Episode 64 – Interview with Olly Dove from That’s What I Call Science

This week we are so delighted to chat with Olly Dove. Living up to her bird name, Olly Dove is a marine ecology PhD candidate researching the foraging behaviour of little penguins and short-tailed shearwaters in lutruwita/Tasmania. Olly’s favourite part of working in zoology is undoubtedly the exciting fieldwork it leads her to, and she loves sharing stories about the natural world with others.

When not hanging out with critters, Olly is an incredible science communicator. She is the weekly host, a co-manager, and an editor on the nipaluna/Hobart-based radio/podcast show, That’s What I Call Science, which was recently awarded a prestigious Eureka Prize for STEM inclusion. Other recent scicomm adventures for Olly have included performing at the Festival of Bright Ideas in 2022 and competing in the FameLab Australia Finals in 2023, both with a shearwater puppet for her on-stage co-star!

You can follow Olly and learn more about her work here:

• https://thatsscience.org/
• https://twitter.com/olly_dove
• https://twitter.com/ThatsScienceTAS
• https://www.instagram.com/ols_dove/
• https://www.instagram.com/thatssciencetas/
• https://www.linkedin.com/in/ollydove/

Transcript

Jen (00:00:00)
Hello and welcome to Let’s Talk SciComm, a podcast by the University of Melbourne’s Science Communication Teaching Team.
I’m Associate Professor Jen Martin and my wonderful co-host is Dr Michael Wheeler, and we believe that science isn’t finished until it’s communicated.

Jen (00:00:40)
Hello everybody and a very, very warm welcome to another episode of Let’s Talk SciComm.
I’m Jen and I’m so thrilled to be here with you today, talking about my very favourite topic, science communication.
And I’m joined by one of my very favourite people, Michael. How’re you doing?

Michael (00:01:05)
I’m doing very well, Jen. I’m doing very well today and excited for the episode.

Jen (00:01:09)
Well Michael, today we have the great honour of speaking with one of this year’s Eureka Prize winners. Woohoo!
If we’ve got listeners who haven’t heard of the Eurekas, think kind of the Oscars with just as many gorgeous frocks but for Australian science. So the Eurekas have a whole lot of different prizes.
There’s 19 of them across a whole range of different topics. So there’s a prize for applied ecological research. There’s one for infectious diseases research. But they’re not all research prizes. There’s one for the innovative use of technology, for outstanding mentorship of young researchers, which I think is great. There’s one for community engagement in science.
But this year, the prize for STEM inclusion was very deservedly awarded to the team behind the radio show and podcast, That’s What I Call Science.
And our guest, Olly Dove, is a member of that team. She’s a weekly host, an editor, a content manager. So welcome Olly, and congratulations.

Olly (00:02:17)
Thank you so much and thank you for inviting me to be here today.

Jen (00:02:20)
Well, we feel pretty lucky ’cause winning a Eureka prize is quite a big deal.
And it was just so joyous for me to be there at the ceremony. And I don’t know if you remember, but I was sitting really close to you, I think just one row in front.
And when you were announced as the winners, turning around and seeing this absolute unbridled joy and surprise on your faces when you were announced as the winners, it was, it was beautiful. How did that feel?

Olly (00:02:47)
We were so shocked. As soon as they said “That’s”… We knew that was the beginning of the winners.
And I don’t necessarily know if it was viewable, but when we were on stage, the two of us were just shaking so incredibly.
So I got to go to the award ceremony with fellow co-manager Anna Abela. And I felt so lucky to just be in the room with everyone and get to experience it.

Jen (00:03:12)
Oh look, it’s just amazing, Olly. And for anyone who hasn’t yet listened to your podcast, and of course, the minute you finished listening to this episode, you should.
“That’s What I Call Science”. You’re based in Tasmania. It’s a volunteer run show. It’s a radio show and it’s also a podcast. And the radio show is now broadcast all around Australia on different community radio stations.
And really, as you’ve gathered from the fact that you won a prize about inclusion in STEMM, my understanding is that your focus really is on sharing diverse voices in STEMM, STEM-M.
And of course, we can’t wait to ask you more about that because you know, we can’t wait to ask you more about the podcast.

But before that, I want to flag that that’s all volunteer stuff that you do. And I can relate. I also do a lot of radio as a volunteer.
But you’re also a PhD student. So you’re based at the Institute of Marine and Antarctic Studies at the University of Tasmania.
And being the geek that I am, of course, I wanted to look up about your research. So Michael, as a non-ecologist, this is the official title of Olly’s research, “The influence of fine- scale environmental variation and anthropogenic factors on the foraging ecology of marine mesopredators in Southeast Tasmania.”
So Olly, I guess, first of all, tell us about your research. And in particular, I want to know in this context, what are the marine mesopredators? And secondly, do you get to do lots of cool fieldwork?

Olly (00:04:42)
Yes. So quick answer to number two before I go into it later is that yes, I do get to do lots of cool fieldwork. It’s by far the best part of my PhD.
But essentially that very fancy title, all it really means is that I look at how two seabirds, the short-tailed shearwater and the little penguin, dive and find food underwater.
These two species actually overlap. So they live in the same area, which is really fun. I’ve seen some sort of rental disputes between the two when they fight over burrows and nests. It’s hilarious. I think it could be a reality TV show in itself.
That is what I am currently in the last six months of a PhD processing, looking at lots of different numbers to try and work out the different movement patterns underwater of the two birds.

Michael (00:05:28)
Hmm, that’s really interesting. So it sounds like you’re kind of getting to work closely with the these birds as well. Are you tempted to name them?

Olly (00:05:37)
Oh, well, one of the very… We do give nicknames to a few of the birds.
I had, one of my favourite ones was on the very last trip and it was a thousand and seven hundred grams. It was the biggest penguin I’ve worked with. And yeah, we called him Big Boy.
And he was a gentle giant, except he wasn’t gentle at all. Little penguins are very savvy, aggressive, cheeky little ones.

However, shearwaters, they can go on short trips around Tasmania for three days at a time. And they’re the trips that I want to study.
But sometimes they, if they need a little R&R for themselves away from the chick, they will go all the way to Antarctica to feed for two weeks.
And it’s so impressive that they can get there and back. I think it’s… They’re not a big bird. They’re only around 600 grams. And the fact that they can do a commute like that is extraordinary.
But it does mean that we have to wait for them to come back. So I’ll be on Wedge Island for up to five weeks to wait for them.
And given that you have to walk around a colony every night until 1 or 2 a.m. and you might not see a bird for three weeks before they all start coming back. It gets, it gets kind of bleak at that point.

Michael (00:06:46)
Oh yeah.

Michael (00:06:50)
I can imagine. That’s dedication for you. All that waiting around.
I guess it’s worth it in the end, right? Because Australia has some really unique species.
My accent detector is beeping. And I noticed that you do have a bit of an accent. And perhaps you haven’t always lived in Australia. Would that be fair to say?

Olly (00:07:09)
That is fair to say. I’ve actually come back and forth three times.
So I’m from the UK originally, from just outside London in the south of England. And I wanted to do my undergraduate degree in Australia, but couldn’t afford it as an international student.
So I went to the University of Manchester, partially because they had a study abroad program. And so during my zoology degree, I came and studied at the University of Queensland for half a year.
And my suspicions were correct in that I absolutely loved Australia. I love the way of life. I love everything. I love how nature is just much more integrated into your day to day life here. And I love the space and the blue skies.
And I often say I felt like Dorothy going from black and white Kansas to the very colourful Oz, ’cause I literally came to a very colourful Oz.
But unfortunately, I had to go back. I ended up at Imperial College London. And it was a dual degree in taxonomy and biodiversity based at the Natural History Museum of London.
And so studying there and getting to walk past a stegosaurus on my way to lectures every day was wild. It was so good. And it’s actually where I had my first radio show.
So a few of my course mates and I, we had a weekly show called The Natural Selection, which was really fun and got me sort of hooked on the radio world.
And I essentially wanted to come back to Australia, wanted to work with birds, wanted to do something sort of related to Antarctica, ’cause it’s been a dream of mine to get there for the past decade. And yeah, ended up here at IMAS.

Jen (00:08:43)
What an awesome journey. And you immediately piqued my interest when you said that you’d been to Imperial College London. Because the thing that I’m really keen to get to is from that passion for animals and nature and zoology, which is absolutely my background as well.
I’m really interested to hear where this shift into science communication came from. And the reason I visited Imperial College London is because they have a really great science communication teaching program.
So was that involved? Like, how did the radio happen? And I know you… ’cause you’ve done so many things, Olly. Like I think it was back in 2015, you wrote a kids book about a pigeon learning to fly. I know you’ve written three novels.
You know, you’ve made a whole lot of video blogs. You know, you’ve been doing a lot of science communication. Clearly, this is something that you love. How did that begin?

Olly (00:09:30)
Full disclaimer in that my dad actually worked in radio as well. So not science communication. But I did as a kid get to go into the studio and it was always very exciting. It was like a, ooh, what a, what a world to work in.
Then over the last decade, there’s been sort of voluntary jobs here and there,  I’ve worked for a few organisations translating academic journals into things that are actually easy to read and those sort of things.
But the Natural Selection show, that ended up happening, it wasn’t with the SciComm department. It was because a friend of mine, we were at the open day, the sort of the equivalent of the Australian O-Week.
And a guy from their radio station was like, “Oh, do you want to see a studio?” And we were like, “Oh, that sounds kind of cool”. And he let us… We had to actually go through a bush. I think something that was blocking the normal path. But it was like this magical little journey round.
We realised halfway we were following a stranger to this underground basement through a bush. We didn’t know where we were going. But it led out to a studio. And we sat down and we asked a couple of other friends as well.
We were like, “Yeah, why not have a radio show?” So every Wednesday at 9pm, we would have a different topic and we would bring music and facts and just talk about the natural world on a different theme each week.
And it was, it was amazing. It was great. We probably maxed around 10 listeners. But it was really fun and it was a really good chance to practise being on air live and getting to do something a little bit different.
And so when That’s What I Call Science were advertising for two new team members in 2020, a friend of mine saw it and heard about that and actually passed it on to me because they knew I had a bit of a background and an interest in that sort of thing.

Jen (00:11:15)
It sounds like Narnia, you finding the, you finding the studio.
I’m picturing, you know, with the lamp and the, and the woollen coats.

Olly (00:11:23)
Yep. Yeah, and given I love Narnia, this probably also partial… part of the reason why I grew up to be a zoologist. Talking animals…

Michael (00:11:33)
It’d probably be a good place to have a recording studio, you know, in a cupboard with, behind loads of coats would be good for the sound I reckon.

Olly (00:11:41)
Yeah, that’s true. Soundproofing.

Michael (00:11:43)
Maybe. Maybe when we design our studio Jen, it can be like a Narnia style studio.

Jen (00:11:48)
Will there be lots of Turkish Delight?

Michael (00:11:51)
Oh, now you’re speaking my language.
But Ollie, it sounds like you’re really following your passion there and you’re able to kind of bring those, the stories around what you’re interested in, in the natural world to a broader audience.
And you’re, you’ve been doing it for a while. You’re pretty good at it as well. I know in 2021 you were an Inspiring Women in STEMM Tasmanian fellow. I’m curious to ask you a bit more about what that involved.

Olly (00:12:22)
Yeah, I’m so glad you did actually, because that’s a wonderful thing to have been a part of.
It’s a grant award scheme in that people can do a, an outreach project. And so what I submitted for and asked for was actually a camera so that I could film and make some videos of my fieldwork on Wedge Island and then share it and just make some resources to be able to send back home.
And then what’s actually been a long term benefit of being one of the fellows is that a few times a year we all meet up and it’s been a really supportive network and cohort to be a part of because we’re all from different faculties at University of Tasmania.
So it’s been really nice. And they are, I think I’m very much the least inspiring of all of them because they’re just wonderful women that are involved in it. And I’m really glad that I got to know them.

Jen (00:13:15)
I do not buy that you were the least inspiring. I’m sorry, but I think that, that is definitely not possibly the case.
It’s interesting though, isn’t it? I’ve had the good fortune of being part of a number of kind of different programs where you end up with this extraordinary network of particularly women in STEMM.
And, you know, you sort of spend half your time just feeling like an imposter and comparing yourself to everyone else but then just feeling so lucky to get to interact with incredible people doing incredible things.

Olly (00:13:45)
And touching on being an imposter, that’s such a valid point to raise as well because I think everyone feels like an imposter at one point or another.
But especially when you’re doing a PhD, and especially if you’re doing a PhD by fieldwork because I’m surrounded by friends publishing, and I’m just not.
And so, back to That’s What I Call Science, that it gives me a sense of having helped the scientific community that I don’t necessarily get in my PhD.

Michael (00:14:14)
Yeah, great to get the recognition from some of these prizes that you’ve been winning.
I guess that might help with the imposter experience? I don’t know.

Olly (00:14:24)
Yeah, or make it worse. But no, it does.
In a fun anecdote is that at the beginning, at the end even of my first year of my PhD I was actually told by a staff member in a position of authority to stop my science communication work, and to sort of leave it in the first year.
And while I could have you know, defended that it is a valuable use of a PhD candidate’s time to do science communication. I actually said, “Well, I do it in my evenings and weekends. So you know that kind of… It’s my time.” Like no one would really bat an eyelid if I was at the pub every night or watching Netflix sort of thing.
So I had to defend myself. And then the validation came when two years later, my faculty awarded me the Beyond Academia Prize for the science communication work I’ve done. And that will go on my academic transcript at the end of my PhD. So that did help with the imposter syndrome. That felt like a justification of yeah, the hours.

Jen (00:15:23)
Olly, I can so relate. You and I’ve trodden some of the same paths.
You know, for me working on a nocturnal species. My PhD out in the middle of nowhere struggling with really tough fieldwork. And you know, it takes forever to get anything that you can publish and and finding so much joy and connection and usefulness in doing kind of communication stuff but being told from the powers that be that I shouldn’t be doing it and it would never be valuable and yeah. Anyway, this is your story not mine but I can relate.

But I do really want to move on to talking about That’s What I Call Science because you know, if we’re talking awards and usefulness and kind of validation, my gosh, a Eureka prize is pretty remarkable.
So I know you told us earlier that you weren’t there from the very beginning but I’m really interested to understand you know, how the team has worked, how the show started.
And I guess the idea that the drive behind That’s What I Call Science is making science accessible, firstly to diverse audiences, but also showcasing the diversity of people and voices in STEM-M.
And I know you’ve had lots of people involved. I’m really proud to say that one of your former plant science co-hosts Kelsey actually studied with me all the way back in 2013. When I was really new to this world, Kelsey was one of my students. So yeah, just talk to us a little about the podcast and, and the story of the podcast.

Olly (00:16:47)
That’s so wonderful you know Kelsey.

Jen (00:16:49)
Yeah!

Olly (00:16:50)
I adore Kelsey. She’s now part of Science Made Beerable. She leads this awesome not-for-profit about learning the science of beer.
So they do a great annual event every year where they get local brewers to make up a special beer and they talk about the science behind it. So yeah, Kelsey’s awesome, sadly no longer in the team.
So That’s What I Call Science as well as wanting to share STEMM research and stories is also a science communication training platform where we want people to come in, learn skills and then go on to bigger better things like Kelsey.
So it was started by a group of four. The very first idea came out of young Tassie scientists I think in 2018, but it wasn’t until 2019 that they started recording. And we’ve been supported by Edge Radio, Hobart’s premium youth station since the very beginning.
And the first lot of episodes if you go back and listen, they were actually recorded live in the Edge Radio studio, and they would have a guest on for the whole hour or recorded clips.
And because it was done live it was quite, I think quite hectic, quite stressful. So nowadays we do recordings in bulk once a month, and it’s all pre-recorded and edited.
But each week what we put out is a different, an interview with a different person from STEMM, so Science, Tech, Engineering, Math and Medicine. And to spread, as you said, the diverse people and the range of careers that are out there.
And we just want to spread what’s happening in [?] to Tasmania with the rest of Australia and the rest of the world ’cause so often, this island sort of gets left off maps. It’s not noticed but I think, don’t… please don’t fact check me on this but I’ve heard several times that we actually have like the highest proportion of scientists per population or something?

Jen (00:18:39)
Cool.

Olly (00:18:40)
And yet we also have two thirds illiteracy rate in Tasmania. So that’s a staggering gap that we want to bridge. And we want to also give people the chance to directly tell their work to the public so that it’s not behind an academic paper paywall, or the barrier of jargon and language that I mean… I’m a zoologist and I still don’t understand most things in these papers.
Yeah, and so we’re current team of 13, and the last year the leadership actually changed in the team. So that’s when me, Anna and Kate came in about a year and a half ago as co-managers and the show was sort of on a caretaking mode for a while. And I’m really proud that we did a big recruitment thing and built it back up and now yeah, the show has never felt stronger.

Jen (00:19:30)
That’s amazing.

Michael (00:19:30)
Yeah, no. That’s fantastic. It’s such a great approach that you’re taking around breaking down the barriers and making science more accessible, great that you’re really tackling that problem.
And I’m really curious to ask you about what you’ve learned through being part of the That’s What I Call Science Team. You know, what have you learned about science communication and being able to make science more accessible and inclusive?

Olly (00:19:56)
Yeah, I’ve learnt quite a lot of different things. I think I’ve learnt how insecure or imposter syndrome feeling everyone at every level is because we interviewed different people from all levels of academia from you know, students to professors.
And it’s very surreal to interview the professors here at my faculty and realise that you see them get nervous and you have to sort of you know, make them feel comfortable and want to share their work.
And then you realise that everyone gets stagefright, everyone thinks they’re gonna say the wrong thing. Everyone has the same want to share their science but want to do it really well, and that no one is perfect at it. And I think that’s a really reassuring thing to have seen over the past few years.

Jen (00:20:49)
Yeah, I think just recognising that everybody feels like an imposter at least some of the time. And we do quite a lot of teaching about this because we teach research-active students who can sometimes be really debilitated by it.
So I’ve read a lot of the research and you know, the research shows that in fact, it doesn’t go away the more senior you get. If anything it gets worse because as you get more senior, you’re expected to do more and more new, difficult things that you don’t already have evidence that you’re, you know, evidence of that you’re good at kind of things.
So, I think it’s really tricky and I just love that you’re, as you say, bridging that gap between the scientists and the people who might be really interested in science but don’t necessarily have access to it.
So when I think about all of your episodes and you have an extraordinary number of episodes, more than 200. You’ve done a lot of interviews. And when you think about someone who is really good at breaking down the barriers and being inclusive in their language and sharing their story, is there a particular interview that stands out to you?
I’m wondering if there’s sort of someone that you were like, Wow, they really nailed that. If I reflect on why they are such a great communicator what do they do. I mean, maybe it’s impossible to think of one interview.

Olly (00:22:04)
I know, there’re so many I could give. One that I would say, technically, it wasn’t an expert coming in and talking about things but one type of episode we love to do are youth takeover episodes.
So recently, my cohost Emma and I, we went to Clarence Arts & Events to run a workshop on birds for them during the school holidays. And as part of that what we did is we had the kids, so aged 8 to 11, present a story about birds.
And they also actually interviewed each other and asked each other questions about what they enjoyed at school, the science they enjoyed, different things. They were talking about all these different parts of nature.
And those sort of episodes are the ones that I think stay with you the most, in seeing the passion in future generations and in their youth. Because they just, they ask questions that often say if I was watching a talk, even though I enjoy conducting interviews, I very rarely ask questions at the end of a talk. Because I’m afraid of saying something stupid, or saying something that was already covered or basically just making a fool of myself.
But if you let kids ask questions, they ask the best question. They’re not, they don’t have any of those inhibitions, nothing’s holding them back.
And one of the kids was actually at the Eureka prizes, they showed our video. And the very last, like a 30 second video about That’s What I Call Science. And the last thing to be said was one of the kids from this event said, “And I want to know how I can change the world”. And the entire room went “Aww”. It was so lovely. And yeah, you just, you get absolute gems in episodes like that.

Jen (00:23:50)
Such an important takeaway there, isn’t there? That our own inhibitions and our own kind of fears and inadequacies and anxieties really can prevent us just going back to a childhood where most children are remarkable scientists ’cause they’re just curious and they’re not afraid of being judged.
And yet as we get older we get into this headspace of Oh, what are they going to think and what if I ask something silly? And yeah, I mean I love giving talks at schools because as you say, kids ask the best questions.

Olly (00:24:18)
They do.

Michael (00:24:19)
Hmm yeah, it kind of yeah, makes you think what are we learning that brings us out of that zone of being not afraid to ask those types of questions.
And we get caught up in our own heads, you know. I guess we, we would all do well to channel more of our inner child I guess. Well I do that anyway all the time.

Jen (00:24:36)
You do, Michael. It’s one of the, one of the things I most love about working with you. It’s just fabulous.

Michael (00:24:42)
Well, we’ve had some fantastic advice from you, Olly.
And we have reached the time of the podcast that we’re going to shift gears a little bit now.
We’ve got a few more questions, but they’re not as hard hitting and and serious as the questions that we’ve been asking you.

Michael (00:25:10)
First one I’d love to ask is: If you had to pick an alternative career path to the one that you’re currently on. What would it be?

Olly (00:25:19)
It would be author.
Funnily enough, when I was looking at what career I wanted to do growing up, I was like Oh I can’t pay rent if I’m an author. Like there’s no money in it. There’s no job stability.
And then I’ve ended up in academia and discovered Oh there’s also not much job security here either.

Jen (00:25:37)
So you can combine two things where there’s no job security.
That’s ideal.

Olly (00:25:43)
Yeah. Make a bit of stability.
They’ll balance each other out maybe? I don’t know. Yeah.

Jen (00:25:46)
Oh that’s awesome.

Michael (00:25:48)
It reminds me of that art piece that you have on your wall in the office. Jen.
It’s someone curled up on a bench with a, they’re lying on a PhD transcript.
I don’t know what, what the caption is but I guess the idea is that, yeah, there’s not much security, but at least we’ve got a piece of paper.

Olly (00:25:05)
Yeah.

Jen (00:26:05)
Oh, I can’t. I can’t think of the caption. Something like “Now my life is so free. Free because I have a PhD” or something like that, yeah. Yeah, long story that goes with that picture, but yeah.
So next question, how would you describe your work in three words?

Olly (00:26:25)
Seabirds. Diving. Hmm, Eating and…
I was like oh, every other word sort of takes it down another way.

Michael (00:26:35)
I feel like I’ve done you a disservice Olly ’cause I told you the hard questions are done and these are easy questions and…

Olly (00:26:42)
Yeah… Well, when I was listening to the other episodes, every time I heard you get to this round, I was always like oh no, that’s gonna be the worst part of all.

Michael (00:26:52)
I’m glad you mentioned eating as one of your words. That is also a passion of mine. I love talking about it and I want to ask you, if you were going to host a dinner party, in addition to your other friends that you can invite, you are able to bring along one scientist living or from history, who would you invite and why?

Olly (00:27:12)
Oh no. This is the sort of question where you want to sound really meaningful and impactful. And then the only scientist that is coming to mind is umm all the fictional ones. All I can see is Back to the Future. Oh my gosh, this is…
This is a very niche reference, but it’s actually someone called Natalie Bool who worked on Wedge Island before me. And so she had sort of the past record of length of time spent on Wedge Island.
And I think I’ve beaten her ’cause I’ve accumulated six months. But we’ve never actually met in person. We’ve only ever crossed paths. Her partner actually gave me some of the equipment.
I’ve never met her and we’ve never got to talk. Yeah, about Wedge and connect. So just because of timings and you know, things going on. So even though it’s not someone famous, that is actually someone that I am desperate to meet at some point.

Michael (00:28:06)
Oh, you should absolutely follow up on that. I’d say that would be a great chat that you’d have.
And there should be a Guinness, you know, world record for the most amount of time spent on Wedge Island.

Olly (00:28:15)
Yeah. Yeah, well, there’s no showers or toilets. So I think it’s quite an achievement.
Yeah, to be out there.

Jen (00:28:24)
Well, I think that lends itself beautifully to my next question because maybe your fieldwork is sort of the answer, although maybe it’s absolutely the opposite of the answer.
The next question is what have you learned to date about work, life balance and how to try and achieve work life balance?

Olly (00:28:40)
Ooh, I think setting boundaries is really important and that’s also setting boundaries with yourself is that you need a life otherwise the work will just drag you down and make you miserable.

Michael (00:28:53)
Yes.

Olly (00:28:55)
Even if you love it.

Michael (00:28:57)
That’s great advice. We all would do well to avoid being dragged down and made miserable.
You’ve given us some really good advice and I’d love to know what your top tip Olly is for effective science communication if you had to pick one top tip.

Olly (00:29:13)
A little enthusiasm goes a long way. So no matter what sort of media medium you’re using, if you can put some of your enthusiasm on the audience and the person taking it in, it goes so much further.
Because if you think about someone who’s presenting that doesn’t smile once or doesn’t look at the audience once or looks like they’re resentful to even be there, then you’re not going to engage with what they’re saying.
Yeah, so don’t be… A lot of modern society is wanting to look cool or not wanting to look passionate and wanting to come up as an aloof kind of person.
And it’s absolutely a waste of time because even if you’re kind of goofy, people are going to really love that and they’ll want to be goofy with you.

Jen (00:30:03)
I think looking cool is definitely not one of our problems, Michael.
So I think we fit in quite well and hopefully Ollie, you’ve had a sense of a lot more than a little bit of enthusiasm coming from us today because we’re just so rapt to have the chance to speak with you.
We’re so thrilled that That’s What I Call Science and your whole team was honoured in the way that it was. And just keep doing what you’re doing.
We can’t wait to stay in touch with you and find, I don’t know, maybe there’s some ways we can do fun things together.
But yeah, just huge congratulations and thanks for talking with us today.

Olly (00:30:36)
Thank you so much. I… Yeah, I hope we definitely can link up more in the future.
It was such an honour to be on your show, especially having listened to the past episodes and the sort of people you’ve had on. I feel really you know, really honoured that you wanted to hear from me.

Michael (00:30:50)
Thanks so much, Ollie. I hope we’ve lived up to your expectations and it’s been an absolute pleasure chatting with you.

Olly (00:30:56)
Thanks, you definitely have.

Michael (00:31:16)
Thanks for listening and thanks also to our wonderful production team, Stephanie Wong and Steven Tang for making these episodes happen behind the scenes. And thanks also to you, our listeners, for your support.
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