they have access to core strategic information about the group. But the twain seldom meet.

Company Secretaries straddle the line between being useful in media relations and having no outlet to the media. As in Professor Michael Adams' article in a previous edition of this journal, albeit in a different context, which 'hoped that this article may aid Company Secretaries in their attempt to straddle their burgeoning responsibilities', the burgeoning responsibility that this article addresses is the Company Secretary's role in media relations. It is a role with which they are neither familiar nor comfortable but a role that they will increasingly need to meet and assume greater visibility in.

The Company Secretary as a useful media resource has assumed increasing relevance as their role has for some time expanded from being little more than a loyal company servant to one where the Company Secretary assumes the role of chief administration officer and even a senior executive officer, for which they now assume many of the same liabilities as directors.

They have the information

Company Secretaries are a dream for financial journalists, a hidden treasure--if only they were available to speak to them!

Still, off-the-record talks and informal conversations with Company Secretaries do take place and are often useful. From the perspective of a financial journalist they should be more commonplace. After all, Company Secretaries can be a font of group information, be it historical, contemporary or dealing with the group's future plans. I deal later with the different and more complex issues relating to confidential information.

The trouble is that most Company Secretaries, mindful of the restraints imposed on them in …