How To Command a Room
Amanda Ripley: Hi, Magna. How are you?
Meghna Chakrabarti: I’m doing well. Thank you for thinking of me.
Amanda Ripley: Oh, my God. Thank you for doing this.
Meghna Chakrabarti: Well, you are one of my favorite guests ever, period.
Amanda Ripley: Thank you.
Meghna Chakrabarti: And also, this will be such a delightful turn because we just got off the air talking about, like, pathological liars and how they end up becoming members of Congress and presidents. And it just like it was so depressing was the opposite of the kind of journalism that I promised you would be to.
Amanda Ripley: Welcome to how to I’m Amanda Ripley. Today we’re going to basically talk about the opposite of pathological liar to get elected into office. We’re going to talk about regular people who need to speak in front of a large audience for whatever reason. People who want to be taken seriously without pretending to be someone they’re not.
Yuzuha: My name is Yuzuha and I’m a journalist based in Japan, and I have been working in this field for six years, mainly in digital, and I cover business and technology.
Amanda Ripley: You may have actually come across Yuzuha work in outlets like Reuters or the BBC or News picks, and although she currently works with the written word, she’d love to do more with the spoken word.
Yuzuha: I think one of the reason why I love audio is that I feel this intimacy. But for me, broadcast is something for the boys. Who has the appearance, who has the confidence. I’ve always felt I’m not good enough for this.
Amanda Ripley: Hmm. And did you come up with that on your own or did somebody tell you that? Do you know what I mean? Or was it a combination?
Yuzuha: Yes. INTERVIEWER Maybe it’s also in America or other countries as well. Many of the journalists, especially the senior journalist, they are male. So when I come into the room and to do the interview myself, sometimes people don’t take me that I am a journalist because I’m a little bit younger. I am and I am female. So they don’t assume that I’m a journalist.
Amanda Ripley: So they think that you’re doing what instead?
Yuzuha: Well, that’s a really bad Japanese tradition. But female employee come in the room to to give out that he’s served, that he’s in that kind of role that we are assumed.
Amanda Ripley: Okay. So that doesn’t help. Right with this whole be confident be yourself framework.
Yuzuha: Or not at all. When I go into the room with another journalist who is a lot more senior, who is male, who is more confident then something happens in the room, is that the company executives start to talk to only the other journalist, not me, because they think that the other person is a lot more important or they have the power. So right, sometimes they can ignore him.
Amanda Ripley: So you feel maybe a little suddenly invisible. Yeah. Hmm. Wasn’t a good feeling.
Yuzuha: No.
Amanda Ripley: Yuzuha dream is to become a broadcast journalist one day. Asking tough questions in front of a live audience and holding her own. Even with people who might underestimate her. Her first test is coming up sooner than she expected.
Yuzuha: So in a month, I will be moderating a panel for the first time. And it is a fairly big conference held in Tokyo. And I will bring up two guests and I will moderate the panel about a future of food. So this is my first time hosting or moderating a panel, and I am nervous about it.
Amanda Ripley: What’s that? Tell me what that’s like. What is your I hate to say this. It feels like I’m torturing our guests when I say this, but what is your worst fear about next month’s panel?
Yuzuha: So I think there are a couple because I am a journalist still early in this career. There are so many more talented and experienced journalists. And being a female, being a non English speaker, I fear that. There’s so many great guests coming in and I want to bring the best out of them. But I fear that if I mess up, that’s not going to happen. So that’s the biggest fear I have.
Amanda Ripley: So it’s almost like you’re hosting a very special dinner party and it’s it’s on you to kind of bring out the best in everyone, make everyone feel engaged and curious and not screw it up. And you have some worries about whether you’re the right person for the job. Is that right?
Yuzuha: Yes, definitely.
Amanda Ripley: Today on the show, we’re going to help Yuzuha get ready for her live audience debut, speaking publicly in front of hundreds of people despite her fears and their prejudices, whatever they may be. So how do you command a room while still being yourself? To help her out, we brought in one of the most impressive, but also most genuine on air radio interviewers I have ever come across.
Meghna Chakrabarti: Well, my name is Meghna Chakrabarti and I am the host of a public radio program called On Point, which is heard on public radio stations across the United States.
Amanda Ripley: If you haven’t heard on point, you definitely need to check it out. Meghna interviews. People live on air every day about fascinating and important subjects. And she’s known for being deeply prepared, but also bringing her whole self grace and humor included to the broadcast, which is something we can all aspire to. Whether you’re hosting a podcast or moderating a panel or giving a presentation at work, sooner or later we all have to capture a live audience. So Meghna is here to teach us how to speak confidently without necessarily being the loudest person in the room. Stay with us.
Amanda Ripley: Meghna. What’s your first reaction?
Meghna Chakrabarti: Well, my first reaction is Yuzuha. You have a beautiful voice, first and foremost. And I’ve just been listening very intently. I have a million possible things. But I’d like to be as.
Amanda Ripley: Helpful.
Meghna Chakrabarti: To you as as I can be. Maybe instead of giving you sort of a bullet list of advice, which when people do that to me, I find that of sort of questionable utility. I’m going to start by asking you a question instead. Mm hmm. How would you describe the kind of person that you are?
Yuzuha: I would say that that I am an introvert, so I work better in a one on one setting rather than a big dinner party. If someone is down or suffering, I think I might be able to sense that. So that’s my power. Compared to the sparkling moment, that’s hard for me. So does that help you?
Meghna Chakrabarti: It does, because first of all, I can deeply relate. I’m a capital I introvert. Yeah, People always like what you host. This radio show is like. Yes, because I can sit alone in a studio and talk to people. It’s not at a party where I would be with you in the corner, shrinking into the shadows. But, you know, it’s interesting how you describe yourself, because you were right about audio being an incredibly intimate medium. And I’m going to, if I may, describe the person that I’m hearing when you talk.
Meghna Chakrabarti: Okay. So the person I’m hearing is deeply thoughtful, empathetic, inquisitive and sensitive. So it’s a little different than how you might have described yourself. And I put it that way, because I don’t actually hear a person who lacks confidence. I hear a person who’s willing to engage with some probing questions that Amanda and I have just asked you.
Meghna Chakrabarti: And the reason why I point that out is because, you know, you said the third thing you wanted to know about was, you know, what role should you have in audio journalism? What kind of style should you have? And I want to tell you, Yuzuha, you should just delete that question from your brain, because I say this to everyone who asks me, because people ask, I hate this question, but they ask me, Oh, you have this great like radio persona. How did you decide what your persona was going to be?
Meghna Chakrabarti: I was like, This is just who I am. So have confidence in the person that I’m hearing when I’m talking to you. Yuzuha just just be you. Because anyone that I know and admire who’s been successful in audio journalism, they’re never adopting a persona because of exactly what you said. It’s such an intimate medium. You can hear it when people are putting on the kind of personality that they don’t actually have. That’s my most important starting point for you, is to be fully confident in who you are, because the person that I’m hearing right now is someone that I would want to listen to. Hmm.
Yuzuha: I really, really appreciate you saying that. And most of the journalists I work with, this may be five years or ten years older than me. So their dominance or their confidence is something different from me. And I sometimes feel that there are good size and aggressiveness or inquisitiveness, But at the same time, sometimes it helps to be in a softer side. You could bring out other aspects of people if you’re being on a different persona. So if I can be myself more, maybe there is something that I can bring out that other journalists may not be able to bring. So your advice really, really helps me.
Amanda Ripley: That’s our first takeaway. Putting on a persona is kind of like putting on a mask. Usually people can sense it, whether they can articulate it or not. Something doesn’t feel right. So your best choice is to show up as yourself, which is way easier said than done.
Meghna Chakrabarti: Amanda, I’m sure you know as well as I that we’re our own worst critics and therefore our own worst enemies. And I went through years when I started regularly hosting of like being really disappointed with myself at the end of every single show. But that just, like, wasn’t helping me. And it wasn’t definitely was not helping, you know, the people who are working themselves to the bone to help make this whole program a success.
Amanda Ripley: When you say when you first started hosting, you would feel disappointed in yourself for for what can you say more about then?
Meghna Chakrabarti: Oh, sure. Well, frequently, the number one thing that I would just be really self-flagellation ing about is not having covered enough ground in the conversation as I wanted to or achieved. You know, that moment of depth where the interviewee is really revealing something or giving us analysis that we hadn’t heard before. So that, you know, my my goal for every show of any program I’ve ever worked on is for the listener to stay with us and to walk away from it, really having learned something they did not know before. And I always used to feel like I just never hit that point and never hit that point. And it made me quite frustrated with myself.
Amanda Ripley: Yeah. And I should say Meghna for your show, it’s live and it’s every day. So I can see that there is pressure in a live event to get to something new, to be useful to, you know, even break news. There’s pressure to do that. Sometimes I feel like there is a model for this how a journalist is supposed to be, especially when doing quote unquote, tough interviews with politicians.
Amanda Ripley: Right. There’s a way you’re supposed to be and that way is very aggressive and it’s, you know, unflinching and relentless and all of these things that our profession kind of holds up. I will say that is not what most viewers and listeners want. Often there’s a disconnect there, but that is kind of the default. And sometimes, you know, I feel like I’m supposed to act like a reporter. And it’s it’s not always intuitive to me. What have you learned about how to hold people to account and ask tough questions and still, you know, they’re your guest. Right. I mean, it is there’s a little bit of a tension there.
Meghna Chakrabarti: Yeah. This is such an interesting question, Amanda, because while I completely understand that people may not necessarily want a relentlessly aggressive questioning and it’s very culturally dependent, right? I mean, there are other places in the world where that is what folks want, but but it’s not necessarily true here all the time. So I, I get that. And at the same time, though, especially with politicians where anyone who holds a lot of power, it’s a tough balance. And I’ll give you an example of early on in my career where I absolutely did not strike that balance and it kind of blew up in my face.
Meghna Chakrabarti: So I was interviewing the former governor of the state I live in, and I had done some pretty extensive reporting on some claims that he was making about, you know, saving $1,000,000,000 in the state budget. And the claims were I couldn’t substantiate them. And I came right out of the gates just like, boom, saying, you know, governor, you know, so-and-so has said this. This document says that, why are you making this claim? And it just did not go well. Okay.
Amanda Ripley: Journalistically.
Meghna Chakrabarti: I stand by every question I asked him. Right. Because they they the content of the questions was definitely they had to be asked. But in terms of Amanda, you know, to the point you’re making, there’s a human being on the other side of the table. He got his back up. He was very argumentative. He just rejected the even the basis of my questions. And it was just a grueling, awful 20 minutes. Thereafter, I learned you do have to have a period of time, whether it’s live or on tape, being human with each other.
Meghna Chakrabarti: Right. And starting that way. So you establish a mutual respect of humanity, if not point of view, but of humanity. And then you can start saying, well, you know, or I don’t want to say you because people have different styles. But then I start saying, Oh, okay, well, so what about X or our reporting shows Y? And that has become a far more effective way of doing it. But I guess I’m actually really glad you asked that question, because connecting as human beings. Hmm. Mm hmm. And again, it’s because Yuzuha you kept using this word intimacy. It’s so right about this medium really, really matters to get the most out of the person, no matter who they are.
Amanda Ripley: Here’s our next takeaway. And honestly, this could be a takeaway for almost all of our episodes. Meet people, Human to human first. Those moments of connection may seem artificial or like a preamble, but if they’re genuine, they’re essential. Be a human. You can set the tone for the entire rest of the conversation and dive much deeper, even in choppy waters. Once you’ve connected as fallible, real people, now you might be thinking, How can I do that and still be taken seriously? Nobody wants to sound like a pushover or a suck up. When we come back, we’re going to hear exactly how Meghna artfully pushed back on one very high profile interviewee who wasn’t really answering her question. Stay with us.
Amanda Ripley: We’re back with Yuzuha, a journalist from Japan who’s gearing up for her first live interview in front of an audience. And Meghna Chakrabarti, the host of On Point. Before the break, we were talking about how to ask tough questions in front of an audience while still being a human. So we thought it would be fun to hear a moment from an interview Meghna did with Dr. Anthony Fauci in 2021. At the time, she was pushing him about the CDC recalibrating when COVID should shift from a pandemic to a manageable endemic disease, essentially asking how we will know when the pandemic is under control. Take a listen.
Meghna Chakrabarti: Dr. Fauci, one more quick question here. Sure. But I hear you very strenuously trying to not answer a question here.
Speaker 4: I am answering your question. We don’t know what that number is. And that’s why I say and you think I’m being evasive. I’m not. Let’s all get vaccinated and you’ll know it when you see it.
Meghna Chakrabarti: How are you doing?
Speaker 4: I’m doing fine. You’re wearing me down.
Amanda Ripley: It’s not asking softball questions. No, it’s. It’s connecting as a human being. And that could mean any number of things, right?
Meghna Chakrabarti: Yeah. It can mean any number of things. Just getting a sense of, you know, what their ideas are, how they’re doing. In fact, on my live show, I just asked that question a lot more these days. It’s just the most basic thing we all ask each other, and sometimes it kind of throws folks so they don’t actually expect it on a radio show. But, you know, things like that. And then when you get to the the sort of tougher, more pointed fact based questions, I would add Yuzuha that that is a time to also you have to build that muscle to be willing to stand your ground, right? So you don’t become someone who defers to the unwillingness of the other person to answer the question. But there’s lots of different ways of politely saying, you know, a phrase I often go to is.
Amanda Ripley: Yeah, that was.
Meghna Chakrabarti: Interesting, but I don’t actually think I heard the answer to my question. You know, you can there’s.
Amanda Ripley: Different ways to poke.
Meghna Chakrabarti: And prod. And the other thing about radio is that there are people listening, so they hear the same thing that you do as the host. Yeah. And they hear the person not answering the question. Mm hmm. I was called the role of a host. The listeners advocate. Mm hmm. When we take that point of view, it’s absolutely understandable. When you we might you might say, Well, I know you want to answer that question, but I think it’s important in the conversation right now to clarify for listeners, you know, why you lied about going to prison in 2013 or something, you know, whatever, whatever, whatever the topic might be.
Amanda Ripley: This is probably the single most important rule for how to prepare to speak in public. Whether it’s a radio show or a keynote or a PowerPoint presentation. Remember that you’re the advocate for the listener. What do they need? What do they know? What do they want to know? Worry less about you, about sounding smart or tough and more about what your audience is yearning to understand?
Meghna Chakrabarti: Once I sort of framed that what the role is in my mind, it became a lot easier to navigate through conversations.
Amanda Ripley: I like that the listeners advocate, right, because you’re you are hosting a gathering and it’s not just the people on stage or in the studio. It’s the hundreds of thousands of people or hundreds of people, and you are their voice to some degree in that in that context. So I wonder, hearing what Magnus said. Are there any things that come to mind for how you can prepare for this conversation you’re going to have next month?
Yuzuha: Yes. So my panel is about the future of food. So I’m inviting a professor who is working on the alternative protein and also an entrepreneur who is working on the synthetic meat. So the topic is about that and bringing them from the Silicon Valley, California to Japan. It’s not just about the technology, how innovative it is, but maybe there are many mothers or fathers who are concerned about like how healthy are they? Is it really sustainable for the environment? Those kind of basic questions I think I want to cover for the listeners. And I felt that it’s always important to keep in mind what is the level of the audience or the understanding or the context of the audience that they have? Not if I go to technical, right? Right. Not going to help.
Meghna Chakrabarti: Honestly, I wish I could actually watch this. It sounds like it’s going to be cut a bit, but I would say two things that I would encourage you to remember. First and foremost, remember, they asked you to be the moderator. Do you see why that’s important? It’s because they want you. Mm hmm. Yeah. You said earlier you were worried if you were the right person to do this or not.
Yuzuha: Mm hmm. Yeah.
Meghna Chakrabarti: And you do have a deep expertise in something your panelists don’t, which is what Japanese viewers and listeners would most benefit from hearing from. Mm hmm. Mm hmm. So I just see that, like, you don’t have to pretend to be the scientific expert here. Mm hmm. You bring your own expertise to the table. I would predict that no matter what you ask them, it will be very interesting to the people who watch. I mean, does that make sense? Yes.
Yuzuha: I have an expertise that the experts don’t have that. Is something that I should keep in mind because what’s my role here? I am here to connect the audience and the panelists.
Amanda Ripley: So remind yourself. And this could even be a little note you look at right before you go on stage or a mantra. You’re in your head that you were chosen for this task. Someone believed in you. So go do this thing the way that only you can do it.
Amanda Ripley: So I wonder. We all have things when we get nervous, right, that are giveaways that were nervous. Yuzuha What happens to you when you get nervous?
Yuzuha: I think. In terms of my voices, I can’t pitch a little higher. Hmm. And sometimes when I listen back to my recording of me doing interviews that I. Tend to not end the question or end the sentence. Well, I think I have a fear of being interrupted because I think I am easy to interrupt. So I try to minimize the gap, but that’s making me harder to understand. So that’s just something that I noticed.
Amanda Ripley: Mega You probably don’t get nervous before you go on the air.
Meghna Chakrabarti: No, I’m wondering.
Amanda Ripley: There might be situations where you. Still do get nervous. Maybe it’s before a large live event. Or maybe it’s at a party. I don’t know. How does that feel to you? And what are some of the tricks you’ve learned to kind of get through that?
Meghna Chakrabarti: Yeah. But by the way, the question that you just asked Yuzuha, this is why you’re so good. Amanda It was such a good question.
Amanda Ripley: It’s really a question for me. I’m not even I’m an advocate because I am the listener.
Meghna Chakrabarti: I what I try to do in order to prevent getting nervous is to prepare and overprepare as much as I possibly can. Okay. And that involves, you know, reading, researching all the things that we do as journalists and thinking through what I, you know, structuring what I think my ideal. And this is especially true for live events versus the radio show, which we also prepare is just a slightly different way.
Meghna Chakrabarti: And then I put it away for, you know, the day of the event, which is great because I find that for myself, I need a little bit of sort of spiritual and mental space from overthinking. You can overprepare, which is I think, a good thing, but you should probably shouldn’t overthink because overthinking is what makes me nervous and can sometimes undermine my confidence. So put it away, take long walks, meditate, you know, just have a great day. And then. Then I just dive in. Hmm.
Amanda Ripley: Yeah. No, that is such a good point that you need to prepare, prepare, prepare. Right. Get really comfortable with the material and the people. Have your notecards or whatever it is that you have, but then walk away. I love that advice. One thing that I sometimes forget is that when people are at a conference, what do they want most of all? They want to be entertained. Like, let’s just be honest, right? Like, they want to learn some things. They want to be curious. But they it’s a live event, right? Like they you know, they want to see something magical happen or something funny happen or something surprising. Right. And that you can’t prepare for because it’s in the moment, you know, like if. And I always this is I feel like it’s next level.
Amanda Ripley: So one of the things I’m trying to do when I’m moderating events, I don’t know if you feel like it’s Magnum, but you know, is not just kind of robotically ask each person to introduce themselves and then ask them my questions. One, two, three. But like, react in real time, just like the audience is reacting, right? So if somebody says something that surprises me, even the word choice, you know, maybe I’ll I’ll come back to that. I might even interrupt them, God forbid. Right. And and just kind of try to make it more like a conversation. People always say that. Right. But it’s not it’s not easy to do because the the environment is so, you know, formal and serious. Yeah.
Meghna Chakrabarti: Could I just add another thing? Because what you said Amanda was like, so spot on. It reminds me that we have a tendency to think of these events as the moderator and the panelists. But the most important character in the room is the audience, right? Because they want to be there. And so therefore you can really engage them in in the whole the whole conversation.
Meghna Chakrabarti: I, I frequently, you know, make as much eye contact with members of the audience as I do with the panelists. And I don’t know, you know, if there are different cultural expectations in front of a Japanese audience. So I’m speaking in the American context here. But, you know, I do a lot of like occasionally throwing questions to the audience, be like, raise your hand if you think that impossible meat tastes like beef, you know, or whatever. And and so to make them part of the conversation and use them as your supporters, by the way, I say you ask a question that like the panelists don’t want to answer. I’ve done this before. I look at the audience like, I don’t know. I still want an answer to that question, don’t you?
Amanda Ripley: Yeah. Yeah. I actually find if I can remember, I like to ask the audience a question in the first two or 3 minutes. Yeah. So right away they get out of that mode of thinking. They don’t. They’re not there. They don’t matter. They’re passive. Right? How many of you have had artificial beef or how many of you would try one if we had if we passed around a platter of fake meatballs right now? I don’t know. But is that something you think would go over a question for the audience?
Yuzuha: Definitely. And what you said about how you’re inviting the audience to the table, to the conversation, to be able to entertain the audience. That’s the most important thing. And that advice really helps me a lot. Yes.
Amanda Ripley: Part of being in the moment and kind of relaxing into the conversation and asking the audience questions and reacting to what gets said that you didn’t expect. Part of that is goes back to what Magna you were saying in the beginning is you have to kind of just be be who you are, not try to be someone else or someone you’ve seen on TV. Right. And you said, Magno, that in when you first started hosting, you know, you really were hard on yourself after each show. And then you said you have to let that go. So I want to circle back and ask, what are some of the ways that you were able to let that go?
Meghna Chakrabarti: Someone essentially took me aside and metaphorically whacked me over the head and said, You’ve got to let that go.
Amanda Ripley: Oh, really?
Meghna Chakrabarti: No. I mean, look, finding mentors is incredibly important. And no matter what you do, no matter what your vocation in life is, I solidly believe seeking out mentors is so important. I have been really lucky in my career. I’ve had several absolutely brilliant mentors, and one of them, you know, was like, Oh, I didn’t do this right today and did that right today. This didn’t go well. And she took me aside. She’s like, This is not good for you and it’s not good for your staff. You just have to let it go because you’re going to do it again tomorrow and you’ll get a little better tomorrow, and then you’re going to do it again the next day and you’re going to get a little bit better. You have to think about how you’re undermining yourself by being so relentlessly critical when what you should be thinking about is, hey, these are all these things that we did that worked out. Some of it didn’t. So let’s like try it again tomorrow and have fun.
Meghna Chakrabarti: And so I don’t think I would have been capable within myself. To snap out of it. I needed her to take me aside and sort of set me straight a little bit, to be perfectly honest. So finding people who can give you that guidance, that loving, even if at times tough guidance, I think is like it’s a game changer.
Amanda Ripley: Hmm. That’s so interesting. She totally reframed it for you in about 30 seconds. It sounds well.
Meghna Chakrabarti: And she also made me stop thinking about me.
Amanda Ripley: Right. Because like, in this room, you’re you’re there’s the whole team here.
Meghna Chakrabarti: Total team effort. Yeah. And we’re all responding to each other’s energy all the time.
Amanda Ripley: So here’s our last couple of takeaways. First, it’s not about you. It’s about your audience. Secondly, find your team, your mentors, people you trust to give you feedback in a way you can hear it, people who understand why you’re doing this in the first place.
Meghna Chakrabarti: Just give yourself the opportunities to develop yourself and develop your ideas. Have fun. Please. Please, Yuzuha. Please promise me you’ll have fun because life’s too short. And if you’re not, you know, enjoying yourself, whether it’s at work or outside of work, then I’d ask you to reconsider everything. But I come back to what I told you. When? When we first started. I hear in you already someone that I wants to listen to. So please don’t be the person who undermines you. Let other people try to do that out there in the world. And then you can just tell them to buzz off. Don’t be your own worst enemy, okay?
Yuzuha: That means a lot to me. Thank you so much, Meghna.
Meghna Chakrabarti: Oh, you’re most welcome. This has been such a pleasure.
Amanda Ripley: Thank you to Yuzuha for bringing us this question. We can’t wait to hear how the panel goes next month. And to Magna for all of her wisdom, you can catch on point live every weekday on public radio. Or you can tune in via podcast by searching for on point wherever you get your podcasts.
Meghna Chakrabarti: Can I just add one more thing?
Amanda Ripley: Yeah, of course.
Meghna Chakrabarti: You did say it’s something you’re wondering about. Voice in particular for audio. Hmm. I don’t know what to tell you about that because I’ve never done any voice training. And so I would say, Don’t worry about it. The voice of God era is over. Yeah, right. Yeah. Yeah.
Amanda Ripley: In fact, we don’t. We want the opposite, right? Like humans.
Meghna Chakrabarti: Yeah. And it all has to do. I probably if you went back and looked in the transcript of our conversation, I probably said the word confidence like, a thousand times. But the confidence with which you are engaging in the conversation is the most important thing that is, that is communicated through your voice. So work on that and then the voice part takes care of itself.
Yuzuha: Thank you, Meghna.
Amanda Ripley: What about you? Do you have some insecurity you’re trying to overcome? Send us a note at how to at Slate.com. Or leave us a voicemail at 6464954001. And we’d love to have you on the show. And if you like what you heard today, please give us a rating and a review and tell a friend. Surely you know someone who hates to speak in public. That helps us out more people. How does executive producer is Derek John? Rosemary Belson and Kevin Bendis produced this episode. Mary Jacob is our senior technical director. Carvell Wallace is my co-host and Charles Duhigg created the show. I’m Amanda Ripley. Thanks for listening.
