Preparation - with Catherine Jaeger

preparation

Summary

Craig talks with Catherine Jeager about her podcasting journey and her plans to add a co-host to her show. Catherine shares her experiences as a new podcaster and the challenges she has faced in developing her hosting and interviewing skills. She discusses the potential benefits and challenges of bringing a co-host into the mix, including the need for pre-planning and coordination to ensure a smooth and engaging conversation.

@CatherineJ

Episode Audio

The Challenges and Benefits of Adding a Co-Host to Your Podcast

Podcasting is a challenging but rewarding medium, and for many new podcasters, the process of learning how to host and interview guests can be a steep learning curve. In a recent conversation, Catherine Jeager discussed her experiences as a new podcaster and her plans to bring on a co-host for her show.

Catherine has taken a podcasting course and has been experimenting with hosting and interviewing on her own show. She shared that the process of developing these skills has been a “super PhD” experience for her, but she has enjoyed the learning process and is excited to publish her first 10 episodes.

However, the prospect of adding a co-host to her show has raised new challenges for Catherine. She is thinking about the flow and arc of the conversation, and how to balance the styles and personalities of both hosts to create a spontaneous and engaging listening experience. She is also considering the amount of pre-planning and coordination that will be necessary to ensure that the conversation flows smoothly.

Despite the challenges, Catherine is excited about the potential benefits of having a co-host, such as the ability to share hosting duties and have a more dynamic conversation. She is looking forward to exploring these possibilities and continuing to grow and improve as a podcaster.

Transcript

00:01.14
Craig
Um, hello I’m Craig Constantine welcome this is the podcaster community show short conversations that are not just about podcasting because I like to take the scenic route. My guest today is Catherine Jeager welcome Catherine how are you.

00:14.75
Catherine
Hi Craigs I’m great. It’s fun to be here I get you all to myself today. Usually you’re in a Zoom room or something a bunch of other podcasters. So ah.

Summary

00:22.24
Craig
Um, yeah was hollywood square top left corner. You can just put cut them off. Um, yeah, well we’ll see whether you feel think it’s cool 20 minutes from now when you’ve had 20 minutes of me. Um, you can get a little tiring I’m told. Um, but anyway before we wander too far afield.

00:29.98
Catherine
Ah.

00:36.15
Catherine
Ah, yeah.

00:42.00
Craig
Ah, there are a bunch of things we could talk about. Um you’re one of the students that I know of who’s taken the course the podcasting course that’s put out by akimbo taking it more than once there’s ah, several people who’ve done that but you kind of have a bigger break between the first and pass and the and the most recent one. Um.

00:54.50
Catherine
M right? yes.

00:59.69
Craig
Which kind of strikes me as interesting. There’s stuff there. But when we were talking beforehand. You mentioned that you were thinking of changing. Maybe not totally changing but trying a slight variation on the interview format by bringing in a second host. Um, which turns it into like a three-way triangle conversation which is interesting in and of itself. Um.

01:16.17
Catherine
Right? right.

01:18.95
Craig
And I had asked you so I’ll ask you again? What’s currently like a thing that’s that you’re noodling over that you’re challenged with or that you want to work on with your podcast and I think that’ll lead us into you know the challenge of having an extra mind in the mix for your conversations.

01:29.42
Catherine
Yeah, yeah, so podcasting is a super new medium for me I’m used to other with my marketing background writing other kinds of Speaking. Et Cetera So This is a super new medium for me and so when I started doing this. Um you know, just exploring being a host I have guests I’m not host on Mike the whole interviewing how you interview people how you bring them out has been of course. Ah, super Ph D process for me and how you do that? You know yeah exact the primordial soup. Oh yeah, it’s super interesting and so that’s.

02:10.90
Craig
Ah, this is the swimming pool get in right? It’s the learning cliff. Ah.

02:23.43
Catherine
That’s been a big curve for me and I’m loving the interview podcast team that we have going on that we meet every other Saturday I’ve just learned so much from that and experimenting with that. But None of the things that I had concepts that it initially started out thinking about was having a co-host and part of that. My thinking was to just offload the hosting thing like it’s easier to co-host. So I thought with somebody else right? And now I’ve got I’m about ready to publish my none podcast I’m excited about that. But now I’m coming.

02:52.46
Craig
Right.

02:58.23
Craig
This is the part where I want one of those post-production buttons where I can hit a button and have a crowd. go go yes exactly congratulations on 10 episodes podcasting is a lonely hard slog congratulations.

03:03.84
Catherine
Ah, ah woo like think fireworks. Ah yeah, double digit it is but now that I’ve gotten this far. Um, you know I am I am I have. A friend of mine and I are going to ah co-host and so now I’m thinking again with this whole deep dive into interviewing the arc of the conversation. The storytelling. What are we doing? What’s the purpose of the podcast thinking about bringing another person in throws up.

03:26.55
Craig
Um.

03:42.53
Catherine
All of that in in making it spontaneous in allowing their style to come through in preconceiving that art and sharing with them how much pre-work. Do we do? There’s like a None questions.

03:43.36
Craig
Are.

03:59.67
Craig
Um.

04:00.64
Catherine
Of how to do it or not right I could just say like press the big red button and we’re going to do this and whatever happens. So um, what are your thoughts on that. What are you? what’s going through your head right now with that.

04:07.74
Craig
Are.

04:16.34
Craig
Um, um, well it’s one of these things where you only get to draw on the chalkboard. The None time once. So whatever you pick, you’re always going to wonder oh what? if I had done this the other way. So I’m not sure that there’s a right way to do it. You know like how to start out with a new cohost.

04:28.64
Catherine
Yeah.

04:32.88
Craig
Um, so I generally prefer the I’m going to do a lot of prep work myself. But I’m not going to expend the other person’s time I’m going to like prepare as much as I can and then whatever they want to do on their own That’s cool, but we’re just going to start so like minimum preparation in terms of time spent between us because that time that the 2 of you. Um, you and the cohost would have in preparation that’s super valuable because that’s that synchronous time that’s difficult to organize and get so you’d want to do it. Um, if you have any of that you want to do like the best you can like let’s talk about the guest. Let’s talk about what kinds of questions are we interested you like if I had a minute. To spend with a co-host I would entirely spend it all on who the on the guests who we know is going to be the None guest or the None guest or the None guest I would spend very little time unless it was like my best friend that I saw every day I would spend very little time like well how do we imagine our listeners reacting to us laughing and. You know should I figure out how to laugh quietly like I wouldn’t spend any time on that I’d spend all my time on what about this guest excites you other person that I’m talking to to be my co-host so that that would be where I would go in terms of prep work and I think you’re going to Find. Um.

05:33.97
Catherine
Martin.

05:39.73
Craig
You know I’m just sticking of all of the 2 person teams that you see in sports on radio. There’s always a leader and a color per there’s always 1 person who’s like you know says well actually that person leads the league and you know or this person is you know or they wrote this album. There’s always that one person who is doing the that they they um, there’s always.

05:46.20
Catherine
And.

05:58.72
Craig
If a foil if one of them if it’s joking one of them will play the foil or if it’s sports one of them addds statistics. There’s always like there’s 2 They point and counterpoint each other. So I think you’ll fall into that naturally and you may already know which of you is going to be which like depending how well you know this person in advance like is it. Um.

06:05.71
Catherine
Yeah, yeah.

06:15.84
Craig
So I’m also thinking are you okay with burning a friendship like this might be the end of a friendship you know right? because oh you hadn’t thought of that because you know that podcasting is is horrible right? So it’s like do they know what they’re in for like are they going to survive the process. Do you think.

06:18.10
Catherine
Yeah, ah oh my God ah.

06:31.16
Catherine
So yeah, yeah, interesting. So um, my cohort doesn’t have a lot of time for this I mean it’s like an extra for her right sprinkles on the cake and so I’m definitely going to be doing.

06:32.51
Craig
Or you expect you’re going to do all the hard work.

06:44.62
Craig
Are.

06:49.80
Catherine
Heavy lifting which I’m fine with and I think it’s I’m just not going to worry about I’m just going to do it and see how it goes I think that’s my my None thing and one of the things that I’ve learned from you because those none podcasts that I did I mean boy did I edit did ah you know I was like a freak. Kind of afraid to publish wanting to make it whatever and one of the things I want to do with these the series is just jump in and do it minimal editing and just get them out.

07:25.68
Craig
Um, right? Yeah I.

07:27.14
Catherine
Get them done and out and that emergence I think is going to be really important and then also because she has limited time. We’ll we’ll find a rhythm I think it’s better. Will I think we’ll find a natural rhythm by doing them pretty much one after another and.

07:45.87
Craig
Um, um, there’s lots of technical questions I’m thinking like are you and this other are you and the co-host going to be in the same space or are you going to make this a 3 hree-way online call like that makes a little more challenging but I actually think it’d be worse if you were both in the same room because then.

07:45.96
Catherine
That’s my hope.

07:55.64
Catherine
And.

08:05.70
Craig
You have a what I would call a bandwidth advantage you know like you can you know like little head gestures or all the subtleties are going to be caught because you’re in the same space and you can hear each other breathing and you can pick up on the room on the tone of what’s going on better. So it’s probably better to be all 3 of you virtually present.

08:13.33
Catherine
Yeah. So yeah.

08:24.30
Craig
Then everybody’s on the same footing. So.

08:24.71
Catherine
Yes, we’re well she’s in Florida I’m in California. So yeah, ah solve that problem. Ah, but.

08:29.10
Craig
Virtual pretty good. We’re on a plane every Tuesday and we’ll meet we’ll meet in Idaho at the sounds studio. Yeah npr cool.

08:37.79
Catherine
Ah, ah yeah, yeah, so have you ever done any host. Oh go ahead. Have you ever ever done. Any co-hosting or your kind. How do you never really occurred to you.

08:43.10
Craig
What is it? No go Ahead. Have I done any host On. Um No I haven’t really oh, It’s definitely occurred to me of but they’re like. I got people and you say would you I’m like well I got people I would like it and I’m not going to say their names because I don’t want to jinx it? Um, but there are people that I know like personally who would be interested in working on projects and I’m like yeah it would be cool to do um and what I’ve thought about doing and I’ve said I’ve mentioned this idea like 3 or 4 times now in in this show. I’ve thought it would be cool to have recurring conversations I got this idea from somebody else with the same person multiple times. So not so much out of the gate was I imagining me and a co-host and another guest I was imagining having repeated conversations with the same person so it kind of becomes like a.

09:23.46
Catherine
And.

09:35.56
Craig
Doubleheaded host on mic kind of thing where the 2 of us are talking about stuff and neither of us would really be I’m going to say exploring the other for the benefit of the listeners. It’s more like us holding up some social object like well this is interesting. Let’s talk about this thing. Um and then the listeners would get a chance.

09:35.90
Catherine
Yeah.

09:54.65
Craig
Become familiar with how each of us thinks and the kinds of things that interest us, but it also lets me and this other person do more interaction and less podcasting if that makes any sense like every one of these I do I have to be a podcaster and a conversationist at the same time and I think if I could work with the same person on multiple.

10:03.69
Catherine
And.

10:14.23
Craig
You know, like yeah we did None um, then it would be way less of us podcasting more of us just having a conversation because I don’t have to keep thinking like are they going to get stuck are they going to stall. Are they going to be able to carry their side of the conversation or like who’s leading here or just be None people having a conversation with even less structure than the crazy messes that I produce now. Ah, so I’ve thought about doing that I’ve also been in funny situations where my guests turned into co-hosts on the other like I had I had None terrific women who started a nonprofit organization I I got them to sit still which in and of itself is hard. And I got them to sits til at the same time in the same place with microphones I had four mics on a tabletop. Um, and for most of that episode I mostly just sat there and went like this is awesome I’m just going to watch them like they basically had a show on their own I was occasionally like hey. Ah so I’m still here and I’m wondering if you could tell me but you know.

10:53.50
Catherine
Wow.

11:06.79
Craig
Um, so that was fun but that wasn’t like me having co-host I was like the co-host took my show which is great I like please do that more so that was I’m.

11:06.85
Catherine
Ah, super interesting. Yeah well act you know and the and the um the guest you know I’ve done work with. Interviewing and how to be a good interviewer like media training kind of things right in in answering questions and keeping it going. You know it comes to mind that Drama Improv The and yes, right, but that kind of thing and there’s a person.

11:23.66
Craig
Um.

11:32.20
Craig
Um, bright.

11:39.53
Catherine
That I was thinking of having as a guest on my show and I just called him up I mean we’re colleagues and I’ll tell you talk about pulling teeth and I was like you are not going to be a guest on my show because you don’t you don’t reciprocate right? Yeah like oh my God So you know, kind of getting that.

11:50.42
Craig
Um, way too much editing right.

11:59.20
Catherine
You know the magic in the bottle is some jazz musicians say right getting that group together so that you can really have that spark and both drive the conversation forward. It’s It’s an art I think so it’s.

12:14.44
Craig
Yeah, it is riff riffing and jazz improvisational co-creation. How many hyphens are big words do we need here. There’s very much I didn’t realize that one I started pointing microphones to people in the very beginning of but whatever year that was 17 I think um.

12:23.73
Catherine
Now.

12:33.65
Craig
When I None did it. It was just I was having cool conversations and people kept saying to me dude that was like they’d be like behind me like that was cool. You should record these and I’m like record what you know I’m just talking to somebody. They’re like no, you should oh okay, um so that was very much the.

12:41.60
Catherine
Right? Yeah, so.

12:47.64
Craig
What I’ve always called the found conversation like what I’m trying to do is just find a conversation and oh by the way it’s recorded so other people can hear it too very different in my opinion from like conducting an interview where I have a particular thread that I’m from like trying to learn something I want to know like how this gets made or why that happened that Journalistic um.

12:48.57
Catherine
Um.

13:07.62
Craig
Doesn’t call that Journalistic Bend doesn’t call to me the same way as that’s interesting tell me more about that. But.

13:11.28
Catherine
Yeah, but you are that that found conversation I made to notice that that is you you such a natural at it and and makes it really fun. It’s they’re crazy random conversations but they’re really fun to listen to right? The other.

13:17.20
Craig
I Saw that.

13:31.13
Catherine
Podcast that I love I don’t know why I love it is David Axelrod and how he interviews people they are hour long. Obviously this is a skilled super smart man right? Who’s been through training and experience and stuff like that. But I love the way he interviews people and I’ve had fun.

13:40.40
Craig
Um, name.

13:50.90
Catherine
Where he’ll interview someone and that guest has been on other shows and so I serial listen to that. Um, that’s part of you know my Ph D research and it’s really interesting to hear the different people and their styles and how this one guest they bring out different things and how in.

13:55.77
Craig
Um, yeah.

14:10.55
Catherine
Unquot media training the guest says the same frickin thing over and over again in every interview right? So it’s It’s just all interesting different ways different styles. It’s just interesting to me so I’m trying to figure out how I want to approach this right and I’m figuring that.

14:13.21
Craig
Yeah.

14:29.23
Catherine
Right now I’m figuring that out just by blithering and trying different things and just being being intent being intentional with my blithers right? As in jazz I’ve heard they all have a structure. You may not be aware of it. But there is a structure there and just trying different things in little bursts.

14:33.80
Craig
He yeah.

14:49.20
Catherine
So watch this space for.

14:49.17
Craig
What are your thoughts on timeframes and formats of like so I didn’t realize how fun the short form was going to be until I start because I started doing long form and I exclusively in person with physical mics that show up all the gear. Um, and I I think those conversations are really awesome.

15:06.26
Catherine
Yeah.

15:08.10
Craig
Um, because they’re multi for the guest and yourself they’re multi-sensory and you’re it’s the same you know inputs um, but the short form is also fun because it’s completely different. It’s like you know out of one out of the corner of my eye I’m watching the quat the timer tick like you know we’re at 15 minutes and 19 seconds and I know where we are at all times because I was like.

15:11.17
Catherine
Yeah, yeah.

15:24.14
Craig
This is the last thing I get to say and then I’m going to have a question here at the end at some point and then Catherine’s going to say I don’t know what and then somewhere around 20 minutes I’m going to hit the stop button I have no cluee. It’s going to happen. So I’m wondering have you thought about maybe you should give yourselves more space with the cohost or maybe less space like have you thought about that and what are your thoughts on how.

15:30.52
Catherine
Right? right? right? right? right? right. And.

15:42.57
Craig
Playing with the time constraints or or no time constraints might affect what your cohost does.

15:43.76
Catherine
Yeah, well no sound bite answer for that one so in went. Okay so I’ll fill up 4 minutes and 33 seconds okay so I started out with like long blizzards and my.

15:50.16
Craig
Good because you got None to fill. He.

16:02.54
Catherine
Because I was talking with friends right? I mean I’ve only done 10 and they are long like an hour long like I would talk to them for an hour and 40 minutes and so editing that down to something did do so because I was going for. So you know an hour is the most and it is I mean that’s just a. It’s a beast just a beast and so now I um, and now I’m like oh I can’t do that anymore and and plus you have your aphonic credits and all those kinds of things so I’m really working to bring it down to something more bite size 20 to 30 minutes and part of that is for me being succinct in what I’m asking and do I blither you know what? really it makes it’s making me really think much more deeply about why I’m having this conversation and what I’m doing and I’ve gone through. With my initial guests they were friends of mine and so it was really easy to talk to them and share ideas and there was a comfort level there. But now as I move on to phase two I’m not going to know the people so well and there’s a whole different level of.

17:18.26
Craig
M.

17:18.43
Catherine
Guests and they I’m sure they’ve never heard of me and they may never want to hear of me after this I mean who knows right? So ah, ah so there’s a it’s just like a whole different thing So short shorts.

17:26.83
Craig
Ah.

17:35.97
Craig
I I I think there’s magic and time constraint I would agree with you obviously my exhibit a b c d e f to you or the episodes that I’m making here and I think it. See because I tend to say that I ignore the listener I’m not thinking about what’s the thing that Catherine can bring to this conversation. You know, like before we press record. What’s the thing that Katherine can bring to this conversation that the guests are going to find most I’m not. That’s not what I do anymore maybe me in the very beginning but now I’m just like I don’t care like I’m just.

18:05.74
Catherine
Yeah.

18:10.73
Craig
Happen to be recording. But I’m really just interested in like talking to this person who’s in front of me today and then I think if I make them an hour and a half I have just as much fun, but it’s way harder for the guests to like rationalize? Oh no, this guy I’ll just give him an hour a time that’s a lot of time.

18:25.82
Catherine
Right? yeah.

18:28.90
Craig
So I think it’s much nicer for the guests to say can I have a half an hour and we’ll try to get 20 minutes and then obviously I’m also finding the the listeners respond like oh thank you like I can do 20 minutes that’s cool. So yeah, there’s a lot of magic in short in my opinion and not.

18:32.68
Catherine
Yeah.

18:39.15
Catherine
Yeah.

18:45.27
Craig
I’m going to say artificially short, not like I trimmed it down to 20 minutes um but like 2 people trying to be mindful of like what can we get done in 20 minutes or what can we create in 20 minutes or what can we share. So I think that’s yeah I think you got a good handle on that there. Yeah.

18:54.18
Catherine
Yes, yeah, so thank you for this master class right? So I’m gonna I you’ve helped me noodle through a lot of these questions that are kind of emergent as I think more about this and.

19:05.67
Craig
Ah, earth.

19:11.56
Craig
Um, it’s see and so we were just talking about time constraints. But there’s also a constraint I call it a Bandwidth constraint because I’m a nerdy geek. You cannot I can talk really fast. Most people can talk pretty fast but nobody can talk anywhere near the speed that they think at.

19:12.73
Catherine
Right? so.

19:27.86
Catherine
Yeah, yeah.

19:30.15
Craig
So being forced to take the craziness in one’s head and like turn it into a sense saying and like as rarely as possible. That’s a skill that forces you to think more clearly. It’s almost as good as writing I believe in terms of if you can’t write Clearly, you don’t think as clearly as you think you think I believe that’s Avana good quote.

19:42.36
Catherine
So.

19:49.73
Craig
Um, so I love Also the time makes me do I Really want to say that I mean that’s a funny story but do we really need it right here that kind of editorial stuff too I’ll be curious to see.

19:52.86
Catherine
So yeah I think um, it’s.

20:01.31
Craig
Report back and tell me how your cohost does because sometimes you get a co-host and you’re just like yo this version talks a lot. What’s going on. They’re just like behind you on that warning curve.

20:04.76
Catherine
Yeah, she does and um I know we’re at 20 minutes so I one of the things that’s nice about a cohort host is um that ability when you’re holding space yourself, you’ve got to.

20:13.75
Craig
We can go a little more. Ah.

20:24.43
Catherine
Multitask and have all of those things going keeping the conversation going the next question all of that behind the scenene multitasking and we’ll see with a co-host if I can quote Unquote Unburden some of that with my cohost. Or do I feel that that is another entity. Yeah I have two casts. Ah so will you know a life is full of these little experience.

20:43.78
Craig
You have 2 guests. Yeah, that would definitely have to follow up on this i. Yeah, we definitely have to ah be sure you post when you when you put that one when you put the None one of those out definitely post that somewhere in Podcom. So We can see it I’d like to hear how that works Out. Um and we probably need to circle back and talk about you know is it more editing work than the than the messes you make on your own or is it easier like.

21:03.91
Catherine
Yeah.

21:10.57
Catherine
Yeah, yeah, for sure, it’ll be really interesting.

21:13.16
Craig
There’s be a lot of interesting stuff to come out of that experiment who I as much as I hate to say it I will just say thanks that was terrific. It was a pleasure to get a chance to chat? Um, hope you enjoyed it have as much as I enjoyed it. So thanks again.

21:28.92
Catherine
Thank you Craig for your master class. Love it. Thanks.

1 Like

Wow!

A @craigconstantine masterclass! And you thought you were posing as a host! It was so fun to chat with you and of course super helpful to get your thoughts on my concept of co-hosting. Thx for the opportunity to be on the show.

And a shout out to others: I’m going to be co-hosting a series of 5 (seems like a nice number) episodes with a colleague … any suggestions or warnings?

1 Like