From Procrastination to Podcast
“I will be the Brene Brown meets Oprah for women veterans.”
A former US Air Force commissioned officer’s journey out of obscurity and into leadership. By Siobhan Cunningham
Bottom Line Up Front [BLUF]: Consider EJCP if you value thoughtful instructors and staff, a hands-on curriculum, and an active community of global students at every stage of the journalism business spectrum.
My Journey to EJCP
The pandemic made me realize that I can’t keep wasting time playing it safe. I’d morphed into a lonely stay-at-home mother who had hunkered down in the house to keep an infant and a toddler safe during COVID-19. My background is in social work. I’ve been doing therapy for 20 years, and the thought of returning to work was terrifying. I would go to church and sob at the idea of listening to people’s problems again.
I looked into jobs outside of mental health and became interested in journalism and business marketing. Why? I served in the US Air Force from 2014 to 2018. Since leaving the military, every other job seemed to waste my energy. The civilian world did not appreciate my experience as a commissioned officer, and my history of being a badass couldn’t deny my fiery passion to continue to serve on my terms.
In 2021, I attended a conference with a panel discussion about storytelling with a speaker from Military Veterans in Journalism (MVJ). I got on the email list, and eventually, they gifted me a one-year membership. As the world came out of lockdown, I knew the “stay-at-home mother of two” title wasn’t in the cards for me. I’d become an accomplished author by contributing to three or four multi-author book projects and was ready to explore other media mediums. So, I took a leap of faith and applied for a scholarship with MVJ to join the sixth cohort of the Entrepreneurial Journalism Creators Program (EJCP) at the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY.
At the time, I was considering Empower Women Veterans as the primary source of business. I even wrote a few blogs and hosted a virtual business summit that generated some buzz in the civilian business world. As time went on in the program, I realized I needed to focus on my story and how it relates to others — not merely waving the empowerment flag on behalf of the women veteran community.
Ultimate Outcomes
- I started a weekly-ish newsletter to my email list with the goals and ways to measure the objectives.
- I adopted some feedback-gathering techniques used in the program to decide on a logo, solidified my target audience, and hosted our first in-person event.
- I set a launch date for the podcast and have a basic marketing and monetization plan that involves crowdfunding a book about leadership.
- I scrapped the business marketing angle and shifted the focus of Empower Women Veterans to nonprofit mental health for future endeavors.
Started an Email Newsletter
In a world of busy business ownership, spending time on social media is the top item on the list of energy-draining marketing tactics. We spent a week developing a plan to increase your community by creating a Substack or other content-rich regular communication with your target market.
I’ve committed to sending these emails out weekly. However, my Customer Relationship Management program stopped serving my needs, and I’m troubleshooting other options. I launched the Empower Women Veterans Sunday newsletter on April 16, 2023. I sent fifteen (mostly) consecutive newsletters for three months. The newsletter featured conversations about current events, my thoughts about service, relationships, and business-related insights.
Feedback and Startups
EJCP challenges your assumptions about what it takes to be a successful social journalist in this age of artificial intelligence (AI), internet influencers, and boss babe hustle culture. As students, we participated in a plethora of feedback exchanges, from honest conversations about monetizing your startup from our expert guest speakers to filling out weekly surveys about the course content.
One thing is sure: Students are encouraged to voice their opinions, whether they want it or not. The feedback skews towards constructive, but when you are in a period of filtering big ideas into an actionable business model, the amount and type of information you have to screen can be overwhelming. From my experience, stick to your intuition, clearly define your ethical standards, and be prepared to upset a few people because you cannot please everyone.
Armed With Ambition Podcast
EJCP connects you with a mentor who helps you integrate the weekly lessons into your media venture. My mentor, Marcia Stepanek, was a brilliant addition to my life — the voice of reason and hope for my grandiose vision of being the Brene Brown meets Oprah of women veteran issues.
The long and emotional story boils down to my fear of failing and dealing with disappointing everyone. I stretched myself too thin, trying to launch events, newsletters, an anthology, and host a virtual summit instead of just listening to Marcia when she suggested launching a podcast.
So here we are. I’m proud to announce that I’ve hired a production studio to hold my feet to the fire and stop half-stepping toward success. The Armed with Ambition Podcast will focus on conversations about how the military community helped women veterans and military families overcome the tough stuff.
Why hire a production company? My life got complicated during the last 30 days of the program, and I had to put some skin in the game to make me commit to doing the big scary thing that I was afraid to do. We started batching episodes on September 7, 2023! Woo hoo, and EEK!
The Next 100 Days
The podcast is the marketing engine for the business. Ultimately, I will crowdfund a book about leadership and mental health and build my brand around public speaking. Deciding whether to do the book or the podcast first was a massive bottleneck for me. Yes, I can do them simultaneously, but one has to come first.
Currently, the simple strategy is to filter ideas for the book through Armed with Ambition and relaunch my weekly newsletter with links to the most recent episode. The first ten episodes will make up the bulk of the book. Eventually, I will incorporate a paid membership element to build community engagement and support while I venture into pre-selling and writing the book.
Conclusion
If this article feels incomplete, it’s because I’m still figuring out how this will become a profitable passion project. The first step to profitability is finding a podcast sponsor to offset my current production costs, averaging $200 an episode. The call to action for my public speaking opportunities will lead to asking people to continue the conversation and find out how you can support the Empower Women Veterans’ mission to offer education and support to listeners struggling with mental health and continuing to pursue their purpose in the civilian world.
My biggest takeaway is that I’m in a fabulous community of creators who push the envelope, take risks, and aren’t afraid to discuss uncomfortable topics regarding starting, failing, pivoting, and revisiting entrepreneurial journalism at every stage of the process. I’m thankful to MVJ and EJCP for selecting me and MVJ for supporting my efforts to serve military women and those who love them. Cheers!
