Podcaster's Portal: the interview relationship

The interview relationship

IN THIS ARTICLE

It's important to understand the three-way relationship that takes place in a typical interview
Within this relationship, understanding your role is critical

By Jonathan Halls

The choice you make as an interviewer is with whom you establish the relationship. Of course, one party has to be the listener. But do you set the relationship up to exist either between the listener and you, or the listener and your guest?

In personality talk radio - especially ‘shock jock’ style – the relationship exists between the listener and the presenter. This changes the role of the contributor to be merely a prop for the presenter’s ego. His or her role is to be drawn into the conversation to prop up the presenter.

In factual radio and audio, the relationship should exist between the listener and your guest. That means you’re secondary to the guest as far as your listener is concerned. Your role is one of facilitator.

The reason this distinction is important is that it helps you distinguish your role in the podcast interview. Are you a personality or are you a facilitator? We’ll focus on the factual interview style.

Your Role as Podcast Interviewer

As a factual interviewer, your job as a podcaster is to ask as many questions or as few questions as you have to, to get your interviewee to make relevant and useful comments to your listener. That means you are responsible for a number of things.

You coach the interviewee to sound acceptable on the microphone.
You ask the interviewee questions to elicit comments. That means if they clam up, you need to prompt or push them to come up with answers.
If your interviewee is a chatterbox, you can sit back and let her or him talk. However, if she or he goes off track, your role is to jump in and bring the comments back on track.
The questions you ask are on behalf of your listeners. They should not be questions that reflect your hobby, opinions or interests. Your role is to represent the listener to your interviewee.

A Few Comments on the Interview Relationship

When you interview someone for audio, you are adding a few more responsibilities to the process. Your first purpose is to get them to say something newsworthy. But your second is to make sure they sound good on audio.

You are responsible for making your guest feel at ease. The microphone can threaten some people. So before you start asking questions, you need to develop a rapport that puts them at ease to answer your questions.

You need to listen to their responses from an audio perspective. Think about the characteristics of audio. Expression should be encouraged. But make sure that what your interviewee says is easy on the ears.

You’ll remember our discussions in writing for audio that expressions like “attacks on tourists,” can sound like “a tax on tourists.” Listen for expressions like this. When your interviewee uses expressions that could be easily confused, ask them to clarify the expressions.

Don’t put words into your interviewee’s mouth. Closed questions take the magic out of an audio interview and it sounds clumsy for an interviewer to be asking, “So you really don’t think it was a successful outcome?” when you could ask, “How successful was the outcome?” This second question could elicit the responses, “It was awful,” or “We failed to meet our targets,” which make great audio.