Episode 76 – How to communicate about science using an evidence-based approach with Dr Craig Cormick

This week we had the great privilege of speaking with Dr Craig Cormick OAM. Craig is the Creative Director of ThinkOutsideThe. He is one of Australia’s leading science communicators, with over 30 years’ experience working with agencies such as CSIRO, Questacon and Federal Government Departments.

In 2014 he was awarded the Unsung Hero of Science Communication by the Australian Science Communicators, and in 2011 was a co-winner of the International Association of Public Participation’s national best practice award for the development of the Science and Technology Engagement Pathways (STEP) framework.

Craig has headed up several communications and marketing units, before moving to consultancy work. He specialised in communicating complex science to the general public – and in communicating the complex attitudes and beliefs of the public to scientists, particularly on topics of biotechnology and nanotechnology.

He has a broad background in both the theory and the practice of working with social attitudes to new technologies, and methods of community engagement, particularly on how different values influence attitudes and receptiveness to messages or behaviour change.

He has been a member of the Society of Risk Analysis and has published research papers on risk communications and risk perception, as well as giving many workshops and talks, both in Australia and overseas, on the differences between public and scientific perceptions of risk.

Craig has a particular interest in evidence-based, and client- and audience-driven, communications and marketing. He has also published more than 40 books and won many writing awards.

You can follow Craig and learn more about his work here:

Transcript

Jen (00:00:00)
Hello, everybody. I’m so thrilled to welcome you to another episode of Let’s Talk SciComm.
It is my favorite place to be. In part, because it means I get to hang out with my very good friend, Michael.
I have to say g’day, Michael, today.

Michael (00:00:37)
G’day, Jen.

Jen (00:00:38)
Well, you’ve just had the pleasure of spending a bit of time at home in Ireland, so I had to listen to whether your g’day had improved or deteriorated during your time at home.

Michael (00:00:46)
One of the first things a neighbour said to me is: you sound more Irish now after getting back from Ireland.

Jen (00:00:54)
Oh, Michael, I know I’ve said it before, but today it is really really hard to know how to even begin to introduce our guest. Because our guest today has just done a million and one things in the world of science and science communication and also history, which is something we want to talk about. So I’m really thrilled to introduce you to my friend, Dr. Craig Cormick, OAM.
For anyone who’s listening, who isn’t in Australia, OAM stands for the Medal of the Order of Australia. It’s one of the absolute highest awards you can ever receive in Australia. And in Craig’s case, it was for his service to science and to the community. And you’re going to soon understand why Craig was honoured in such a way.
So I first met Craig through the Australian Science Communicators Organisation. And I feel incredibly humbled that as much as there are many things that Craig and I share, a love of science and writing and books, we also have both been awarded the title of the Unsung Hero of Australian Science Communication.
And in Craig’s case, that was back in 2014. And I reckon a lot of people have been singing Craig’s praises since then. And we certainly intend to do that today.
So hello Craig. It’s so great to see you.

Craig (00:02:12)
Marvellous. Marvellous to be here.
And just correct you, an OAM according to my wife stands for Old and Male.

Jen (00:02:18)
Well, I’m not going to discuss the old. I do know that you are male.
But I think it stands for also being a bloody legend.

Craig (00:02:30)
Well, thank you, Jen. That’s… It’s always hard to sit there without blushing.
But on the podcast, you can’t see the blushing happening. That’s fine.

Michael (00:02:35)
I think you’ve really blazed a trail, Craig, with a lot of the work you’ve done and kind of shaped science communication as an area in your wake. So really excited to chat about some of the stuff that you’ve done.

Jen (00:02:49)
Yeah. So Craig, you are first and foremost a science communicator. You’ve got more than 30 years of experience in that field. And that’s obviously why we’re so thrilled that you’ve been able to make time to be with us today.
But I feel like we need to talk about a lot of other things as well. You’re an educator. You’re a researcher, a journalist, a multi-award winning author. You’re a traveler, having spent time on all seven continents. You’ve been a government advisor, a consultant.
You know, you’ve done lots and lots of other things. You’ve got your own consultancy, Think Outside The… And yes, that is the whole name, which I think is a really awesome name.
And you’ve got a really broad background. So you’ve got a background both in theory and practice. The list of universities you’ve studied at is pretty cool. Please correct me if I’ve missed any. I’ve got University of Canberra, Australian National University, the Canberra School of Art, the University of Iceland, Helsinki University.
And your PhD is actually in creative historical fiction from Deakin University, which is where Michael works three days a week when he’s not with me at Uni Melbourne.
Did I miss any, Craig? Did I miss any?

Michael (00:03:50)
Oh wow.

Craig (00:03:55)
Yeah, I’ve also got a management something degree at Griffith University, but anyway…

Jen (00:04:00)
Oh, Griffith. Can’t believe I missed one. I tried so hard.

Jen (00:04:05)
You’ve worked for CSIRO. You’ve worked for Questacon, which for anyone who hasn’t had the pleasure of visiting Questacon, is this absolutely fabulous interactive science museum in Canberra, in Australia for all ages. It’s incredible. Go if you ever can.
You’ve worked for the Australian government. Your writing has appeared in essentially all of the literary journals in Australia. You’ve published more than 40 books. You’ve won more writing awards than I can possibly name.
And as we were just discussing before we hit the big record button, you also serve on the advisory board on education and outreach to the Nobel prize winning organisation for the prohibition of chemical weapons.
I need to stop and take a few breaths, Craig.
I mean, you’ve just… You’ve made so many contributions to science and to society, hence your OAM. And we’re not going to get to talk about it all, but there are lots of things we do want to ask you about.
But on this podcast, we always like to begin our conversations by going back a bit in time.
Tell us a little bit about little Craig. How did you first discover your passion for science? And I’m guessing also for history as a child? I don’t know. Tell us, what was little Craig like?

Craig (00:05:13)

Yeah, so little Craig was one of four boys in the family and I had a twin brother. And like a lot of twins, you mark out your own territory, in a nicer way than dogs do.
And so, my twin brother tended to go into maths and science and I tended to go into the arts. Tends to be the thing we looked at to distinguish yourself. You know, we’re both very good at most of the subjects [at] school. But well, if you’re doing that, I’m doing this.
And so, while my brother… had ownership I guess it were, territorial ownership of maths and science, I had territorial ownership of history, arts and so on.
But we both have a strong interest in what the other one’s doing as well. Because as a twin, you can’t not be aware and [towards?] what the other person’s doing.
So, when I came into science communications, my first degree was in arts particularly, but I discovered then that I had a huge awareness and passion for science and maths-based things, simply because of the interest I’d taken because my brother was doing it.
And for him as well in his career as a medical doctor and researcher, he’s had a big interest in history and things. So, I found out it was a real natural link.

And at the time, back, this must be back in the late ’70s. No, early ’80s, mid ’80s, mid ’80s when I first got in science communication, the, really there wasn’t much happening in the space.
There were a couple of science journalists on newspapers. There were… the ABC Science Unit was the main game in town. And they had primarily been employing scientists.
And they were starting to discover [at] that time, maybe their staff have to work outside employing scientists as science communicators, because the scientists were really comfortable in their area of expertise and not so comfortable talking about areas that weren’t their area of expertise.
But people who came from broader backgrounds had to learn everything. When they went to talk about a topic, they had to research it. And that research came out in their work.
And so, they started thinking, Hmm, we need to start employing people who have a broader background than just science, who have a strong interest in science.
And so, I was actually a part of that wave, I think, of people coming into science communications with a background in social studies, history, social psychology, et cetera, which proved invaluable, because that was an era when social psychology was first starting to be understood.
The way you need to communicate science is about understanding your audience and understanding when you’re reaching them and when you’re not reaching them and why.
And, you know, these days, post-fake news, post-COVID and anti-COVID lies and so on, we suddenly realise that the psychology of science communication is vital.

Michael (00:07:52)
Hmm. Yeah, that’s really fascinating. I suppose those transferable skills might have also benefited how productive you’ve been in the writing that you’ve done, you know, with that background in arts.
You’re a prolific author, having written over 40 books and 100 short stories, which is just incredibly productive.
I think that works out to about a book a year since 1998. I’d love you to elaborate a little bit more on your love of writing.
I presume you love it because you’ve done so much of it.
You know, where did that love of writing come from? Do you remember the first story you ever wrote?

Craig (00:08:29)
I do remember when I was in high school. This was when we’d recently moved to Canberra and I was in, must’ve been Year 4 or 5.
And the careers advisor sat me down and said, “What do you want to be?” And he’ll talk you through that career path.
And it was going smoothly. And so I came in the room and he said, “What do you want to be?” And I said, “I wanna be an author.” And he went, “Hmm, but what do you want to do for your day job?” Which was actually very solid advice.
So I’ve always, it felt to me like I’ve always been writing since I was little. And that came out of I guess yarning. And yarning came out of our family.
Used to have a very large extended family. And every fortnight or so we’d gather at one of my uncle’s places when I lived in Wollongong. And all the uncles and aunts would sit around in the backyard on chairs and eskies and tell yarns and chat and stories. And stories became a part of explaining the world, explaining how you understand things.
And we moved around a lot when I was young. My parents moved from business to business and moved from city to city.
And you realise story’s also a way of not just understanding yourself, but helping you communicate with new people, and being able to tell stories about your background as a way of making new friends.
And I found a lot of overlap working in the sciences and the arts, literary arts, in that both scientists and writers are really trying to understand things.
Trying to understand what makes the world tick, what makes people tick, what makes us understand things. And so there’s a lot of commonality there. You know, the jump between them’s not that far.

Michael (00:10:02)
Yeah, I really resonate with that. The process of writing I think is a great way to understand yourself better. It really helps me align my thoughts, gives me ideas I guess, for how to express myself. But it’s a hard task. You know, it’s a complicated relationship that I have with writing.
I think a lot of people find it really difficult, Craig. You know, you’ve got issues like procrastination and not feeling ready to write, but you never feel ready to write.
What’s your secret to being so productive?
Because myself, and I’m sure there’s a lot of listeners who have writing tasks. We’ve got a lot of students who listen to this podcast who maybe have assignments or theses that they have to write.
But writer’s block is real, and there are challenges around just getting it done.
You know, how do you get it done? What’s your secret?

Craig (00:10:52)
So the secret is, I always tell people, “Look, I’m not actually a great writer. Gee, I’m a good rewriter.”
And so the answer is, just sit down and put those words down on the page. Because once you’ve got them there, you can do something with them.
I say it’s like, you want to build a castle out of Lego blocks? If you haven’t got the Lego blocks, you can’t do anything.
So just put those Lego blocks down. Just put any old shit down on the page, but then you can work on it. If you’ve got something to work on.
If you’ve got a blank page, you can do nothing.

Michael (00:11:23)
So you can sit down and write while you still feel other things are calling you away, but you’re able to just accept that that’s always going to be the case and you get words down on the page anyway.

Craig (00:11:35)
Yep, say I’ve got to write a column or something and the deadline’s looming and all these other things calling me.
I think, well, shit, I’m just going to sit down and write a hundred words. So I’ve got 10 minutes before I have to go.
And normally say, “Oh, 10 minutes, where do I go? I better go and brush my teeth, put on my shoes.” You know, 10 minutes is not enough time to work on anything.
But 10 minutes, you can knock off a quick hundred words. And then you’ve broken the ice. You know, you’ve, that’s the hardest bit is that discipline [of] starting. Once you’ve got that happening, come back and look at it and think, Okay, now where do I go from? Add a bit, add a bit, add a bit. It’s there!

Michael (00:12:03)
Right, I’m taking notes here. That’s great.

Jen (00:12:06)
So Craig, you have written a ton of books and now we have some understanding of how you’ve managed to do it.
But the one that I have beside my computer at work, which lives right beside me. So you don’t realize that I think about you all the time, Craig, even though we haven’t seen each other for ages, ’cause your book sits right beside me.

Craig (00:12:22)
In a good way, yeah?

Jen (00:12:24)
Absolutely in a good way.
And the book that I have beside me all the time is called “The Science of Communicating Science, The Ultimate Guide”. And it really is one of my all-time favorite books.
I mean, I don’t read it as a bedtime story or anything. But you know, for anyone who’s interested in evidence-based practice when it comes to science communication, I always tell them they’ve got to read your book.
So for someone who hasn’t read it, tell us about it. Why did you write it?
And I’m really interested to know, you were already a very experienced science communicator by the time you wrote it.
Were there things that surprised you that you found out about effective science communication in the process of researching it and writing it?

Craig (00:13:02)
So the history to why I wrote at the time was, that time I’d quit full-time employment with CSIRO, started my little company.
And I thought, yeah, I’m [going to be] retiring in the next somewhat years. And I think I want a legacy project.
And so I want to put all the knowledge that I’d gained over the past 30 years into a book that others could use and benefit from. So that was one driver.
The other driver was going to a lot of science communication conferences. I was watching the divide between the theorists and the practitioners appear to get wider and wider.
As you had a lot of people who were doing science communications, and they were finding the literature a bit impenetrable or firewalled.
And you had people who were, and particularly in Europe, a lot of people were who are theory of science communications and don’t really practice.
And they tend to these days dominate the big conferences like Public Communication of Science [and] Technology.
And there’s a reason why when you bid for a conference presentation, people who’ve done the theory have a lot of background of references and citings and so on.
And so bit by bit, I’ve watched this grow. So I’ve thought, Okay, so I need a book that can, particularly for practitioners, that takes all that complex theory out there, all the academic papers, 120 or so academic papers and books, and puts them in real plain English. And make it funny. Make it really fun and enjoyable.

Jen (00:14:25)
Yeah, it is. It’s funny, yeah.

Craig (00:14:28)
That’s so important.
And in writing the book I must say I actually had a lot of fun. I used to come home from work, or I’d be working in the day on things, and I’d do it at nights.
Put the kids to bed, didn’t watch much TV, didn’t find much TV worth watching. And each night I’d work for an hour or two on the book.
And I gave myself a fortnight for each chapter, I think, and set myself a deadline. And bit by bit, by bit, by bit, there it was.

Jen (00:14:54)
Yeah. Well, I mean, I really do highly recommend it to everyone listening. If you haven’t read it before, it is funny. It is easy to read.
And you come out just feeling like you’ve been completely flooded with good quality evidence-based information about how to do this thing called science communication better.
So thank you for writing it. And what a legacy. I mean, you know, along with the other 40 books, but…
But Craig, when I think about you, I feel like you really are a jack of all trades and a master of many, I have to say.
But I think about you as having kind of two broad specialties. So on the one hand, you yourself are a practitioner. You’re incredibly skilled at communicating complex ideas to non-scientifically trained audiences, so an audience that often gets called the general public. Which, you know, we don’t have time to discuss that.
But then you also actually have a lot of experience doing something that not very many other people do in my mind. And that is, communicating the really complex and nuanced beliefs and ideas of those lay audiences, so that general public, back to scientists.
And you’ve particularly done that on topics like biotech and nanotechnology. And the first time I ever came across you, you won’t remember ’cause I was just a young student in the audience. But you ran a session at the Australian Science Communicators Conference, I don’t know, many years ago on risk perception about how the public and scientists perceive risk very differently.
And you used a spider as an example to think about how people perceive risk differently. And I’d just love to draw you out on that a bit. Why do people perceive risk so differently?
And I guess, why is it so important that scientists are aware of the fact that they are perceiving things very differently to their audiences and potentially to society as a whole?

Craig (00:16:45)
Sure. Great question, Jen.
So early in my career, I discovered that there was a lot of energy going into communicating science to the public, but very little going back the other way of communicating what the public were like back to scientists.
And so a lot of my early work was working with the disengaged, unengaged. You know, so we knew that 40% of the public were sort of in there with SciComms, but up to 50 to 60% weren’t really across it.
So I started trying to delve deeply into understanding what was happening there with surveys and social engagements and all those things and coming back with some stuff that was like, “Wow, we had no idea that people thought this because they’re never coming to our events and we’re not polling them.”
We do live in tribes, and we tend to live in tribes of those people who think like ourselves.
And so even if you’re a scientist and your wide network are not scientists, your friends and families, but they probably think very similar to you as a scientist.
They’re driven by data, not emotion. They’re driven by… they value science, et cetera, et cetera.
So it became very clear that unless there was a broader understanding of all the people who don’t get science or don’t trust it. And trust was a huge thing here, what’s happening with trust in the world, trust has gone out the window in many ways.
Finding out what’s happening to the unengaged and disengaged in particular, to be able to feed back to scientists. And there was risk perceptions, as you’ve asked about.
It was people they trust and don’t trust. It was messages that resonate with them, messages that don’t resonate with them.
And what were their values that were letting, acting as gatekeepers? So depending on your values and how you’re wired and who your network are, you’ll accept a message or reject a message. And we saw that really strongly during the COVID years.
So with risk perception, why are we different? And I always say, well, the difference is for scientists, you’re taught risk equals probability times impact.
And for members of the general public, risk equals WTF time OMG.
And so one is a quantifiable analysis of risk, and one is a strongly emotional reaction. And that tends to us a broad summary of the difference between the general public and a science mind.
And often there’s this thing we talk about the N factor, and the N factor of one, which is my auntie’s cousin had that done to her, and she said it was terrible. So…

Jen (00:19:11)
Yep, there’s my evidence.

Craig (00:19:12)
Yeah, there’s my N of one. Your number is one, or it’s yourself.
I think. Therefore, everybody else must think.
And so it’s, I think it’s very important to understand when we’re trying to work with the public or publics, that there are differences that drive them, and they need different messages, and they need different values.
And sometimes the best way to talk about science to those people is not to mention the word science. We call it science by stealth.

Michael (00:19:39)
That’s really interesting.
I’d love to ask you a bit more about that idea of the publics.
And I guess there’s lots of different ways you could divide up the public, but maybe one way that you’ve thought about is those who trust science and those who don’t trust science.
If you’re communicating differently, or if you need to communicate differently to those different audiences to reach them, could the way you communicate to, say, an audience that doesn’t trust science, could that way of communication undermine your credibility in the minds of those who do trust science? Because maybe you’re leaving things out that are essential for credibility in their minds?

Craig (00:20:16)
You’ve touched on the 100,000 dollar question when it comes to science communication, which is if you can’t differentiate channels to reach those different audiences with different messages, you are in trouble of mixing your messages and diluting it.
So if you looked at it, and there are many ways of cutting it up. If you looked at five basic groups.
First there are the fanboys and fangirls. They love science and they can’t get enough of it, and they subscribe to all the podcasts. They’re listening to this, and you know, they’re really, really keen.
Then you get those who are generally interested. You know, they’re aware of David Attenborough documentaries, and they’ve been to Questacon, or the Scienceworks with their kids, and you know, they’ll take a general interest.
You get then the other ones who are interested in topics only of their interest, topics that relate to them personally. And often they’re real busy, busy people. And they’ve got kids to get to school, and they’ve got dogs to get to the vet, and they’ve got the rest of it. But when the topic comes up that’s of their interest, whether it’s sustainability or chemicals in the environment, that’s the one they switch on for.
Then you’ve got a group who are unengaged. They’re disengaged. They don’t really care about science. Not an issue for them. Too many other things in life to worry about.
And the last group are the hostile to science group. They do not trust it. And they do not want to know about it. And they have alternative beliefs that have filled their mindset.
So if you think of those five things. Yes, different messages to the wrong message to the wrong group will be a bit disastrous. And that’s always been the challenge, understanding you’ve got the groups.
Now, fortunately, with social media, people tend to have a media that follows again, their tribal group. And so you know, if you’re going onto a mainstream commercial TV group, it’s probably going to be those groups three and four I talked about. If you’re going to go into a specialised science program, it’s going to reach one and maybe two.
And the group five, you’ve really got to get into their networks to try and reach them with different types of messages than you would for any of the others.
But you know, those messages, they cross over to number one, not so good.

Michael (00:22:14)
Must be really hard reaching group five.
I mean is it possible if people are hostile? That’s the hostile group, right?

Craig (00:22:22)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Michael (00:22:23)
How do you reach people who are hostile to science?

Craig (00:22:28)
Well, it’s the same as saying, let’s convince Putin and the Israeli government to call a peace accord. It’s not going to be easy ’cause they’re hostile for it to start with. You can’t come in and say, “I want to talk to you about science.”
There are ways to do it. And generally, you’ve got to find a way to align with their values. If they don’t see you as belonging to their tribe, you haven’t got a chance to start with. You’re lost.
So you need to find a champion who can work for you within that group. You need to be not talking about science, but talking about the impacts or the effects or talking about issues of trust.
Say you’re talking to an anti-COVID vaccination person who believes long COVID is due to vaccinations. So how do you work with them? So you’ve gott to do it in tiny steps.
You’ve got to find and think that, yeah, you’re willing to listen to them first. So you’re not saying, “That’s just bullshit.” You’ve lost it.
You’ve got to listen to them and say, “Oh, that’s fascinating. You really think that. So what brought you to that position? What brought you to that conclusion?”
“Oh, I saw this video on something.”
“Oh, and why did it convince you? Why did it…?”
So start going back to the, questioning the points that they ticked their boxes be coming down and sort of unticking some of those boxes in their mind. And that’s often the best you can hope for.

Jen (00:23:41)
Yeah. The power of curiosity, right?

Craig (00:23:43)
Yep, Yep.

Jen (00:23:44)
The power of not being stuck in your own way of thinking and taking a big step back and recognising that other people will have other ways of thinking.
And while you might fundamentally disagree. To them, they are valid ways of thinking, and the curiosity makes a big difference.

Craig (00:23:56)
That’s right. That’s right.
Yeah, yeah.

Michael (00:23:58)
I just find that whole idea of the different types of publics so interesting.
And what’s particularly interesting is, so this group that are hostile to science, it’s not like they’re not interested or they’re not engaged.
They’re still really curious and I guess proactive in thinking about certain issues. It’s just that they’ve landed on a, kind of a different conclusion than the conclusion that scientists have landed on.

Craig (00:24:27)
That’s right.
And if you start to understand the values that different people have, it starts to make logical sense why they’ve come to those conclusions.
Example is if you look at the… they’re largely mothers who are anti-vaccination for their children. We’re talking about the MMR, measles, mumps, rubella type vaccinations here, not COVID.
And they started looking for, okay, let’s stop analysing why they’re anti-vaccine. Let’s see what other things they’ve got out there. And we started doing the research.
They discovered there was a bit of a type, and [it’s] someone who’s really worried about government’s impact, really worried about multinational impact, worried about the safety of food, tend to drive a four-wheel drive because it’s perceived to be safer in an accident.
Tend to go to alternative schools because you don’t trust the mainstream education system to do right for your kids. I’m going to have a lot of home security put up. And often it’s like the mama bear syndrome.
And all these things together make me… You know, so it’s not so much a fear of vaccines, it’s a fear of everything out there in the big wide world. It’s a fear of multinationals and government and everything that could impact on your children.
And so the data is not important. It’s about protecting your child from everything out there that’s a bit unknowable and perceived to be risky.

Jen (00:25:44)
Which you know, is actually completely understandable position. I would do anything to protect my children.
I just have access to different information that leads me to believe that the best way I can do that is by taking a different approach.
But if I didn’t have access to that information or if I felt excluded from that information because of the language that it was shared in or any other number of ways that science can be made difficult to access, perhaps I would also come to those conclusions.

Craig (00:26:12)
One of the other big things is people tend to be on a, you know, a four-fold scale of hierarchical community, community, individual, et cetera.
And if you’re very, very individualised in thinking. You look at the stats on vaccines and say, “Okay, so my child has a one in 10,000 chance of having a reaction and the rest is what happens to the community. I’m not so worried about the community. I’m worried about that one in 10,000 chance for my child. So no, I’m not going to do it.” As long as everybody else does, it’ll work for me.
If you’re more community-minded, you look at that ad and say one in 10,000, pssh. But look at the impact for community! Okay, I need to have.
So there’s also this playing into it, your value set, whether you rely on this individual
versus community.

Jen (00:26:56)
Hmm. Oh, Craig, it’s so interesting and I really wish we could talk to you for another I don’t know, maybe 40 hours or something.
But sadly, we can’t do that because well, I think we just have to invite you back. Can we invite you back sometime to talk more about this?

Craig (00:27:10)
More than happy.

Jen (00:27:13)
Excellent. And to anyone listening Craig’s face just then looked like yeah, maybe I’d be happy to do that.

Michael (00:27:21)
So we are running towards the end of the podcast, Craig. But, before we let you go, we would like to shift gears a little bit and switch to our rapid questions, which are lighthearted questions. Lighthearted answers are acceptable and encouraged.

Michael (00:27:46)
The first one that I’d like to ask Craig is if you could pick an alternative job to what you’re doing today, what would it be?

Craig (00:27:58)
Musician.

Jen (00:28:00)
That was my guess.

Michael (00:28:01)
What’s your instrument?

Craig (00:28:03)
I actually played trombone for many years in orchestra.

Michael (00:28:06)
Wow. Okay.

Craig (00:28:06)
So it would be a brass jazz instrument.

Jen (00:28:08)
I love it.

Craig (00:28:09)
There are other ways to get to poverty rather than being a science communicator and one is being a musician.

Jen (00:28:15)
Oh, I love it.
Okay, Craig, if you could choose one superpower that you would have, what would it be?

Craig (00:28:21)
Invisibility.

Jen (00:28:23)
So good.

Michael (00:28:24)
You’ve thought about this before, haven’t you? That was a very quick answer.
Didn’t have to edit out any empty space there.

Craig (00:28:30)
And the children or the wife are looking for me, and I’ve seen that. Snap, invisible.

Michael (00:28:37)
Yeah, yeah.
If you could go back and give yourself a message at the age of 21, what would you say to yourself?

Craig (00:28:43)
It doesn’t matter. Chill the fuck out. It does not matter.

Jen (00:28:49)
I’m going to, I’m going to make that into a meme.
And I’m just going to play it anytime I feel stressed about something relatively meaningless, I’m just going to listen to your voice saying that Craig. Thank you.

Craig (00:28:59)
The older you get in life, the more you realise all the things you thought were really really important, like what people are thinking when they’re looking at you doesn’t matter.

Jen (00:29:06)
Yeah. Hear hear. I love it.
Next question, Craig. What do you think makes a good leader?

Craig (00:29:14)
Empathy.

Jen (00:29:15)
Mm-hmm.

Michael (00:29:15)
Yeah.

Jen (00:29:18)
I like it.

Michael (00:29:19)
Good answer.
And then final question that I’d like to ask, and we’ve kind of touched on this a little bit before when we were chatting a little bit about your book, “The Science of Communicating Science, The Ultimate Guide.”
I’d like to ask you now, what would be your ultimate tip about communicating effectively about science from your vast experience?

Craig (00:29:41)
Put yourself in the other person’s shoes. Always think from the other perspective in your own perspective. You’re not telling what you know. You’re trying to tell what they don’t know.

Jen (00:29:52)
Beautifully said, Craig.
And look, I’m just so thrilled that our calendars finally aligned after quite a few attempts, and that we could have this conversation. Because I’ve admired yeah, both your public speaking abilities and you know, your communicating abilities yourself, but also there’s a wealth of knowledge that you have for so many years.
And it really is just such a pleasure to get to have a conversation with you for a little while. And I really am going to invite you back, I promise.
So I hope that we can find another time when you’re not in Antarctica or the Netherlands or Finland or anywhere else that you tend to visit.

Craig (00:30:29)
Thank you. It’s been a privilege being on. And thank you, Jen. I’m a great admirer of your work as well. And well deserved Michael. Lovely to have done this podcast with you both. Very enjoyable.

Michael (00:30:39)
It’s been an absolute pleasure. Thanks so much, Craig.

Jen (00:31:02)
Thank you so much for listening to another episode of “Let’s Talk SciComm” from the University of Melbourne Science Communication Teaching Team. I’m Associate Professor Jen Martin and my brilliant cohost is Dr. Michael Wheeler.

Michael (00:31:16)
And if you’ve enjoyed listening to this episode, we’d love you to share it with your friends and family. We’d love you to share your favourite episode online. And you can find us at Let’s Talk SciComm on X, formerly known as Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn.

Jen (00:31:31)
And this season, we are asking for your help to spread the word so that more people find out about our podcast. So if you enjoy listening, we would love you to tell a friend.
But we’d also love you to think about taking a couple of minutes to write us a review. Whatever platform you listen on, there will be a place for you to leave a review and we are gonna keep track and award our favourite reviewees some prizes.
We’re thinking about some merch and we’d also love to reward our favourite review with a free science communication workshop that we will run for you in person or online, depending on whereabouts you are.

Michael (00:32:07)
Ooh, prizes. And if… They sound great. And if you’d like to get in touch to suggest a guest or a future topic, we’d love to hear from you.
Please email us at lets.talk.scicomm@gmail.com.
And as always, a huge thank you to our production team, Stephanie Wong and Steven Tang.