For the last couple of weeks I’ve had a name marked in my Outlook appointment diary. I couldn’t work out who it was but I figured I was going to interview the person on radio because the appointment was marked down during my morning air shift.
Before I agree to interview anyone I ask for background information. That might be in the form of a media release, an email, a book they’ve written or something else that will help me do a little research. For some reason this didn’t seem to be the case with this person.
I searched their name in my email and on Google. I asked around the office if anyone knew of this person. Nothing. They were simply a name with no supporting information.
The morning of the ‘interview’ arrived. I asked our Office Coordinator to watch out for anyone coming into the building. I said that should anyone come in and ask for me that she ask, “Where can I say you’re from?” The problem was that I wasn’t even sure that it would be an in-person interview. Did I have to phone them? Were they going to phone me? I didn’t know because I had no details apart from a time and a name.
The interviewee did in fact arrive at our building. Our Office Coordinator came into the studio and told me my guest had arrived and who they represented. Phew! It all came flooding back.
Some minutes later we were live on-air. I was the fully informed interviewer and they were the knowledgable interviewee. It worked.
The weird thing is that I always make sure I have interviews confirmed in writing in one way or another and this one just slipped through the cracks. Looks like I need something to repair those cracks.
Posted by Rodney Olsen
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Unfortunately I missed the morning show this morning. Who was the mystery guest??
Umm …. arr …. that’d be telling. 🙂
Oh my, I’d be sweating bullets if I were in your shoes.
My interviews are very conversational rather than scripted so I wasn’t really sweating it too much.
As long as my guest is a good talker I only need to find a couple of good questions to get them started then the conversation flows pretty well.
*chuckling* … you are getting to the age where the old memory creates these cracks … if you DO find out how to fill them – please let me know too!
thanks for your comment on my blog, it was very comforting to me.
Now who was this guest? Anyone I’d know???
Spontaneous chatting / interviewing rather than having a script could be fun too.