This is an I-Heart podcast.

Solvable listeners, I want to introduce you to Ronald Young Jr.

You might be familiar with his name from other work in podcasting, leading shows like time well spent and leaving the theater. He's a sometime guest contributor around NPR's Pop Culture Happy Hour. We are really excited to make it official that Ronald is going to be the newest host of Solvable.

Thank you. Thank you for having me. I'm so excited to be here, so publicly on the team.

Believe it or not, hosting Solvable is not my main job.

My main job is being CEO of Pushkin. and Pushkin, over the last year in lockdown,

has, like, doubled in size. We have almost 50 people now. And it's exciting. There's a lot going on,

but it's sort of crowded out the time that I like to spend preparing and figuring out guests.

And also, I'm not really a host.

I don't know if you noticed that.

I think you're a great job. I'm an untrained to a host.

I have certain host qualities, mainly that I'm really interested in talking to the guests on the show.

And I have a lot of drive to learn.

But I don't have that quality of hostiness, which I hear in your voice. And I really want to know how that's done.

Well, first of all, I don't know if that's the message I wouldn't be saying. Like, we got hostie

McOasters coming on to host our show.

No, I know what you mean, though.

I, you know, I've always found it easy to talk to people.

I've always found it easy to connect with folks and ask questions that I'm curious about.

And mostly because as a child, I was always encouraged to ask questions, whether it was to friends, the families, the teachers. And I think that's what helps with being a good host and with conducting good interviews, which you do a great job of. Well, thank you, Ronald. But yeah, no, I think that just that basic quality of curiosity, you know, if you don't want to know, you can't read someone else's questions. I mean, our producers on the show do suggest a lot of great questions for us. But ultimately, you ask the ones that are your questions, that are the things you want to know.

Yes. It's funny because, like, you know, working with the solvable team, it certainly is a team effort. But I think what makes a good host and what makes a good interviewer is the ability to read the conversation and to know when it needs to take a turn,

when it's about to pivot, or when your curiosity might push the interviewee a little deeper

...