The Podcast Life is a newsletter by Deanna Chapman that helps you create a great podcast.

Last week, I was joined by Amanda McLoughlin to talk about how here company Multitude fosters community and how the business operates as both a podcast collective and a production company.

Full disclosure: I do some freelance work with Multitude on the production side. That said, it was a great chat and I loved getting to know more about the company.

Bonus content!

Amanda gave me a few extra minutes to ask some questions about Attach Your Resume, a podcast she does with her partner Eric that is all about jobs within the digital media landscape. It’s a great reminder to create the things you want to see. (The interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.)

Deanna: I wanted to talk about Attach Your Résumé because I noticed something different with this show as an interview show in your episode, you informed me that you and Eric are married. So that explains some of the different co host vibe that I was picking up on.

But what you guys do with Attach Your Résumé is you do this post mortem at the beginning of the episode and then go into the interview, which I thought was really clever some people do a post mortem or a debrief after they've done the interview. And it's kind of just a recap of what they liked or didn't like about the conversation.

Usually what they liked about the conversation. Instead, it acts as a recap. sort of an introduction to the interview. How did you guys come up with that format and what led to the vibe of the show in general?

Amanda: Eric and I both wanted to have a digital creator interview podcast where we could talk to creators that we admire, that we work with, whose careers we find interesting.

We have different perspectives and styles and creators that interest us, but neither of us wanted to do the show alone. We were inspired by this podcast. Tape, have you ever heard of Tape? It was by Mickey Capper and Mooj Zadie it's almost impossible to find online anymore.

You have to go to Mickey Capper's personal portfolio and click to an unlisted SoundCloud playlist.

Deanna: I use Overcast to listen and I was just like, why won't it download the episodes? What is happening?

Amanda: Go to mickeycapper.com and go through the portfolio. They had a similar structure where they would alternate which co host did the interviews. It was very insider baseball, very for public radio people who wanted to get into the public radio world. But each episode started with the host who didn't listen, listening and then saying something they liked or observed about the episode. We love that because it makes it clear there's continuity between episodes. You're not just randomly hearing from only me or only Eric week to week. We tend to alternate who does which interviews. And I have things to say about interviews I'm not in and vice versa.

Eric has great observations. We also help each other prepare questions. So [00:02:00] before the interviews, Eric, myself, and our producer Brandon Grugle are giving feedback about what the questions are. We're excited and invested to see how the interview actually ended up happening.

So I think at its best, like, this allows us to recap the creator. Not everybody's going to know every creator we talk about. Give important biographical information, like where they work or what the history of something was. I have to say Hank Green popularized the video blog. Because people might not necessarily know.

And then you get to have me and Eric interact a bit, which, I am definitely biased, but I think we have a good rapport and interesting things to say to each other. We really think of it as like the preface or the foreword of a book where we tell you something to look out for, reflect a little bit on the experience, but leave most of it for you to get and then end the interview as a unit of its own where we don't at the end come back in and be like, “thanks for listening.”

We let the interview land in the place where the conversation ended.

Deanna: I love that. And I love the reference to a foreword or preface as a big reader personally. What is your process for getting guests on the show?

You mentioned alternating interviews, so it's not the two of you interviewing each guest, but how do you decide? Who does the interview if there's someone you both want to talk to?

Amanda: We ask each other who would do a more interesting interview. So far, we haven't had a ton of ambiguity around most guests.

For the most part, Eric and I say to each other, this is somebody I'd be interested in talking to. Then we both help the other one determine: Are they a good talker? Are they going to be able to reflect openly about their jobs in digital media, which is a prerequisite of the show?

There are tons of people whose jobs I think are fascinating, but don't necessarily want to or can reflect on the ups and downs of being that job. Mostly it's reaching out if we have a personal connection a couple of cold emails sometimes or asking a friend, friend of a friend to be like, “Oh, Taylor Lorenz, will you come on?”

And she said yes. Eight years into podcasting, we have done a ton of guest booking, but it's great to just have that collaborator to be able to bounce off of. At least for me, almost all the time, my first idea is surface level. And then I get feedback from Eric and Brandon like, “what do you mean by that question?”

Or like, what do you want to get at with this person? What is the thesis statement or the hypothesis of this interview before going in and what is it afterward? I love the chance to be able to refine those skills, but ultimately in a conversation I think it's easier to open up to one person a lot of the time either Eric or I are fans of their work or know these people or have a strong personal interest in what it is they're bringing so you don't get the vibe that one co host is super plugged in and one is zoning out which sucks as a guest.

Deanna: Thank you so much for that insight into how you guys create Attach Your Résumé and everyone should definitely go check it out.

If you enjoyed this newsletter and really want to level up your podcast, I interview the smartest people in the business. I’m always looking for the best ways to help you grow your podcast. So be sure to subscribe and share this with a friend! And if there’s something you’d like to see covered, reply to this email.