By Steve Seepersaud
The world of business is constantly cranking out stories of CEOs behaving badly. To Rebecca "Becca" Platsky '12, MS '13, and Adam Platsky '16, the messier the story, the better. It's all material for the siblings' Corporate Gossip Podcast.
Launched in 2022, the podcast is basically business news for lovers of gossip and pop culture. Viewers get the juiciest stories from the C-suite — cheating scandals, cults, financial schemes — in addition to more serious topics.
To date, the Corporate Gossip Podcast has more than 900,000 downloads worldwide and more than 150,000 social media followers. It was the Town & Country best podcast of 2024, and received a 2024 "Valentine" from NPR's Planet Money.
"I had been making videos on TikTok and started a series on Enron (my favorite fraud) and they went viral," Becca said. "Around the same time, my husband, Mike, was opening a podcast studio in New York called Borough House Creative. It was perfect timing. I wrote an outline for our first episode about Peloton and Adam was game to record it with me!"
"Becca and I were working on another project together around the same time," Adam said. "The original project ended and she told me she wanted to start a podcast and needed a co-host. I originally joined thinking it would be temporary, but people enjoyed the brother-sister dynamic."
The siblings say their podcast was influenced by courses in the School of Management as well as their father Jeffrey Platsky, MBA '98, longtime business editor for the Press & Sun-Bulletin in Binghamton.
"One of the best classes I took was business ethics with Tom Kelly," Becca said. "It should be mandatory material for every CEO we cover! I also loved the classes I took on fraud while I was getting my master's in accounting. Kim Jaussi's leadership classes were also incredibly influential along with my time as a Road Map intern with President Harvey Stenger."
"Becca and I saw firsthand the decline of print journalism," Adam said. "Because of that, we feel strongly about championing the journalists who write the stories we cover."
Adam works in data analytics at a consumer electronics company, having spent most of his career in e-commerce. Becca, impacted by AI-related job cuts, is a Certified Public Accountant and works full-time on the podcast. Although business is second nature to them, they place a high priority on making the podcast inclusive.
"We try to make complex business topics approachable for everyone, even if you know nothing about business," Becca said.
"Most existing business podcasts are not approachable for the average listener," Adam said. "The lack of a business degree or MBA is a barrier to entry, so we try to treat our business stories like they're straight out of 'Page Six.'"