A conversation with Joe Squawk

Josh Pichler of the Cincinnati Enquirer interviewed CNBC anchor Joe Kernen about his job.

Here is an excerpt:

You’re on Twitter now, @JoeSquawk. How do you think about using social media?

Everything happens instantaneously now, and I’ve been slow to adapt. A lot of people in their 40s and 50s aren’t quite as comfortable with social media. I’m very careful with anything I tweet or … even retweet. I do tweet verbally for three hours every day on air.

Business news is serious, but you look like you’re having a lot of fun on the air and aren’t afraid to do gags with guests and co-hosts.

It’s very difficult sometimes for people who are coming on to relax as we’re counting down to being live. And I realized this can be hard for them. So I think it helps to be somewhat disarming and to be conversational. It elicits more information if people are relaxed. As far as the gags and the humor, we’re talking about business news, and it is a little bit dry and there are some people who tune in just for the information, but there are other people who feel like we’re almost family. When people decide to spend the morning with us it’s important that they feel a connection.