Continuing Studies: Higher Ed Podcasting

Neil McPhedran: Welcome to Continuing
Studies, a podcast for higher

education podcasters who want to
learn, connect, and to get inspired.

I'm Neil McPhedran, founder of Higher
Ed Pods and Podium podcast company.

Jennifer-Lee: And I'm Jennifer
Lee, founder of JPod Creations.

If you're podcasting in
higher ed, you are not alone.

There is a fast growing
community out there and we're

here to help you tap into it.

Neil McPhedran: That's right Jen.

And for Higher Ed Pod Con in
July in Cleveland, the cutoff for

speaker submissions is the end
of February, so that's coming up.

We've got a whole bunch of really
good ones in, but 'cause we're going

to two days, we've got that many more
slots and so get your submissions in.

The website, higheredpodcon.com
has all the details.

If you have any questions,
happy to answer it.

If you're thinking about something
and you're not quite sure, reach out.

I would love to chat with you about this.

Jennifer-Lee: Yeah.

And.

Ideas as well for the show.

If there's anything that, uh,

Neil McPhedran: our show

Jennifer-Lee: but our show,
we'd love to hear from you too.

And speaking of ideas for Higher
Ed Pod Con , actually one of our

guests today is going to submit.

I'm really excited because we
have people that we interviewed.

I wanna say they were
one of the first five,

Neil McPhedran: one of
our first five episodes.

Jennifer-Lee: Neil and I have
worked with them since on

their podcast Innovation Fuel.

So in this episode we talk to
Dave Keighron and Dr. Gelareh

Farhadian, who has had Innovation
Fuel, the podcast for five years.

They were working under
University Canada West.

I've been with them for over four
years, bringing their podcast

to life on the production side.

Neil McPhedran: The last four have have
been much better than the first season.

Jennifer-Lee: Oh, thank you.

That was a great answer.

Good answer.

This is co-host synergy and that's what
I learned about Dave and Gelareh, they

have great co-host synergy as well.

And Neil, you've even helped us recently
do the big move because it was time to

move on from University of Canada West
and Neil, along with the awesome people

at Podium Podcast Co, and JPod Creations,
and we moved them to be their own entity

where they've created their own business.

So

Neil McPhedran: yeah, that was quite
the projects actually, Jen, you've

recently helped them make another move,
which has moved their hosting over to

TrueFans, Sam Sethi's new hosting product.

I think that's super exciting.

Jennifer-Lee: Yeah, I'm really excited.

Sam has been amazing at helping us,
uh, move it over and we're learning.

It's a good thing to learn and this
is something for our audience that,

if you are creating a podcast now
with a particular institution or a

company, your podcast could change
hands or move on to different people.

And if you can't just move a podcast
simply by putting another platform.

So, lot lots to dig into
with Dave and Gelareh.

and I'm really excited because it's
been a few years and there's been quite

a few changes lots to catch up on.

Neil McPhedran: So much to catch up on.

let's jump into our chat.

Jennifer-Lee: So how are you
guys today, Dave and Gelareh?

Dave Keighron: Amazing.

Glad to be back here and glad to share
our adventure 'cause we've been on an

adventure, a lot of adventures and,
and seen some really unique stories

along the way and now we're taking
those and we're accelerating them.

So

Gelareh Farhadian: Thank you guys.

First, I want to send my condolences to my
people of Iran for this modern massacre.

Thanks for being here guys.

Thank you very much.

Neil McPhedran: Thank you for
re reminding us about that too.

Yeah.

So maybe since we last met with you
but why don't you just give us the

top line and then let's dig into
some of these evolutions that you

guys have encountered along the way.

Dave Keighron: So when we first started
this journey, we saw a gap in the

market and the gap in the market was
that we wanted these small businesses

coming in, and their stories coming
into the classroom and interacting

with students because a lot of the
domestic based product in Canada is

small businesses, medium businesses.

We wanna to bring those
into the classroom.

Fast forward from that, since we last
chatted, we had lots of success that

we've interviewed lots of different
companies that have gone on to do

some really great things and we're
like, oh my God, we gotta take those.

Tell their story further.

We need to bring those and show
how those businesses have evolved.

And Gelareh came up with a great idea
to do that and is through publication

and peer review publication.

So we brought that in and we started
taking those stories after the fact,

three, six months later, bringing them
back and then taking 'em into publication

and having them published in big journals
like Sage and Emeralds, Ivey, ILE School

of Business where we're gonna, a variety
of different places where we've been

very successful in getting these across.

And from that, we also thought, hey,
the other part that we're really

struggling with is how do we get this
back into the classroom for faculty

to be able to engage with further?

And so we've now created a thing called
Innovation Fuel Studio, where we use

artificial intelligence to bring it back
into the classroom and help the faculties

activate these cases and activate
the students in playing with them.

Gelareh Farhadian: I want to add that is,
so Innovation Fuel is started to build

cases studies, you know, that's was the
first objective of the Innovation Fuel.

So the cases studies are just a
structured narrative and showing

challenges of entrepreneur or founder
or directors on the special issues.

And then it is how we can connect
them to the theories as well.

When we start writing the cases that
was because we had those questions

around the structures, questions
that around theories as well, right?

So it was easy for us to turn them in
the written cases and go to the peer

reviewed platform like Sage, Ivey, Emerald
or Case Centers, so those are as well.

However, we know that the generative
AI come with the challenges for faculty

that they actually really, really want
make sure students are learning and

there is going to be critical thinking.

There is two mode as the day
sets a faculty mode, so they have

the case through the podcast.

Or in the teaching node of
the published case study.

So they have a faculty mode.

When they unlock the faculty mode,
they can create assignments, lesson

plans, rubrics, and also they can
build role play with the founder

or the C or director as well.

So in the student mode, a student will
say that, okay, I'm working on this case.

Automatic, the case will pop up.

And it's a summary and the link of the
case, the student can listen to that one.

They will say that, okay, now I want
to work on this, the first challenge.

And then they have to present their
recommendation to the CEO through

the ai, and they have to start
roleplaying and try to convince

the CEO of their presentations.

We try to simulate the role play with
the founder, CEO or directors, that

who was the host of the case, and
that is students will never, ever,

ever get the solutions through the ai.

They just try to convince
it with the facts data.

They can bring it from the case or
from the publicly available data.

Neil McPhedran: Wow.

There's so much there.

It's amazing sort of where you guys
have gone since we last chatted.

I wanna kinda roll back a little
bit here and click on some of

these things along your path.

'cause you've put a lot together here.

So when we chatted with you last, what
you were doing was you were taking the

traditional educational way for business
school of case studies and each one

of those was an episode, essentially.

So each episode was a case study.

Before we kinda jump back into the
AI stuff, I think what's interesting

is, 'cause we've talked about this
on some of our previous episodes here

about the scholarly output of podcasts
or your podcast being the scholarly

output, which is what you were doing.

But since we last spoke with you,
you've taken this extra step of

putting it through peer review and
getting it submitted to journals.

Can you tell us a little
bit more about that?

Like that, that is super interesting
'cause there's a lot of people

talking about that right now.

Gelareh Farhadian: There is
several ways you can do, put

your podcast as a scholarly work.

So one thing is that you find several
peer review to review all your episodes.

And they say that, okay, we, we reviewed
this episode and it's a theoretically

rigor as well, and also is academic rigor.

And then the questions are
not biased, not the leading.

So, and those are the way you can peer
reviewed your own podcast only, so that

will be part of your scholarly work.

So when you, for example, record the
episode on February, for example,

2026, in six months later or a year
later, you have to go back to that

same episode and see what was the
development of this case, right?

So that can be your story and narrative
for written cases, study as well.

And then what challenges they are
facing and the teaching note as well.

So what Dave and I did to prove it.

So we brought those written cases
to our classrooms and actually

used it and refine it to make sure
that it's doable in the classroom.

So it's a 90 minutes or it's a
going to be group assignments.

So it's very important you
test your own cases before even

thinking about it can go further.

But the other ways of doing this is,
that's what Dave and I are doing,

working on several different papers.

Papers about, for example, connecting
these entrepreneurial discourse theories.

So this is on several papers
we are either with be submitted

or we are working to finish the
manuscripts of those one sets Datas.

What is a trend, for example, regarding
SDG entrepreneurship, constraints

in BC or Canada or ecosystems, or
another paper that we are working is

about how the podcast can impact a
student learning in the classroom.

So what we did over a year, we exposed
specific classrooms with the episodes and

then we had go through this methodology
of before we ring and afters, we have

different surveys, and then focus
group with the students to see how

it's going to impact their learning.

It is really important how you can
bring those content because you are

creating lots of data and information
and content, how you're going to

connect them, how you're going to
find the dots between them, not just

on the isolated episodes as well.

And also it's because you
want those good narratives.

is really important to see what your
podcast trying to achieve regarding

the learning of the students, right.

And then it can find good data and

Dave Keighron: like Gelareh said, it's
the s opportunity for future learning.

Hey, we went through this
element over the last five years.

We peer reviewed these elements.

We'd also taking study from this element.

To see, Hey.

Neil McPhedran: Mm-hmm.

Dave Keighron: What is a better practice
for the way we can deliver this?

How can we teach entrepreneurship better?

How can we teach marketing better?

And even to the point is that we're
going, the next evolution that Jen

sort of alluded to is we have another
podcast called Marketing Corner Talks.

It's focused on marketing.

We have another podcast called Education
Action where it's focused on the

practice of education and the teaching
of experiential learning in those

elements and all with the same elements.

How do we leverage
artificial intelligence?

How do we Leverage peer review.

How do we leverage study in order to
enhance that classroom experience?

Jennifer-Lee: And Gelareh's
been so good at getting all

these papers in the journals.

Uh, I know about one of them.

Can you tell us a little bit
about how you got into London?

Gelareh Farhadian: So when we wanted
to publish a case, we, you are

thinking about which venue is your
best and can get more attention of it.

So when you publish your case,
you can see that how many people

are using it actually, right?

And also you always need a consent
from the founder as well, right?

So to publish their cases, uh, unless, for
example, many case venue, they are looking

what happened next or something that it's
not in this publicly available, right?

So if you're using something very
internal and ask the founder to tell

something in confidence to you in
this email or, but their own word,

you can use it in teaching notes.

So when you're doing it, you need to
have a concept from the founder as well.

So that was another process
and that was really good.

Dave Keighron: One other thing to
note here is that one of the things

that we're doing and what podcast
has the advantage of doing is

that we have up to date content.

One of the challenges that we face as
faculty is the content you're getting

sometimes is so way outdated that it
doesn't have any relevancy anymore.

So in this element and building these
is creating a funnel of our library or

resources of continuously updated content.

That's going to be more relevant
to students and more connected

to what their future's gonna be.

Neil McPhedran: Oh, interesting.

So do they have to pay to
put these submissions forward

for some of these journals?

Gelareh Farhadian: We
never faced this one.

So even we have these
open access journals.

Mm-hmm.

We never faced something they want to pay.

And also some venue
actually pay you to do it,

Neil McPhedran: right?

Yeah, more so they should.

And so is there a separate designation
for it being a podcast versus a written

or a more traditional monograph?

Gelareh Farhadian: What
do you mean designations?

Neil McPhedran: Oh, I just like,
like how do they categorize it?

Like, like if, if the output is the
podcast, like how does that, does

it, is it differentiated when you,
when I go into the case center, for

example, and they've sort of, of
course, so they're actively grouping

together podcasts as a scholarly out.

Gelareh Farhadian: I mean, again, just by.

You know what is a scholarly output
is, is it's about peer reviewed, right?

Yeah.

So you need someone review your
work and say that it's rigor,

it's methodology, correct?

Is it ethical?

All of those stuff, right?

So by just recording your podcast,
you cannot count as your scholarly

work unless it'll be peer reviewed.

Again, so one way of doing it is that each
podcast as we do is a written case, right?

So some of them, for example, Emerald,
they have three phase of three different

people review your work, right?

So it may, that's why it takes time.

So for example, if you submit your
case today in any platform, Ivey,

Sage, Emerald, even International Open
Access journal, I mean all of them.

It may takes minimum
six months to finish it.

Sometimes a year, right?

Neil McPhedran: Yeah.

Gelareh Farhadian: So that is a, you
may see it as a constraint for sure.

That's why it's giving this
peer review and its count as

your scholarly work, right?

Mm-hmm.

But we don't want just to stop and
wait for one year to get published.

So that's why you try
recording the episode.

And also, again, you need
to find a place that.

Review podcasts, academic podcasts.

To review episode, all the episodes
not just one episode and written one.

Neil McPhedran: Mm. Okay.

Jennifer-Lee: That's a lot of work.

Neil McPhedran: Yeah.

Yeah.

Gelareh Farhadian: It's, you
need a lot of patient.

Neil McPhedran: Well, that's the process.

I mean, overall, like for
submitting to these journals, right?

I mean, it is.

It's a system that's
been built over decades

Gelareh Farhadian: that's reliable.

That's why you can say that it is, when
something come published from them, it's

been reviewed several time, and some
people will put the stamp on set and

say that this is valid, it's reliable.

Dave Keighron: Mm-hmm.

Gelareh Farhadian: Right.

Yeah.

If the self, if it's just
the self-published, who can

say it's valid, reliable.

Who can say that?

Neil McPhedran: Interesting, interesting.

So, okay, so maybe we should, let's
dig back into the next evolution,

which is back to this AI whole
process you guys have developed.

That's super, super interesting.

So you're then taking these cases
and you've created this whole

AI wrapper around it basically.

Dave Keighron: So like one of
the challenges is how do you get

it back in the classroom again?

Like how do you get that
activated in the classroom?

And so AI technology is here
now we gotta figure out how to

use AI technology within, and,
and Gelareh makes some points.

So we've been very purposeful
and very meaningful here.

'cause.

Ethics and ethical use of this element,
and especially in institutions mm-hmm.

Has been very challenging and trying to
figure out the, navigate that element.

And so we've already found a technology
that's within AI called RAG technology,

and she can talk to you about the rag
technology piece, but how do we put

barriers around this element and still
bring it back in the classroom where

the faculty can use it to develop these
cases to to assignments, and then where

students can actually interact with it.

So.

Neil McPhedran: I love that
full circle, if you will.

So it's for the classroom and then
it's going through a whole peer review,

get it published into a journal, and
then you're taking it back into the

classroom to apply and to learn and
to probably evolve things as you go.

Gelareh Farhadian: It is.

And also just say that it is, it's
not just for faculty and a student.

Also, it has to be benefit for
entrepreneurs and CEO or founders to come

to be played the role in these ecosystem.

Right?

Another things for them, it's not only
be heard in a different platforms,

not just a podcast, but also be in
the academic journals as well, and.

They can get benefit from the
results of those, what students

provide or faculty can provide it.

And see that's, I mean, try to
resolve their challenges and also

even so, we are trying the next step.

We are building a chat
bot for our episodes.

We have the contents of all episodes.

Neil McPhedran: Smart.

Gelareh Farhadian: You can ask questions
about, for example, the challenge.

I have challenge of this, for example,
fundraising in Canada, so we can

give you the several episode that is
related to that one as well, so you

as an entrepreneur can listen to the
other entrepreneurs and see that's how

they resolved their issues in about
fundraisings and how they did it.

And the same chatbot can work for
faculty as well to find, for example,

they say that I want to have a cases
related to technology adaptation

model, and then say that, okay.

These are the cases can
be related to those.

We are in the middle of developments.

We're in testing phase.

Actually you're testing to
see what the next step will be

connecting to the InnovationFuel.Ca

Jennifer-Lee: And question, because
I know that Dave and I talked about

this before, and you see this as
something that's gonna become like a

subscription services for teachers.

Dave Keighron: Yeah.

So we're at the post that again, at
the beginning stages of this, someone

we're testing to see what really, 'cause
again, we're solving a problem and we're

trying to find solutions for a problem.

We gotta put the user in there and
figure out what works best for the user.

And I think in this early stage, yes.

Eventually we gotta figure out how
to monetize it in a different way.

And we've talked about the membership
subscription based element, but yeah,

we're still, we're still early days.

Neil McPhedran: Yeah.

Well, I, I, I think what's great is
that so often academic work research.

In this case, business, case studies
get, go into these journals and they it,

and it just stays in the academic world.

I love how you, you what you guys are
not bringing it back into the classroom,

but the point you just made, which
just really resonated with me is,

is like there's making it accessible
for outside of the classroom for the

entrepreneurs, the practical side of it.

So it's like, it's like making all
this research and these learnings and

these insights open to the general.

In, you know, audience, in this
case entrepreneurial world, which is

Gelareh Farhadian: Yeah,

Neil McPhedran: super cool.

Gelareh Farhadian: It's, it's often is
that when you look at the academy outputs

papers or cases study, maybe it won't
be much for the public audience, right?

But when it's come talking about some
narratives, it's one entrepreneur

telling their experience with the wording
of the other entrepreneurs, it can

resonate or it can be useful for them.

Jennifer-Lee: I think it's just so
cool because like you're really taking

the words off the page, and like you
said, Gelareh, you're able to hear the

authenticity of the entrepreneur's story.

You're taking it to the next level.

It's not just you reading it, it's
actually hearing their emotion.

And it's hard.

It's hard.

So it'd be nice to have
a resource like that.

And one thing before we
go, just another piece.

We didn't touch on something else.

With Innovation Fuel.

Dave, something you and I have been
working on with Innovation Fuel is

Douglas College is taking our episodes
and putting it in their library.

Neil McPhedran: Oh Cool.

Jennifer-Lee: Tell us a little about that.

Dave Keighron: We actually were involved
in a library at UCW with a podcast

before, and now they're going in.

Douglas is just taking over
and taking those further into

the library to the journal.

Gelareh's the best one
to explain how this works

Gelareh Farhadian: When you want to see
your episode in your Google Scholar,

so you cannot just add manually.

Yes you can, but it's
not very valuable, right?

So you need to have a publisher,
an academic publisher.

You're like a universities,
and they're open library.

So it's like a academic
home for your episodes.

When you have that episode, an academic
library, then automatically it'll

shows in your Google Scholar and it
can shows as your scholarly work.

Jennifer-Lee: I forget just 'cause
I'm working with a, a law on

all these different projects and
it's been really exciting to work

with you guys for over four years
and see how you guys have grown.

Neil McPhedran: But, and we'll put links
to, we'll make sure that we've, we get.

It links to everything we just talked
about here, so I think it would be

great for people to see this in action.

So how does this look in the
Douglas College Library and any,

anything you sort of wanna share?

I know stuff's in iteration, so we
probably can't share everything but.

We will share as much as we can in
the show notes, links to all this

amazing stuff you guys are building.

Gelareh Farhadian: You can find
the, I will share the innovation

field studio link with you.

However, it's so easy if you
k, go to your chat GPT and

just in the apps search for us.

Yes.

In You've got a very, yeah.

Innovation Fuel Studio just will comes up.

Neil McPhedran: Awesome.

Okay, that's great too.

Well, I think this has been
a fantastic conversation.

I mean, congratulations on so many
things that you've accomplished since

we last spoke and we're excited to
keep seeing your progress and we'll

have to get you back on another
60 some odd episodes basically.

'cause I hope you'll have to hear
how you've continued to train

the AI and to continue to move
forward with all exciting things.

You've,

Jennifer-Lee: thank you guys so much.

Thank you.

Gelareh Farhadian: Thanks.

Thank you.

Bye.

Jennifer-Lee: I'm still trying to
wrap my head around what they're

doing and I work with them daily.

I think what they're doing is amazing.

Neil McPhedran: Wow.

That was a conversation jam
packed with information.

Gelareh has so many ideas and she's
doing so many cool things, Dave too,

but Gallari really had some stuff
that she really shared with us here.

I love that.

Jennifer-Lee: I think their whole
idea is brilliant, and I think like

a lot of the people that we've had on
our podcast recently, they're kind of

cutting edge and, and they're doing the
groundwork that's gonna lead to some

really neat innovations in the future
when it comes to higher ed podcasting.

Neil McPhedran: yeah, I totally agree.

Jen.

It's interesting how our last few episodes
have really been looking at a little bit

more forward facing future and ways to use
podcasting from an academic, scholarly,

teaching perspective, and I think that's
what's super exciting about this space.

Not only is podcasting such an amazing
channel form for folks in higher

education, it is also a platform
that is part of the teaching process.

And is attached to so much that is
going on in the AI world as well, too.

Great episode.

Thank you for bringing them back on, Jen.

Jennifer-Lee: it's also neat to just
see how we're archiving history now

and we're documenting it, like the fact
that Douglas College is on board and

taking all their podcast episodes and
putting them in their audio library.

So I think it's just a really neat
thing that we're starting to see.

Neil McPhedran: That's great.

Yeah, I totally agree.

Jennifer-Lee: Thank you for tuning
into the Continuing Studies podcast, a

podcast for higher education podcasters.

We hope you found this episode
informative and inspiring.

If you enjoyed the show, we encourage
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But if you found this episode pretty
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We also invite you to join your peers on
higher ed pods.com, where you can connect

with other podcasters in higher education
and learn from others in the field.

Thank you for being part of our community.

We look forward to continue to bring
new, valuable insights in conversations

around higher education podcasts.

See you on the next episode.

Neil McPhedran: Bye-bye.