A JERSEY-BORN university student has been developing a growing online audience with his podcast – recently interviewing British adventurer and TV host, Bear Grylls.
Harvey Bracken-Smith (21) is studying sociology and gaining a certificate in entrepreneurship at Duke University in North Carolina as part of their Liberal Arts programme.
He is also the founder and host of the ‘Personable’ podcast, where he interviews influential and noteworthy people. Mr Bracken-Smith recorded his first podcast in September 2022, during his gap year.
He fondly described his late mother Louise, who died after a battle with cervical cancer in 2023 and recalled her telling him “always be the best you can be” – a mantra he holds close to his heart.
Due to her love of sport, their family set up the Lou Lou Race Foundation in her name, which sponsors a number of notable Jersey athletes and organisations. Louise was also a successful businesswoman and chief executive of the Fairway group.
Mr Bracken-Smith said: “She was always encouraging me to push myself; be the best you can be is not just to be the best in the world, but more so be the best you can, at whatever stage you’re at. So she always encouraged me to push myself further.”
Often focusing on business leaders, the Personable podcast has also had guests from sports, television and the arts.
Interviewees on Mr Bracken-Smith’s podcast have included the former chief executive of Barclays, the chief executive of Leicester Tigers Rugby Club, professional golfer Justin Rose and former tennis star Tim Henman.
Most recently, he interviewed adventurer Bear Grylls, having spent several weeks trying to get him to appear on the podcast.
Mr Bracken-Smith’s following has grown significantly with his YouTube channel increasing from 300 subscribers at the start of the year, to nearly 2,000, while clips from his podcasts— including his interview with Bear Grylls—have gone viral, generating 2 million views on Instagram and 100,000 on TikTok.
“When I started at Duke University in the fall, I posted once a week for 17 weeks straight, and then since then I’ve really been working hard to get great guests, and to be really consistent. I have posted 70 podcasts this year,” he said.
“It was all done from cold outreach, from meeting people, from networking.
“And I have no real production experience or anything aside from just learning from my podcast. So then I got a production team together, editing team together, put the whole thing together, did the podcast and posted it.
“Bear Grylls collaborated with it on all of his social media platforms, which was quite cool.”
Mr Bracken-Smith also explained that he was diagnosed with dyslexia in his younger teenage years, and ADHD when he was 18.
“I found that broadly in the UK and in the US, there’s a times when people think, ‘oh, they’re not as smart or they’re not good enough’, or even the kids themselves think, ‘oh, I’m different, so therefore I’m not as good’. And so I think having found that out at a later age, I felt quite lucky having not known but then it enabled me further,” he said.
“When I was in my first semester at Duke, I went to the Learning Resources centre, and the lady working there advised me to read this book, it was something along the lines of, ‘Learning Outside the Lines’ by a guy called Jonathan Mooney.
“I read the whole book in one night, and instead of just saying ‘you’re good enough’ and ‘if you have ADHD, you can still be successful’, it was these real, applicable steps to how you can learn better, and help how you can study, which I think is helpful.
“This is something I’ve tried to focus on in my podcast. I don’t just want to hear ‘be brave and be motivated’ and stuff — how do I actually find success?”
Mr Bracken-Smith took inspiration from the author’s story and managed to have him as an interview guest on his podcast, which he regards as one of his most influential episodes.
He said that despite starting the podcast as a hobby, he intends to keep it going beyond his university studies.
“It has kind of transformed from a hobby or an interest to something that I think is intertwined with my with my identity,” he said.
“I’ve been doing this for three-and-a-half years now since I had the idea in July 2022, and I think that with something like a podcast, it’s something where you have just got to show up every day and keep pushing it.”
He added that his main motivation for the podcast is to keep learning from his interviewees and continue to grow as a person.
“I don’t care about the money – I don’t do this for the money,” he said. “You could speak to anyone in the world and learn from them. The amount of knowledge that you get is unreal.
“You can spend as much time looking for things you want to know, but you’re going to get way more information from a half hour conversation with someone that’s done it, than spending hours researching it yourself.”
Harvey’s podcast, ‘Personable’, is accessible through his YouTube channel at: https://www.youtube.com/@PersonableHarveyBrackenSmith.
