Episode 059 Alex Blumberg Part 2

Summary

• Alex Blumberg is best known for his work with This American Life and Gimlet Media.
• He taught a master class on creativelive.com about the art of the interview and how to craft and find the perfect question.
• The goal of an interview is to elicit authentic moments of emotion and narrative stories.
• To get a story, avoid yes or no questions and use phrases like “tell me about the time when”.
• Emotion and narrative are the two main elements of a good interview.
• Ask questions that elicit stories, such as "Tell me the story of this," "Describe the conversation," and "Tell me about the day that you realized whatever it is that we’re talking about here."
• Ask questions that elicit honest reflection and emotion, such as "How did that make you feel?" and "If the old you could see the new you, what would the old you say?"
• Focus on internal conflict and getting people to articulate their feelings in words.
• Ask "What do you make of that?" and then be silent to allow the person to answer.
• Alex Blumberg discusses the importance of asking the right questions to get honest responses.
• He uses a story from This American Life to illustrate the power of the right question.
• He also uses a story from 2008 about the housing crisis to demonstrate the power of the right question.
• The question he asked was "Would you have loaned you the money?" which forced the person to be honest.
• He also discusses the importance of making people feel safe and not judgmental when asking questions.
• Alex Blumberg interviews people from a rough block of West Augusta in Chicago about their bad neighbors.
• Davy identified fear as one of the main problems in the neighborhood.
• The Mouth, a kid in the neighborhood, believes the bad neighbors are those who fear and distrust him.
• Alex Blumberg interviews Mr. Rogers, who suggests visiting the bad neighbor to find out if they are reasonable people.
• Mr. Rogers suggests that people are afraid of not being able to communicate with others, and this fear is the root of the problem.
• Mr. Rogers speaks in his own language and remains true to himself while expressing his honest thoughts.
• Alex Blumberg talks about how he and Mr. Rogers had a breakthrough moment when he asked a question that Mr. Rogers didn't have a ready answer for
• Alex Blumberg talks about how he likes to capture the moment when someone is not being honest and then a question breaks them out of it
• Alex Blumberg talks about his methodology for reporting on a town or location, which is to find someone who knows it better than him and to identify the mainstream view and the outsider view
• Alex Blumberg talks about how he used 99designs for book cover ideas and banner ads
• Arnold Schwarzenegger and Franco used a tape measure with centimeters to measure a patio for a customer.
• Arnold wrote up formulas and calculated the cost of the patio in dollars and square meters.
• He initially quoted the customer $5,000, but after arguing with Franco in German and Italian, he was able to lower the price to $3,800.
• Arnold and Franco employed 16 bodybuilders to help with the job and worked together for two years.
• Tim Ferriss encourages listeners to subscribe to his podcast and blog to stay up to date with his experiments and guests.