by The Cowl Editor on February 7, 2019
Features
by Alexandra Huzyk ’20
News Staff
Finance is a requirement for all business students, but it does not come easily to everyone. To help make things easier, Providence College students Colin Williams ’20 and Christopher Florio ’20 have created a podcast named Common Cents.
The podcast aims to teach people about what is going on in the world financially.
Florio, an accounting and finance double major, says that the podcast is “a look at how world news shapes financial markets, how individual events affect the business world, and our take on them.”
“We get that these topics are boring to most people, so we try to add in a joke now and then,” says Williams, a finance major with an accounting minor.
The two students, who met each other freshman year, decided to create the podcast because it was something that personally interested them. As for choosing a podcast as opposed to another form of media, Williams joked, “I personally have a face for radio.” To which Florio responded, “Hey, that’s my line.”
Both Florio and Williams feel that podcasts are appealing to people with busy lifestyles and have had a recent resurgence in popularity. Williams says he has noticed podcasts becoming popular assignments within classes and an alternative for listening to music while at the gym.
Besides the obvious growth in popularity, Florio also added that they decided to create podcasts because “we’re going to have the conversation anyways, so we might as well record it.”
As for the catchy title, Williams, the self-proclaimed king of puns, said, “The name kind of just came to us.”
Florio and Williams explained that their podcasts are meant to appeal to college students. The episodes are especially relevant to business students that will be going through the interview process. “If you’re interviewing, you need to have some basic knowledge of what’s going on around you,” said Florio.
Williams added that listening to their podcasts is a good alternative to reading a newspaper, as it is an easy way to stay up-to-date on the particulars of financial markets and business-related news.
Of their three podcast episodes, Williams says that the pilot episode was his favorite. Florio says that the second episode was his personal favorite because they were able to talk about investments and real estate.
In addition to their current episodes Florio said, “hopefully, we’d like to think about putting a podcast out every two weeks, but we’ve found that we’re kind of tied to what happens in the world.” Williams said that in the future “we want to expand our audience, so that we teach and inform more people about what’s going on.”
For readers looking for more podcasts in the financial or business sphere, Williams suggests listening to Motley Fool Answers, which “delves into financial planning, retirement, and saving for college.”
His other suggestion is How They Built This, in which, “the hosts meet with CEOs of big companies and talk about how they got to be where they are now.”
Besides working on their podcast, both Florio and Williams hope to pursue jobs within their respective business interests after their time at PC. Florio has a job lined up in public accounting following graduation.
Williams said, “For me, the end game is to do financial planning. What I’m most interested in is retirement planning.”
For more jokes and financial commentary, tune in to the duo’s podcast on SoundCloud or Apple Podcasts (both under Common Cents), which will most likely have its most recent podcast uploaded on Monday, February 11.
Students should also follow their Instagram (@common.cents.363) for the latest market news and accounting updates.