How to Avoid Interview Mistakes: Insights from Emma Robertson

How to Avoid Interview Mistakes: Insights from Emma Robertson

In this episode, we dive into the craft of podcast interviewing with seasoned media professional Emma Robertson. With a career spanning journalism, television, and digital content creation, Emma offers tried-and-tested advice for conducting interviews that are engaging, authentic, and effective.

From working with major broadcasters and celebrities like Jamie Oliver and Piers Morgan, to founding her own production company in the U.S., Emma shares key lessons learned along the way. She breaks down the ideal interview structure, common pitfalls to avoid, and the importance of trust and flow in creating meaningful conversations. Whether you’re a new podcaster or a seasoned host, this episode is packed with takeaways that can sharpen your skills and elevate your show.

In this episode, we talk about…

• The importance of structure in a podcast interview (warm-up, peak, and cool-down)

• Avoiding multi-threaded questions to keep guests clear and comfortable

• Building trust with your guest for more authentic conversations and avoid interview mistakes.

Transcribed Podcast Episode

Hey there, fearless podcaster. I'm super excited about today's episode. This one's special because it's not only my first interview for this podcast, but also one of the first times interviewing instead of working behind the scenes on interviews. We did run into a few tech hiccups during the recording. It got a bit nerve wracking, but hey, that's the unpredictable fun of podcasting. Now, let me introduce you to our amazing guest today.

Emma Robertson. She is a pro at handling interviews. She started in journalism, then jumped into TV, working on cool projects like the BAFTA nominated series, Heston Blumenthal's In Search of Perfection. Emma's worked with big names like Jamie Oliver and Piers Morgan. And after a decade in the UK, she moved to the United States in 2015.

Now she runs Shift Return Digital, her production company based in Phoenix, Arizona. So get ready as we chat with the awesome Emma about the ins and outs of killer interviews and how to avoid those interview fails. Thank you for joining me today. I'm Jamie Kennedy, executive podcast producer at Brave Moon Podcasts. We've produced podcasts for Virgin Active Health Clubs, Functional Training Institute, wellbeing coaches and speakers, and many more.

I'm including all of the insider secrets I've learned along the way being a podcast producer for some of the top health and fitness brands on the charts today. So whether you're a small business owner, health and fitness professional, or a wellness enthusiast looking to boost your brand through podcasting, this podcast is for you.

For a comprehensive list of the equipment and software my clients use, head to my website and grab my free start a podcast guide. I've condensed months of research into this guide offering you the industry's best choices. Download it today. The link is in the show notes.

Emma, you are an incredibly accomplished media professional with a diverse career spanning journalism, television, and digital content creation. And now you help creators on screen and off screen, like in podcasts, interview with more confidence. I am so honored you're here today. Thank you for taking the time to chat with us.

Emma Robertson:

It is a pleasure. Thank you so much for having me.

Jamie Kennedy:

We're going to be talking about interview fails and how we can avoid them. So, in the spirit of things, can you take us back to an interview that just didn't go quite as planned, whether it was your own or someone else's that you were producing? What happened and what did you take away from that experience?

Emma Robertson:

The examples are numerous, I should say. I mean, in many ways, no interview goes to plan. And I'll follow up on that point later on, but certainly the one that comes to mind for me is, I can even remember the date, it's born into my mind. It was 2013, I was being sent to Modena in Italy to interview quite a famous chef by the name of Massimo Bottura.

He has a Michelin star restaurant called Osteria Francescana. And he was just sort of peaking at that point. People were becoming, he was just getting well known and I was being sent for only two days with a full camera crew to interview him. We set up all the gear in the fancy dining room and he sat down and his wife was behind him and I started asking questions and immediately, he shut down.

He couldn't finish sentences. He was, him and his wife were snapping at each other as he was trying to answer my questions. And in the end, he walked out of the interview. So it was an immensely high pressure situation and really taught me, even though I've done hundreds of interviews and I know what an interview is. It is one thing to have the idea of an interview. It is another thing to face the reality of an interview. And that is particularly pronounced when it comes to our guests who perhaps are less familiar with the interview format than we are.

Jamie Kennedy:

What do you think happened to him? Why do you think he shut down? Do you have any guesses?

Emma Robertson:

I do actually. I mean, some of it is nerves. Some of it is speaking in a second language, even though he's fluent in English. It's not his primary language. There was a lot of media attention on him at the time. So he was having to justify who he was, what he was about all the time.

It was the same time that his episode in Chef's Table, the Netflix show was coming out. So he was doing a lot of media. But I also think the primary thing, which I understood later, actually came down to trust. He didn't know me from Adam. And I turned up and was asking him some really intimate questions without having the luxury of building trust with him. I just came off the plane and we barreled into this interview.

So he, I really didn't get the chance to know him and I, I determined that trust was the problem because he had me follow him around the kitchen for the rest of that day. And you can even see the interview now it's on YouTube. It is funny when I reflect back on it because actually it's more a story of the interview than it is of the interview itself.

But I landed up scooping the interview from him in tiny chunks as he raced around the kitchen. So he almost put me to the test. It was a hot kitchen and I had to stand there for hours. But in doing so, I was able to bridge that gap and to really build trust with him. So I think ultimately the short answer is I didn't put the time in to build trust with him.

Jamie Kennedy:

That is amazing that you were able to, in hindsight, be able to see that and the importance of gaining trust with your guests or with your interviewees.

Emma Robertson:

It could have been very bad, so I was very fortunate. And the results are on YouTube, so yeah, people can go ahead and watch them. That was my biggest interview disaster.

Jamie Kennedy:

I will definitely add a link in the show notes to that YouTube channel or YouTube video because I would, I'd love to see it as well as I'm sure the listener would as well. As you know, my podcast is geared toward health and fitness professionals getting ready to launch their podcast or they already have a podcast and they're looking to build it. So really these questions are going to be gearing around health and fitness professionals. And I'd love any insight you can share directly related to that genre.

But even if there's a non-health and fitness professional tuning in, I bet they'll get a lot from this episode because you have so much to share. So let's talk about the struggles that you might face with a guest. Some guests on your podcast might not be used to being in the spotlight or maybe it's their first time being on a podcast. So how do you go about making a nervous guest feel at ease in front of their microphone?

Emma Robertson:

Yeah, I worked directly with fitness professionals for six years. So I have interviewed them on manner of positions. But I think the tips I'm going to share are true of any expert. And really, by and large, when we interview, we are interviewing experts. But while they may be an expert, our audience isn't. And that's the key thing to always remember.

But certainly how do we put an interview guest at ease? Well, it's a number of things. First of all, the first thing is always preparation. The best interviews start before you actually get together with your guest. So ensuring that you're providing enough information ahead of time to ease any nerves they may have.

I would actually advocate being rather broad about the information you share. It doesn't need to be specifics because actually that can actually be counter productive if you provide too much information. But certainly providing a broad outline of what the interviewee can expect is a fabulous first start. Obviously being really clear around all of the logistics too is also really, really critical.

But when it comes to the interview itself, now this, this is whether it's in person or virtual, these rules apply. The first thing I always do is say out loud how odd the exchange or interaction potentially is. I think we're prone to trying to normalise what isn't normal. It's not normal to try and have a meaningful conversation between two people in front of cameras, lights, microphones, whatever it is, it's odd.

So I always encourage saying the oddness, speak the oddness out loud. So immediately you're both on the same page. This is crazy. This is odd. Isn't this strange? Point it out immediately is the first thing I do. The second piece of advice I always have is, and this gets such a bad rap, but ssmall talk. small talk is not small at all. Those tiny little remarks. How was your journey to the location? Have you had a great day? but more than that, the more normal you can make it actually, the better. Cause again, you're just reminding the other person, hey, we're just two normal people going about our day. So if you want to take that up a notch, I would actually try to personalize the small talk as much as possible.

So the person in front of you feels like you took that extra bit of time to understand who they are and what they're about. So if it is an interview that you're doing in person and you know where they live, then ask a specific question about the form of transport they took to get there. I used to live in London. Everyone jokes about the central line. You know, some kind of small talk that that just eases the tension that normalizes the whole exchange.

And the final thing I always recommend doing, and again, you can do this online too, is make sure their creature comforts, their physical comforts are met. So if it's in person, can you get them water? Are they warm enough? Are they cool enough? Is the chair comfortable enough? And even virtually, you can run through a checklist of those two.

Jamie Kennedy:

This is so good and so insightful, and it's reminding me of what just happened to us before we jumped on the call. and I had probably about 30 minutes of technical difficulties, mostly on my end, for sure. And we were joking about the Internet that is Australia. And for the Australian listener tuning in right now, you might understand that our Internet is sorely lacking, especially compared to the United States, which is where Emma is in or lives at the moment. So we joked about that for quite some time.

Emma Robertson:

I'm beautiful example of small talk, but we personalized it. I've also lived in Australia, so I have some understanding of what Australian internet is. So anything you can do to bridge that gap and to get that connection really forged, the better. The other thing I'm going to add, maybe this is getting ahead of us. You can use small talk throughout.

the interview. It is the tool I would advise using the most for whenever you can feel that that interview is just getting dialed up a notch. Maybe the person is ex- they can't answer the question clearly. Whatever it is, feel free to use personalized small talk. Not, not random silly small talk, but small talk at any point in that interview when you feel that the anxiety levels are just creeping up a notch.

Jamie Kennedy:

That's great. And actually it does lead me into my next question that I'm really curious about because this has happened to me. This has happened to every single one of my podcast clients. Conversations can naturally go off on tangents. So, I mean, I'm not talking about the small talk that you're referring to. I'm talking about that someone is very comfortable and coming up with a lot of different things that they want to talk about in answer to a question. So sometimes it can be very interesting, but sometimes not so much. So, How do you gently steer a guest back on track without dampening their enthusiasm?

Emma Robertson:

Yeah, it's such a great question and it always happens. And I actually now do a bit of podcast math. So however far someone is straying from the question can sometimes be an indication of two things. One, how well you asked it. So the onus could be on you. Did you ask a clear enough question to receive a clear enough answer?

The second interpretation of a long-winded answer might be nerves. When someone is heading off in, you know, going the rounds, being long-winded, you have to ascertain exactly what the problem is before you can decide how to deal with it. Did I miss ask the question or are they so full of nerves they can't answer it clearly? So that would be my first advice. Determine what the problem is. Did I just ask a lousy question?

Or are they nervous? If you did indeed ask a lousy question, which is why they're just throwing everything they've got at you to kind of answer the question, I would jump in respectfully, of course, at a point at which it feels like there's a little bit of a lag. You don't want to jump in over the top of them.

You're going to cause all sorts of problems with the recording of it, but also with potentially their anxiety, you're going to heighten it. But jump in at a point and respectfully say, I am so sorry. I may have asked that question. It may have lacked clarity. Can I rephrase it? And just rephrase the question again. Keep rephrasing the question until you feel like your guest has gotten it. That would be the the first thing, if it if it's you.

Often it is, often it is the way we are structuring our questions that makes our guests long-winded. And that's on you to get really clear before the interview starts to get your your questions really snappy. If it's them, I would actually use the same approach again. I would always jump in with a kind, respectful manner.

I think you will find most guests are not ashamed or embarrassed, more often than not, they are relieved that you threw them a line, that you rescued them from the answer they were trying to get to. But if you're hearing them repeat themselves, stumble over their words, or if there are long gaps in the things that they're saying, these are all signs that someone has lost their way and you are more than right. In fact, it is an act of kindness to jump in respectfully at that point.

Jamie Kennedy:

I love that. think that raises such a good point. It actually reminds me of something. I think a lot of podcasters can make the mistake of asking too many questions within one question. So tell me if I'm on the right track with what you're kind of talking about, which is that when you ask a question, it should really just be one question.

Emma Robertson:

I have a phrase for this type of question. I call it the multiple choice question. Because you haven't formed it correctly, there are multiple threads to it. And you're putting the onus on the guest to figure out which of the threads is the most important thing to follow. So absolutely, I'm calling it the multiple choice question.

But really, yes, it's any question that has multiple thoughts or potential routes that your guests could take to answering it. You want to actually, when it comes to questions, stick with the five W's, which is an old journalistic tool, which maybe actually many people learn when we're writing essays at school. It's the old who, what, where, when, why question. The most simply you can construct the question, the better.

I have seen time and time again amongst the less experienced interviewers that they are just stringing a whole lot of words together and hoping their guest figures out what the question is in amongst all those words. So I want to reiterate very much so that you are the host of the podcast. You are in the driving seat no point should your guests be doing any of the heavy lifting.

Jamie Kennedy:

Yeah, that you nailed it. That's exactly what I wanted to speak to. I love that. The multiple choice question.

Emma Robertson:

Absolutely. Keep your questions clean and actually the less words you can use to state them, the better. Fascinating. think it's very interesting whenever I've heard a podcaster ask a question a multiple choice question I'm gonna call it now I find that the guest always seems to answer the last question first because that's the last one that they heard, right? So that's the one that's fresh in their mind, but we lose the essence of the beginning of the question So yeah, I couldn't agree with you more Emma.

Emma Robertson:

You'll also find they'll answer the final thread in the multiple choice question and they'll follow it up with, that okay? Or did I answer that correctly? They will be seeking affirmation and clarification from you at the end when they deliver their answer. Again, this is evidence that your question wasn't asked with complete clarity and coherence.

Jamie Kennedy:

Wow, did not even pick up on that. That is, I'm gonna be listening for that now.

Emma Robertson:

Yeah, if they're checking in with you, is that okay? Was that okay? That's normally another indication that your question wasn't a clear one.

Jamie Kennedy:

So speaking of structuring questions, we do know that it is an art and it's really about creating that natural flow. So you mentioned the five W's. I would love to just hear a little bit more about how can you ensure that you're asking the right questions in the right order?

Emma Robertson:

I love this question because it's not just about the questions you're asking. It is definitely about the order in which you are asking them for sure. So I'm going to use a little bit of a fitness analogy here. When you work out ordinarily, there is the warm up, there is the main section, and then there is the cool down.

The act of working out is in many ways like the three act story. Now, if we've all watched films, we've all watched movies, we know there's a beginning, there's a middle and there and then there's an end. And I always use the story arc when I am stacking my questions in an interview.

How does that actually practically work? So the beginning, your warm up questions are just really simple entry level questions that gives the audience some kind of insight who this person is. It gives them enough of an insight into who this person is that they're kind of bought in. They want to listen more to the remainder of the conversation.

You have to say enough so people feel like they're invested in the person, but you can't say so much that they feel that they've learned everything that possibly is to learn about this person in the first five minutes. So that is the warmup. Fairly low stakes, but interesting enough that someone wants to continue to listen. So that's your warmup.

That's the beginning part of the story arc the conversation goes on what you want to do and if you know anything about the story arc it is an arc it's a it's a peak it takes you up to the top of the mountain peak and then it goes down again much like you know in a workout you're trying to get your the highest point of your heart to be in that middle section of the workout so the same goes for interviewing too so you want to stack your questions to reach a emotional or intellectual or mental peak, whatever it is that you're trying to reach, that should be about midway through the conversation.

Then the back end of that conversation, the conclusion, the end, just like in a workout, you're cooling down. In a movie is the, is after the climax, it comes the period in which we learn well, how was that person changed by going through all those, all those events that took them up to the climates and back down? So I would take the same approach with my, my interviews. I would always at the back end of an interview, you're saying you're slightly cooling them down. You've come off this high point and you're trying to do the kind of takeaways of the interview.

What has this person learned? How are they changed by what they've gone through? It's that kind of a thing bringing the interview to a close. That's how I always structure my interviews, just like a workout. High point, cool down, same thing. If you can think of those three points. Obviously the questions itself, you have to have a really good understanding of where your guest and your guest's story or expertise overlaps with the needs of your audience.

That then becomes the spine of your story. That's the thing that you're unpacking in the interview. And all your questions need to align with that overall aim.

Jamie Kennedy:

I love the fitness analogy. The workout analogy is perfect for this.

Emma Robertson:

Exactly like a story arc, it really is. And the moment you're aware of a story arc, the beginning, the middle, the end, you'll see it in everything that you watch now. So it's a really great thing to look out for if you're wanting to improve on stacking your questions in a way that will really elicit a very profound effect from your audience. It is a tried and tested way of creating content.

Jamie Kennedy:

Incredible. This is so such an interesting topic. It's something that I love also storytelling techniques as well. So I think we definitely have that in common. And I'd love to suggest a couple of books to the listener that really help people understand that story arc.

Emma Robertson:

Just even knowing the story arc exists and paying attention to it in all of the media, all the professional media, I would say all the professional media that you're consuming, you can start to see it play out and how effective it is. Like it's so effective that we don't even know that we are all being taken on that journey.

Even myself, who is who has been in this industry for 25 years, I know a good story when I am not aware I'm being told or spoken to, when I am just swooshed along. There's a podcaster who does it so well. The podcast is called Talk Easy. It is hosted by a man called Sam Fragasso. He is a master interviewer, someone I long to be when I grow up. He always structures his interviews according to the story arc.

Jamie Kennedy:

Thank you. We will definitely add those to the show notes. When recording a podcast episode with a guest, would you recommend that the host introduces the guest or do you let the guest introduce themselves?

Emma Robertson:

I love your questions. Either works, I think. There's pros and cons. There's something rather lovely. I think that you immediately can give a boost to your guests when you introduce them. There's something rather lovely and they get to hear what you think of them before you get going. So I think it can really boost a guest. It can give them a nice kind of boost of confidence before you start.

That is a lovely way of doing it. So it serves multiple purposes. Yes, you're getting the information about your guest over, but you're also boosting them in a really important and valuable way. So I think that's the benefit of introducing them yourself. The second option where you give it over to the guests to introduce themselves, there's a really great precedent with that. And it's in the form of American interviewer, Barbara Walters.

She was very, very big in the 90s and 2000s in the US and very famously she occasionally used to ask her guests to introduce themselves. The most famous example is when she was interviewing Monica Lewinsky and I think it was 97. was the the Clinton scandal was was already out there and you know she was the Scarlet Woman and Barbara Walters got the first interview with her.

And so the interview started with Barbara quoting, and I can't recall where the quote came from, but it was some kind of newspaper describing Monica in really unpleasant, unkind terms. And Barbara read the quote and then said to Monica, this is what the newspapers are saying about you. How would you describe yourself?

And it was such a beautiful moment of acknowledging what everyone else thought of this person, but also giving her a moment to say, to reclaim herself in the mess that was the Clinton scandal. So there are moments like that, that leaving the introduction up to the guest is really, really beautiful. If they need to reclaim their identity or need to establish something about themselves, before the interview gets going, then it is best placed in their words. Otherwise, I think it serves to give your guest a boost right at the beginning and introduce them yourself.

Jamie Kennedy:

That's great advice. That's such a good example of how that worked. think what really it seemed to me what you're talking about is that Barbara almost created a foundation for where she came in to talk about herself. I think where it gets a little bit lost sometimes, I don't know if you agree, but sometimes when you ask a guest, tell me about yourself, but there's no foundation or base on what to start with.

Emma Robertson:

Tell me about yourself is about the worst question you could ever ask someone for the very reasons you're stating.

It's so broad that they're not, they're never going to hit a point of relevance, particularly in a small period, a small period of time, which is obviously you're not aallotting a lot of time for someone to introduce themselves. So yeah, if you are going to ask someone to introduce themselves, be very specific about the point at which you want them to start to introduce themselves.

Great advice. So we're talking a lot about interview fails. There's so many interview fails. We just had one just FYI everyone technical difficulty on my end again. So we have these internet fails or sorry, interview fails, internet and interview fails. All of them. mean, things like, you know, minimizing interruptions and ensuring a seamless listening experience for your audience. What would you say are some techniques that these hosts can do to make their interviews as smooth as possible.

Emma Robertson:

A lot of it is, I mean, you said it beautifully. mean, inevitably an interview will fail. Every interview is a fail because one of the things I always like to share with people and I do in a lot of a lot of the teaching I do around interviews is the biggest mistake we can ever make about interviews is to think that they're just a conversation. Interviews are not a conversation.

They are a highly structured exchange between two people. And if you understand that in the get-go, then you will put the requisite work into ensuring that exchange goes as smooth as possible. So how do you ensure the exchange is as smooth as possible? It's lots of things, isn't it? We spoke before about the necessity of preparation.

And that is both making sure you are crystal clear with your guest about the focus of the interview. So they're not thinking you're, you're wanting to talk about their high school football career when really you want to talk about their failed marriage or whatever it is. Being really, really clear about the focus of the interview before you start. Also being crystal clear about who you are as an interviewer.

There are so many different styles of interviewing that to be transparent about your style ahead of the interview so that they're not shocked when you're asking them in a journalistic fashion, jabby questions, when they think they're going for ⁓ a chat with a friend. I mean, there's so many ways an interview can get derailed, but being transparent about your interview style and the nature of your podcast is critical.

So sharing examples of your podcast ahead of time so people know exactly who you are as an interviewer, that is really, really helpful. Make sure your guest understands the focus of the interview, the point that you really want to get across, and the nature of the interview before you have it is critical for it running somewhat smooth. Obviously, also we spoke about it before, but...

the more technical aspects, which is normally the thing a lot of people are really worried about too. Most people are not technically savvy. So it might be the first time, know, it might be the day they took the microphone out of the box for the first time. Time is very, very critical to ensuring that you get the best interview possible. I think when we are, we are under the misunderstanding that it's a conversation, we think, oh, you know, an hour will do or 30 minutes will do.

It absolutely won't. You have to be very, very structured about how you arrange that exchange. Even if you want to get really geeky, this is something we do in production all the time. You would write what we say, what we call a running order. So if you're speaking to someone for 60 minutes, the first 10 minutes is the warmer.

The next 20 minutes or 40 minutes is the main body of your interview workout. The remainder is your cool down. You may want to get that geeky about it, but really a lot of a smooth interview comes down to the preparation you put in ahead of getting to that interview day. And then if things go wrong on the day, then you're relying on your, really your people skills to nurture that relationship.

Even if it breaks down because there's technical issues or whatever it is, you're relying on that, on your people skills to, to coach your person through. But always, always remembering as the host, is your job to deliver that person safely from the beginning to the end of the interview. It is always your job. And you're drawing on all the things. The small talk.

the tiny things around, they physically comfortable? All those things you're checking in at any given moment to ensure the interview is running smoothly.

Jamie Kennedy:

Beautiful. I love all of those points. Emma, you are actually the first podcast guest on Earless Podcasting. So this is the beginning of me working on my interviewing skills and showing up for my listener who's tuning in. So I thank you so much for being on the podcast today. It has meant everything to me.

Emma Robertson:

I am truly honored. I very much appreciate speaking with you.

Jamie Kennedy:

Thanks Emma. Talk to you soon.

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