Continuing Studies: for Higher Ed Podcasters

[00:00:00] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: Welcome to Continuing Studies, a podcast for higher education podcasters. In each episode, we talk to a university podcaster to ask some questions, get answers, and share tips and ideas about higher education podcasting. Hi, I'm Jennifer Lee. I'm a radio broadcaster and a podcaster.
[00:00:21] Neil McPhedran: And I'm Neil McPhedran. I've come to podcasting after 25 years in the digital agency world. Together, we've hosted, executive produced, and launched [00:00:30] seven, and counting, higher education podcasts. Please remember to follow Continuing Studies in your listening app of choice and drop us a rating and or a review. We'd love to hear your feedback. While you're at it, also join the University Podcaster Network on LinkedIn.
[00:00:45] Okay, Jen. So, today we are interviewing Craig Van Slyke. Craig and I actually met at Podcast Movement in Dallas a year ago and here we are one year later interviewing him. Really shows you the testament of the folks we meet at [00:01:00] Podcast Movement and it's not always about those immediate connections but planting some seeds and here we are one year later having a fantastic conversation with Craig.
[00:01:09] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: And I'm sad that I missed him last year, but I'm really happy to interview him now. He's got three podcasts, which we know is a lot of work, so I can't wait to ask him about it. And he's got one that we're going to focus on today because he said so much great information. We're going to talk about Cyber Ways today.
[00:01:28] Talks about like all the stuff that you have about yourself on the internet. And then of course, join us for another, this is going to be a part two, and we're going to dive into more podcasting with Craig.
[00:01:41] Neil McPhedran: That's right, Jen. We actually have probably talked to him for about an hour, so we're going to break this into two episodes, and our next episode, we're going to focus on one of his other podcasts.
[00:01:50] But today, as you mentioned, we're talking about a podcast called the Cyber Ways. This is really an interesting approach to academic podcasting. Essentially, what Craig and his co host do here is take those meaty, chewy, academic papers, that let's be honest, very few people read, but what they're doing is they're interviewing their colleagues who have written these and they're really breaking it down for a wider audience.
[00:02:23] So in this case, uh, as you mentioned, Craig teaches cybersecurity. So, they really dive into different corners of the cyber security world. And I actually found that, you know, I was really interested in this. I don't think it's even just for, you know, professionals who work in the business, taking these complicated papers, open them up for a wider audience that, that may be interested.
[00:02:46] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: It's not just for the professionals, but it's. Also for us too, that we really should know this information because it's creepy.
[00:02:53] Neil McPhedran: I think there's some good learnings in here. Obviously, we're going a little bit deeper on cybersecurity here, but I think [00:03:00] there's some really good learnings for other fields of the academic world. This use of podcasting is a fascinating channel for academics to, you know, to really break down and to open up their research to a wider audience.
[00:03:13] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: For us regular people to understand.
[00:03:18] Neil McPhedran: Us regulars.
[00:03:19] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: Us regulars. I need to know how my credit card information is going to get stolen. So let's, uh, get started and bring Craig on.
[00:03:35] Neil McPhedran: Craig Van Slyke is Mike McAllister, Eminent Scholar Chair in Information Systems at Louisiana Tech University. Prior to joining Tech, he was Professor and Dean at WA Frank. College of Business at Northern Arizona University. He has also held faculty positions at St. Louis University, University of Central Florida, and Ohio University. He holds a PhD in [00:04:00] information systems from the University of South Florida, Dr. Van Slyke has published over 30 articles in respected academic journals. Welcome Craig.
[00:04:09] Craig Van Slyke: All right. Thanks for having me on. I appreciate it.
[00:04:12] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: Well, Craig, I'm sorry I missed you last year because I've heard that you are such a great time, but we're excited to have you here on the podcast.
[00:04:20] I was listening to your podcast earlier, Cyber Ways, and you have such a soothing voice, so I can see why you have so many podcasts, because you're a great podcaster. Can you tell us a little bit about each of your podcasts and why you have three, because that's a lot of work as we know in the podcast world.
[00:04:38] Craig Van Slyke: Sure. It's a, it's an addiction, I guess. So, the first one is Live Well and Flourish. That's a personal, I call it a purpose project. My purpose in life is to help others live successful, meaningful lives, and my little podcast, Live Well and Flourish, is one way to do that. So, I try to blend, uh, psychology, philosophy, to create practical wisdom to help people live excellent lives.
[00:05:02] Well, once I got the gear and started to learn to do some editing and kind of how all of this worked, it occurred to me that really, we could use a podcast for our Information Assurance Center at Louisiana Tech University and that, that's just a fancy way to say cyber security. So, we, we focus on behavioral aspects of cyber security and one of the things that we want to do is kind of help people that are out there having to practice security listen to what's coming out of the, the academic research world.
[00:05:31] And I don't know if you've ever tried to read an academic research paper. To say they're thick and boring and detailed would be a gross understatement. And so, they're really, I mean, they're not meant for practitioners to read. And so, what we try to do with Cyber Ways, podcast through the Information Assurance Center, is it's a vehicle for us to get the word out about this cutting edge, uh, Cybersecurity research.
[00:05:55] And so my co host, Tom Stafford, who's also an eminent scholar at tech, is an old radio guy. He was a radio DJ in his younger days. And so, Tom and I started talking about it and said, well, let's start this podcast. And so, we're, matter of fact, in a few weeks, we'll be coming up on two years. So, yeah, it's, uh, it's been nice. Uh, it's really done a good job for us.
[00:06:16] And then, once you have two, you know, it's kind of like a cookie, right? You never have that first cookie, you're probably okay. You have that first cookie, and that second one starts to look pretty good, and then that third one starts to look pretty good.
[00:06:27] And so, yeah, I co author a textbook, 'Information Systems for Business, An Experiential Approach', with France Bélanger of Virginia Tech and Rob Crossler of Washington State. It comes out from Prospect Press. And I thought, you know, maybe we could have a podcast for the book where I take and just kind of get to the essence of each chapter. So that led to the third podcast, which is, you know, out there for students that are using our book. I'm trying to hold the line at three. I think that's enough. Three cookies is enough.
[00:06:59] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: Who knows, maybe you'll have another one after this podcast. Also, my background is broadcasting, so I always love it when the co host is somebody from a broadcasting background. Tom also has a great voice and I understand why now. But the thing is, you may have these three podcasts. Each of them are used for specific purposes. Can you tell a little bit more of why each one is the way it is and what the benefit is of them?
[00:07:27] Craig Van Slyke: Sure. So, I mean, I think this is really critical for everybody to understand. Before you get into any venture, especially podcasting, you have to know why you're doing it. What's your purpose for the podcast? And because if you don't have that purpose, it's going to be really hard to sustain any kind of a venture, especially a podcast. And so, I mentioned Live Well and Flourish and the purpose behind that. The purpose behind Cyber Ways is to translate academic research into something that, you know, real people can use.
[00:07:55] And that, that's the entire purpose. And what that does secondarily is it gets our center out into the world. It gets our university out into the world, it lets us build our reputation, but that's all secondary to that main purpose of this really, truly cutting-edge research out there into the quote unquote real world., And all those other benefits, reputational benefits, that kind of thing, they're secondary but still important.
[00:08:23] Neil McPhedran: So, let's dig into the cyber ways. I'd love for you to share that with the audience.
[00:08:27] Craig Van Slyke: So, it's really to disseminate the research findings. You know, as I mentioned, we do this research. It tends to be in a bubble where, you know, we read each other's papers, but nobody out there in the real world reads them.
[00:08:40] And so we wanted to get that really interesting research that can have an impact, out there into the world. And we also wanted to do that in a way that allowed us as a university, to increase our impact. And so, one of the things that Accreditors like, uh, we're part of the, uh, National Security Administration's program around cybersecurity, the NSA, and they like dissemination. You know, they want to see an impact of the programs. So, here's a way that we can have a global impact with really a trivial investment in equipment. You know, I think we spent a few hundred dollars, it's next to nothing. And we have literally had this global impact. And at the same time, we're maybe helping the world be a little bit more secure along the way.
[00:09:22] The reputational effects are pretty huge because not only do we get our, our names as a university out there and to the practitioner world, but we also deepen our connections with our fellow researchers because they like being on, you know, it's good for them to be on the podcast. They want to get their, their research out there.
[00:09:38] And so, you know, it connects us with these literally world class researchers that come on, spend, you know, 45 minutes or an hour talking to us about how their research applies to the real world. We don't get into things like, you know, all the theories and the methodology and the stats, detail and that kind of thing.
[00:09:57] What does your research say and how does somebody use it? And so that, that's, it's really been huge for us. Like I said, going on two years and we've had literally a global impact from North Louisiana.
[00:10:07] It can be lonely, um, but that's why the purpose is so important. You know what your purpose is, you get it out there in the world, you know, and just focus on that. And one of the things, it's kind of hard to accept when you first get into podcasting because you hear about... You know, Joe Rogan and some of those kind of people [00:10:30] that are hundreds and thousands and millions of downloads, and you know, you're getting 10.
[00:10:35] Well, 10's not so bad. Mm hmm. You know, that's somebody that's listening to it, and you just have to remember that you may be having a deep impact on a small number of people rather than some little shallow impact on a greater number of people. Mm hmm. And the metaphor image that I really like is, let's say... You get 25 downloads, an episode, and you put out twice a month. Well, imagine walking into a room where every month 50 people show up to hear you talk or to hear you have a conversation with somebody. And then next month, 50 people are there again. I mean, I'd call that a pretty big success. And 25 doesn't sound like compared to, much compared to some of these others, that's really a [00:11:30] pretty decent impact.
[00:11:31] So you just kind of have to have that mental image, you know, that I am having this impact.
[00:11:36] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: I love that analogy. People forget that podcasts that have celebrities on it, also those people had a following before. So, you can't, me as a regular person in Canada can't be like, oh, I'm going to get a billion, you know, we can't beat ourselves up. It’s like, I don't have that base. So, yes, maybe you can earn up to it and maybe if you're lucky, you'll, you'll get there. But like you said, it's so important, I've even told clients of mine that it's like, even if you have 90 or 20 people hanging on your every word, like that's so powerful because podcasting too, in the recent stats, they said, most people listen to 80% of a podcast, which is huge.
[00:12:18] There's more barrier to entry for podcasting because once you find the show, you have to follow it. You have to check the updates. You have to, you have to find a time to actually physically press play. The audience is more dedicated, so I just think it's really important that, like you said, people don't focus on the numbers. If you're getting 15 people consistently every week, that's 15 people that you're giving a small TED talk to.
[00:12:43] Craig Van Slyke: Well, let, let, let me give you another, um, analogy. So, uh, academics, when we write a paper, we want to see how it gets cited, who cites this paper. And in my field, and in a lot of fields, if you get 25 citations, 50 citations, some papers get tens of thousands, but most of them get between zero and probably five.
[00:13:02] There's even a thing called the H10 index that, you know, does some sort of counting about how many of your papers have tens, ten citations. That's a low bar. So, if we put out a Cyber Ways episode and somebody comes on and a hundred people listen to it, that's a pretty good citation count. Those people have sat for, you know, 45 minutes or whatever and listened to your research. You know, that's that's huge. That's absolutely huge in our world.
[00:13:28] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: That's huge, and people shouldn't take it for granted, but I think people's expectations are really skewed and unrealistic most of the times.
[00:13:37] Craig Van Slyke: Absolutely. So, you know, go into it with your eyes open. Absolutely.
[00:13:40] Neil McPhedran: So, the target audience for the Cyber Ways, the niche or niches, as you folks in the States say, is the cyber professional community. Is that correct?
[00:13:49] Craig Van Slyke: Yeah, mostly. I mean, I think we get a fair number of our fellow academics that listen and then I, I would like to think that some people that maybe aren't [00:14:00] professionally employed in cyber security but are interested in security and privacy might listen from time to time. So, but it is primarily towards security professionals. That's absolutely right.
[00:14:10] Neil McPhedran: I listened to a couple of episodes, and I found it very approachable. So, I, I think you're doing what you're trying to do, in that you're taking these meaty, chewy, academic research and papers, you know, and serving them up for the audience. So, I would especially recommend to the audience, the Voices of Privacy episode that delves into the digital footprint we leave online,
[00:14:32] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: which terrified me, yeah.
[00:14:33] Neil McPhedran: Yeah, super, super eye opening, or should I say ear opening? But, uh, there's my dad joke. The thing that struck me was the, the part and correct me if I'm wrong on this, Craig, but part of the study where I think it was teen social media footprint and formulating, just personas and data around them and attaching data around it to the point that they were even able to attach data about their parent’s mortgages. That blew me away. Did I, did I get that one right?
[00:15:01] Craig Van Slyke: Yeah. Yeah. It's, I mean, it's scary. It's scary. And they have, um, so that's out of Virginia Tech University, Pamplin College of Business. And they have a nice array of resources, you know, videos and tutorials, how to's and that sort of thing. So, I really would encourage people to check that out, it's a fantastic resource.
[00:15:20] Neil McPhedran: Mmhmm great episode.
[00:15:22] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: Well, like not even that, I'm maybe going to explain a little bit more about it, but I was shocked about, um, the coffee company. They only wanted your data, [00:15:30] but they give you a free coffee. And I was like, that's crazy to me. That's how you pay for coffee. I see it becoming such a thing in especially today's culture where people want things for free, but not necessarily, it's not for free because you're giving them their data. But I feel like we're getting into this exchange culture.
[00:15:47] Craig Van Slyke: Well, at least you're getting something, you know, most of the data that people are collecting out there, you're getting next to nothing for. So at least you get some coffee. I mean, if it's decent coffee, yes, you know, if the coffee stinks, maybe it's not such a good deal.
[00:15:59] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: But then they have all your information, but then again, we can't really escape it. Like it's crazy to me that people get concerned, especially during COVID, and I, I loved watching these things, um, happen on Twitter. If you needed a laugh, you're like, okay, people were getting upset. And I don't know if you guys have the same thing in the US, but we had to leave our phone number with the restaurant, just in case they had to do a contact tracing. And people were getting up in arms and they're like it's my privacy, how dare they take my phone number?
[00:16:29] And they're tweeting this on Twitter, and I said, Do you realize that you've gone through all the Twitter? Like, you probably signed your soul away, but, but you're upset that they took your phone number at a restaurant.
[00:16:40] Craig Van Slyke: But, but that, but part of the problem there, I mean, just in general, not that specific example, is we, we don't know what the bargain is.
[00:16:48] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: No.
[00:16:49] Craig Van Slyke: You know, so it's, it's like you're buying a car, but you don't know what the price is. You know, and so... I don't know. Is giving the phone number more of a privacy risk than being on Twitter? Probably not, but we don't [00:17:00] know. That's the real problem, is we don't know what's going to happen with that phone number once we give it up, and we don't know what we're inadvertently exposing ourselves to when we put something on Twitter.
[00:17:09] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: I, I get that, but I also don't think if you're going to be online, and unless you want to never be online, that, you know, it's, you kind of pay to play. You know, know what's going on. You can't, like, if you're going to be on Instagram, if you're going to buy, you know, Amazon is a big thing. If you're going to buy, you're putting your details in. Like if you want nobody to be knowing who you are, you, you can't take part online.
[00:17:35] Craig Van Slyke: No
[00:17:35] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: it's huge discussion.
[00:17:38] Craig Van Slyke: Yeah, it's, it's exhausting to try to protect your online privacy. But I do, I do have to agree, I love it when somebody goes on a rant about privacy on Facebook. You're on Facebook.
[00:17:53] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: And to your point, probably a lot of people, I know you discussed this in the episode is, a lot of people, I know we're probably all guilty of this, don't [00:18:00] actually read the stuff when they sign up for things online. Like they don't read any of the legal jargon and they're just like, yeah, sign me up, create a Facebook account.
[00:18:08] Craig Van Slyke: I'm actually in the early stages of a study on that. I've published a couple of conference papers on it. It's not zero that read that, but it's approaching zero. Virtually nobody. When was the last time you did?
[00:18:23] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: I said, I'm guilty of this. I said, I, but I, you know, if something goes wrong, full blame to myself, man.
[00:18:30] Craig Van Slyke: Well, and part of the, I know this is probably, we're probably drifting, um, but part of the problem is. They make the language so hard to understand. You read it, but you don't know anything anyway. Yeah, because I'm not a lawyer. Yeah, well, yeah, that's right. Yeah, so it's, it is, it's just exhausting. But, to go back real quickly, one of the things we mentioned in that episode is, yeah, if somebody wants to break into your house, it doesn't [00:19:00] matter if your doors are locked, but you still lock your doors.
[00:19:03] Neil McPhedran: Right.
[00:19:04] Craig Van Slyke: If somebody wants to really get at your private information, they're probably going to be able to do it, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't lock your, you know, your metaphorical doors, um, to some extent.
[00:19:17] Neil McPhedran: Totally. I thought that was a good metaphor in that episode of like, you know, you don't leave your door unlocked or open, with your family jewels sitting on the table right there to take, right? Right? So, but [00:19:30] versus like, we, we do that with our online lives, we, we essentially, that's what we do. We leave the door open, uh, and the family jewels just sitting there for the take.
[00:19:39] Craig Van Slyke: We, we put them on the front porch.
[00:19:41] Neil McPhedran: Right, even worse.
[00:19:43] Craig Van Slyke: I think we've taken that metaphor as far as it needs to go.
[00:19:46] Neil McPhedran: Yeah, I think so.
[00:19:46] Craig Van Slyke: Sorry.
[00:19:47] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: And, you know, I don't know if we can go further into this, it's the same thing, is it's like a lot of people are getting into trouble now because they're banking on their phone, but they're not banking on their home internet. They're banking on [00:20:00] like a cafe's internet or the bus's internet, and now they're getting, yeah, yeah, and people are like getting robbed essentially through their app.
[00:20:09] Craig Van Slyke: At least use your cellular data. That's better. Use your data plan. You've got it for a reason. You've got it for a reason.
[00:20:16] Neil McPhedran: Right now, we're talking about your focus of what you teach and that target audience, but I bet you that you could extrapolate that across a number of academics with their respective professional audience.
[00:20:28] When you sort of set out for this, had you seen a gap between that professional audience and the academic audience?
[00:20:34] Craig Van Slyke: Yeah.
[00:20:34] Neil McPhedran: Or was that something that wasn't really a part of the thought?
[00:20:37] Craig Van Slyke: No, there's absolutely a gap. I'm sure this happens in any field, but in my field, we’ve been having conversations for 25 plus years about relevance.
[00:20:46] You know, is our research relevant to business? And, you know, largely the answer is no a lot of the times. Well, here's a way where we can make it relevant to business. And so that there is absolutely a huge gap. We're in some small way trying to plug that gap.
[00:20:59] Neil McPhedran: So sort of curious what your prep process is for these podcasts. I would imagine that these are pretty chunky things, probably a lot of background work. You got to make sure you're reading the paper. Are you doing pre interviews with your fellow academics? Like just maybe unpack that a little bit for us.
[00:21:16] Craig Van Slyke: So, that's a great question. So, what we do, and I primarily do this, is before each episode, I go through the whatever paper we're going to talk about. I mean, it's not always a paper, but it's usually a paper. Like with Voices of Privacy, I went and looked at their materials and that sort of thing.
[00:21:33] And then I create a run of show document. Which is just something that's kind of trying to keep us on track. And I'll put in the questions that we're intending to ask, followed by what we want in the answer. So, it's not necessarily this is what your answer needs to be. It's we're trying to... get at this point or that point.
[00:21:52] And sometimes I'll put even some suggestions. You know, here's some things that I found interesting related to this question. We did a paper, Karen Renaud out of Scotland and Merrill Warkentin out of Mississippi State on an MIT Sloan review paper that they wrote with the co author, about using generative AI, hackers using generative AI.
[00:22:12] Well, you know, I'm reading through this, and it's all very interesting. And I say, okay, I'll ask this question. Here's what I got out of your paper. But feel free to correct me if my impression is wrong, to add to this. You know, take it in a little bit different direction. And so... what, what we're trying to do there is keep [00:22:30] everybody kind of on track, because as you can tell, academics like to wander a little bit. And so, you know, let's come back in. And it's not a script, and we don't read the questions verbatim, but we all find it, Tom, my co host and I, and the guests, find it really useful to kind of know where it is that we're trying to go with the episode.
[00:22:50] One of the great things about podcasting is there isn't a schedule.
[00:22:53] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: There isn't, no.
[00:22:54] Craig Van Slyke: It's long enough, but not long enough to be boring.
[00:22:57] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: Yes.
[00:22:57] Craig Van Slyke: So, you don't have to be 30, you know, on radio or TV or whatever, you've got X number of minutes and that's it. It's not that way in podcasting.
[00:23:06] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: Don't you think there's a limit to what you're talking about?
[00:23:08] I think there's certain podcasts out there that could be five minutes and they'd be stellar. I think there's podcasts out there that could be an hour and that's great, but I really think it depends on who's hosting, who's your topic, and if you have a guest, are they interested? This is a skill I use from broadcasting is, do you really need to say everything and are you engaging?
[00:23:30] And that's a thing that gets lost in podcasting because I think a lot of people see other people that are doing our podcast and they're like, oh, I want to do that too, but maybe your topic only needs 20 minutes. I think sometimes we're our worst enemies of like, oh, I can talk, blah, blah. And it's like, well, no, your listeners just petered off. But if you're that engaging for an hour, then go for it.
[00:23:51] Craig Van Slyke: But few people are.
[00:23:52] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: Yeah, few people are.
[00:23:53] Craig Van Slyke: Realistically.
[00:23:54] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: See? Everyone should have a 20-minute podcast and I'm ruthless.
[00:23:57] Craig Van Slyke: So, Live Well and Flourish. We kind of morphed from the initial concept for it. But now my episodes, if it's 16 minutes, it's long. So I have one, I call it five minute flourishing, that I try to get down to five or six minutes. As your listeners are thinking about getting into this, edit brutally. And I'm sure, you know, we're at 48 minutes and I'm sure this is going to get cut down to a lot less than that because sometimes, you know, the guests will make the same point 16 times. We only need it once.
[00:24:30] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: It's all about having a great team too. And, and, uh, we're fortunate enough to have a producer that goes through, and I don't know if she'll like this, but she's ruthless when she goes through our scripts, which is awesome. We love it. She just cuts lots of stuff out because that's the thing too. We think we're funny, but we're not.
[00:24:44] Craig Van Slyke: It's all about value for the listener.
[00:24:46] Neil McPhedran: Right.
[00:24:46] Craig Van Slyke: And you know, I teach in a business school, so I think about return on investment. Well, their investment is time, and you want to maximize that ROI, and if that means cutting a lot out, then cut it.
[00:24:56] Neil McPhedran: So, my last question then, and I won't ask two questions then, what sort of faculty support or school support you have or have not received?
[00:25:05] Jen and I work on a few higher education podcasts, and definitely there's varying. There's some folks we work with that have done a lot on their own, and we've got others that we work with, that there's a good support behind them. How have you gotten to year two and how much support have you had along the way?
[00:25:21] Craig Van Slyke: We got a relatively small, but generous grant from our, our, we call it our just business grant program. So, the donors give money [00:25:30] and faculty, we'll make proposals. And we made a proposal for Cyber Ways, and it was accepted, and it funds the purchase of the equipment and, you know, there's some money for software subscriptions and that kind of thing.
[00:25:42] I'd be surprised if we've got more than a thousand dollars in the whole thing. I do the prep work. I do the editing, you know, I post the episodes, all that sort of thing, which is extra work, and, you know, it's not really compensated in any way, but that's fine. You can do pretty well with minimal equipment, minimal software, and, I mean, you can really do this with your phone if you wanted to.
[00:26:07] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: Don't you say that to me. I'm an audio purist. I don't believe in recording on phones. I think that's people's misconceptions that they start podcasting, they're doing it for the wrong reasons. And it comes back to your purpose. A lot of people want to start a podcast for money and that is the wrong reason.
[00:26:23] Craig Van Slyke: Yeah. No, don't. I mean, I made a conscious decision with Live Well and Flourish. I even say, I don't want any money. Don't try to send me money. There's no way for you to send me money. And one reason is because it's not enough to worry about. That I would ever make off of it, and so, you know, dreams of what was Rogan's deal? A hundred million dollars. Yeah, not, not going to happen.
[00:26:44] Neil McPhedran: Those are, those are over.
[00:26:45] Craig Van Slyke: Yeah, and that, that's why you need to have your purpose in mind.
[00:26:48] Neil McPhedran: Yeah.
[00:26:48] Craig Van Slyke: You know, for me, the amount of work I put into Cyber Ways, that is more than justified by the impact we have in serving our purpose. I know that sounds a little corny, but that's, you know, I'm a tenured full [00:27:00] professor, I don't have to do this, but I really, I do it because I really believe it's important.
[00:27:03] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: You're going to be talking about a topic a lot, and if you're not passionate about it and you don't care, you're going to have a really hard time.
[00:27:10] Craig Van Slyke: It's not sustained. You'll, you'll, what do they call it? Pod fading. You'll pod fade.
[00:27:13] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: You'll pod fade.
[00:27:14] Neil McPhedran: I think that was a really good way to close out, circle back to the purpose. It's been really fantastic, and we really appreciate your time today.
[00:27:22] Craig Van Slyke: I very much enjoyed being on, enjoyed the conversation. Um, and so I want to thank you for having me on.
[00:27:27] Neil McPhedran: Wow, Jen, that was awesome. I really enjoyed that conversation you know, there was a couple of big takeaways. Obviously, the whole notion of knowing your purpose and knowing why you're doing it. I think it's great for us to keep ourselves in check, no matter what podcasts we're part of, but just reminding ourselves, you know, ticking that box each and every time, like, hey, does this serve my purpose? Is this why I'm doing this? Is this, is this the message that, that I have? And just sort of knowing that from the beginning, but checking yourself along the way in each episode, I think was, uh, was a fantastic takeaway.
[00:28:05] And I think the other one was really this notion of appreciating your audience size. You know, I think we chase big audiences because that's, you know, well back to Podcast Movement, you know, how big is your audience? How many downloads do you have? I think Craig made a really good point here, which is, you know, it's not about the size of your audience, but it's specifically the point he made about like, [00:28:30] imagine if you showed up to a room, 50 people showed up for you to take them through in detail or take them through the highlights of this academic paper you wrote. You would go like, wow, that's a success.
[00:28:43] If we're deeply connecting with a handful of people, that's a lot better than just sort of lightly impacting a whole bunch of people. So, you know, at the end of the day, I think really, it's appreciate your audience size and it doesn't have to be huge.
[00:28:57] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: Yeah, I love it. I always say, when I'm talking to clients, size doesn't matter when it comes to podcasting, because as long as they're dedicated, that's what you want. You've got that return of that similar audience every time.
[00:29:08] Another thing that he mentioned that I really liked too was like Sometimes we think we need to talk about a whole bunch of topics and like drone on for hours and hours and hours to have a podcast, but stick to one topic, less is more, really know what you're talking about, and make it engaging instead of letting it go off on like many tangents. People don't want to do that. I always say, wrap it up, unless you're into things and don't wrap it up. But if you're being boring, wrap it up.
[00:29:36] Neil McPhedran: Yes, I probably, uh, I don't want to babble too much, and I appreciate you telling me to wrap it up.
[00:29:41] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: So, let's wrap it up right now.
[00:29:43] Neil McPhedran: Let's wrap it.
[00:29:44] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: Wrap it up.
[00:29:44] Neil McPhedran: And be sure to tune in to the next episode for the second half of that conversation where Craig talks about his other podcast.
[00:29:53] Jennifer- Lee Gunson: Okay. Till next time.
[00:29:55] Neil McPhedran: 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 you to follow and subscribe to our podcast on your preferred platform, so you'll never miss an episode.
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