The Tripepi Smith team’s #AlwaysBeLearning attitude extends to teaching the local government community key professional skills. Tripepi Smith offers training for your staff in many areas. View each offering below to learn more.
Media Empowerment Training
Speaking to the media provides an exciting opportunity for public sector professionals to share clear, impactful stories. With Tripepi Smith’s guidance, your team can confidently refine their skills and elevate their media relations strategy to shine in any setting—from routine inquiries to high-stakes breaking news.
Comprehensive Training for Every Role
With proper training, your leadership, staff and elected officials can enhance their confidence and learn best practices during critical public engagements. We help participants at all levels master the art of staying on message:
- Elected Officials & Executive Leadership
- Public Information Officers (PIOs)
- Department Heads & Subject-Matter Experts (SMEs)
- New Staff
Our mock interview activity helps build comfort in on-camera situations, enabling participants to deliver relevant, clear and timely messages. In addition, the mock press conference activity teaches participants to craft messaging in a short timeframe and practice responding in high-pressure media interactions.
Topics include:
- Creating a Message Map
- 1-on-1 On-Camera Mock Interview
- Group Mock Press Conference
- Group feedback and debrief
To ensure long-term growth, all participants receive professional feedback and a recording of their interviews. This allows for reflective self-evaluation, helping staff see exactly how they come across to the public and where they can sharpen their delivery.
Tripepi Smith has developed a curriculum directly related to the experiences and environments that you are likely to encounter. We conduct a half-day training session on dates agreed upon by the agency and Tripepi Smith. The session extends to a full-day experience if there are more than 24 participants (two half-day sessions). The agency is responsible for coordinating outreach to appropriate staff about the session date. The engagement scope includes project management, curriculum preparation, scenario development, custom training resource preparation, training facilitation and interview editing and distribution.
Social Media Training
Social media is a critical communications tool; it can help agencies expand their reach, share immediate updates and boost transparency. Tripepi Smith offers a two-hour training session for staff to gain insights into the importance of effective social media and best practices for creating compelling content and generating community engagement.
This interactive training is recommended for individuals across departments who create social media content or help coordinate public communications for their department. Participants will learn how to strategize social media content, draft effective posts, understand metrics and plan for future communications.
Writing and Editing Training
Clear, impactful written communication is the foundation of public trust. From staff reports and public notices to resolutions and community updates, every document your agency produces reflects its commitment to professionalism, precision and transparency. With Tripepi Smith’s guidance, your team can refine their writing skills, eliminate jargon and deliver clear, objective and compliant communications across every department.
Whether drafting dense municipal code amendments or crafting accessible public announcements, staff at all levels benefit from structured writing standards that help them move past outdated templates to write with confidence and authority.
Interactive Curriculum and Practice Areas
Our training series bridges the gap between complex municipal operations and accessible prose. Through interactive “Before & After” document makeovers, live editorial feedback and read-aloud phrasing audits, staff learn to catch mechanical and tonal errors long before documents leave their desks.
Training modules include:
- AP Style and Municipal Grammar: Master industry-standard formatting, proper title capitalization, sensitive language and number conventions to build immediate credibility and eliminate ambiguity across all channels.
- Tone, Objectivity and Strategic Neutrality: Draft direct, factual and public-service-oriented prose. Learn to strip out promotional hype and timid hedging phrases while accurately and neutrally documenting community dialogue.
- Simplifying Complex Information: Translate dense legal, financial and engineering concepts into plain language without sacrificing technical accuracy.
- Agenda, Resolution and Ordinance Formatting: Ensure 100% compliance with city clerk checklists, eScribe metadata character ceilings, file-naming conventions and exact typographic rules for legal recitals and enacting clauses.
Tripepi Smith customizes every presentation directly to your agency’s adopted style guides and real-world staff report examples. We conduct half-day intensive workshops or multi-part training series on dates agreed upon by your agency and Tripepi Smith. Our scope of work includes curriculum tailoring, custom scenario development, live interactive facilitation and post-session training materials.
Designing in Canva Training
In times of need, a design for a social media post or flyer is needed in a crunched amount of time. Ensure your staff have the skills to be creative when needed. Tripepi Smith offers Graphic Design Training that helps staff create eye-catching designs, specifically in the Canva platform.
Smartphone Photography and Videography Training
While professional photography and videography shine, there are moments that require coverage that could not have been prepared for. Luckily, today’s smartphones have all the tools you need to capture memorable moments. Practice your skills with Tripepi Smith’s Smartphone Photography and Videography Training where our videographers will demonstrate how to take high-quality photos and videos with the devices at your fingertips.
Crisis Communication Training
With proper training, leadership, agency staff and elected officials can build confidence and consistency in high-pressure communication environments. Tripepi Smith’s in-person half-day crisis communications training provides participants with practical tools and real-world insight to communicate effectively when information is limited and stakes are high.
The training includes an overview of crisis communication fundamentals, messaging dos and don’ts, and facilitated case studies. Participants engage in interactive exercises focused on message development, risk identification and maintaining clarity and credibility during challenging situations.
Communications Role During Emergencies: Council & Staff Presentations
Effective crisis communication depends on shared understanding before an emergency occurs. Tripepi Smith offers tailored presentations for councils, boards, executive teams and staff that clarify how communications function during emergencies and major incidents.
Presentations cover the distinction between crisis and emergency communication, clarify communication-specific roles and discuss how information is developed, coordinated and shared with the public. Scenario discussions and media considerations are used to help elected and executive leaders better understand decision-making dynamics, public expectations and their role as communicators during high-stakes situations.
Media Training News
Tripepi Smith Hosts Crisis Communications Training for the City of Alameda
Tripepi Smith provided on-site crisis communications training for the City of Alameda staff in April 2024.
Port of Long Beach Hires TSA for Communications Training
Tripepi Smith & Associates recently completed a ten-week series of [...]
