Welcome to another in our series of crucible podcasts. This one is a little bit
different. We've not got one team, one project, from one usually European crucible.
Instead, we're talking about three individual journeys of three crucible alumni.

They're from different Scottish crucibles with different experiences and outcomes. But
it's fair to say, they've all found crucible valuable and also memorable. And I do
mean memorable because we're looking back 10 in some cases almost 15 years as well.
And because of that, that is why they're all here today.

We haven't got a lot oftime, so I'm going to plunge straight in. I'm going to start with
Timothy Drysdale, now Professor Timothy Drysdale. But what were you and what mindset
did you have, Tim, back in 2010 when you applied to Scottish Crucible?

Holy gosh, that is a while ago, isn't it? Look, back then, I was wanting to become
an academic who was doing electromagnetic research, seeing through clothes to
find weapons and contraband. That was sort of stuff I was doing at the time.

And gosh things have changed incredibly.

Now I'm in digital education and funnily enough it turns out all of the technical
things I was doing sort of came together when I made that move but it wouldn't
have happened without the creativity session and a hotel in the middle of somewhere
in the middle of Scotland sometime during that crucible.

Okay we might come back to that creativity session but I want to bring in everybody because there is a certain chronologic logic to doing you all in time order and doing each story separately but I think it's a lot more fun to entangle you all and see what happens.

So I'm gonna go next to Stuart Reed again now a professor head of the Department of
medical engineering at the University of Strathclyde and you were part of the 2011
Scottish Crucible.

Yeah that's correct yeah 2011. And what were you after when you when you thought hang on this sounds like an interesting thing to apply to? Yeah so at the time I was holding a five -year fellowship so five -year funding that was paying for my time to do my research from the Royal Society of Edinburgh and the Scottish Government And at that time, I was primarily focused on gravitation wave astronomy research, really experimental stuff, developing materials for the mirrors and those detectors.

But I was engaging quite heavily at that time with some biologists. And so it was useful within Crucible to gain confidence to progress that. And obviously, as you mentioned, I'm now head of biomedical engineering.

So my career has changed substantially from where I started focused on astronomy to
now also working very much in the life sciences and biomedical research.

I mean it is worth taking a pause to kind of clock that properly because you are you are a kind of one man grand unifying theory, aren't you? You go all the way from the nano scale
up to the cosmological scale.

Yeah and it can be confusing to people when they seeit but actually a lot of the underpinning techniques in terms of how we measure stuff in the lab is very similar and we use a lot of the techniques are in common, but of course when you look at the research publications coming out from the research group people will do get confused because you've got stem cell research alongside black holes colliding and people wonder how could this be possible and they
would presume they've looked up the wrong person but in fact yeah we do everything
but the underlying techniques we use in the lab are actually very very similar. And
we can't say it was crucible that inspired you to have this cross -disciplinary,
trans -disciplinary, interdisciplinary view of things, but it certainly encourages that
belief that you shouldn't be siloed away in your own particular academic region.
Yeah, definitely. And for me, a lot of it was to do with confidence. You know,
those networks are available to us, but we don't always have the confidence to go
exploring them because outside of our additional subject areas or, you know, in other
buildings, other departments, other universities and the confidence part was was key
for me and crucible was a massive milestone, I think in my my career to really
realize that I had the ability to go out and work with all these other people.
Yeah, it's it's about knowledge, but it's also about not being intimidated by their
areas.

Okay, we'll pick up on some of those threads later, but we want to get to
the final member of our trio only final because she's the most recent, Dr Heather
Mae Morgan, now Dean for Enterprise and Innovation and Senior Lecturer in Applied
Health Sciences at the University of Aberdeen. But nine years ago, what were you and
what were you hoping for from Crucible?

Yeah, thank you. In 2015, I was a jobbing research fellow who had actually started out in criminology at my PhD, applied for a few sort of contract research positions and was really trying to get funding to consolidate my research in the area of digital health. So I'd done my PhD research in police CCTV. I was looking at the use of technology and services, public service delivery and trying to really just establish myself. So yeah, now I'm Dean for Enterprise and Innovation. After having a few different positions, actually, I became a lecturer for a while in
applied health sciences and then was promoted to senior lecturer but was appointed to
the role of Dean across the university just last year.

So is it fair to say you're all about encouraging enterprise culture in Aberdeen?

Yes, absolutely. A lot of my work has always involved working externally with police, prison service, health services, looking at the applications of technologies day to day, but also
working with innovators, creating new technologies, doing research and...
I suppose, recognising academic innovators, people working with industry and trying to
encourage that a lot more among our colleagues.

Right, and I suppose it's an extension of that crucible philosophy about collaboration is to not just collaborate between different disciplines and different areas of academia, but to collaborate with different sectors of society outside of academia as well?

Exactly, yeah, and we're all about that, that's a big push for us at the moment. So yeah, really exciting to be leading on that.

- Okay, let's go back to the beginning for you all then. Tim, when you started to do Crucible, what were you expecting and what were the biggest changes from what you expected? What were the big surprises of actually doing Crucible?

- Well, it's a really good question 'cause I think sometimes you just don't
know what to expect from a process like that. And I think I thought I'd meet some
cool people, and we'd probably develop some collaborative projects and have a fun
time doing some stuff.

What I didn't expect was that it would fundamentally change
my approach to how I was doing my work. So yeah, that was a bit of a surprise.

Was it only with hindsight that you realised, oh, actually, this was the turning
point, the pivot.

Oh, absolutely. I mean, looking back, I can see the dots all in
a straight line between all of the things that I did and where I am now. But at
that time, I couldn't see what was coming, but I do remember thinking to myself,
"My gosh, it's 9 .45 in the morning, and I've just extracted all the value out of
this three -day event. I think I would need to feel like it was complete." There
was just a really powerful moments in one session that I do remember noticing at
the time. And I think maybe we ought to be explicit about what that moment was.
Well, I'll tell you what it was. We did this exercise where when groups, we got
handed out envelopes that had clues to some sort of problem in them. And I remember
opening mine and looking at it and just thinking, ah, I think it's sort of
something like this, but I don't actually know for sure. And I don't have the
complete solution, so wouldn't want to be seen to be wrong, so let's not say
anything. And then somebody else said exactly what I had thought, just as murky,
just as incomplete, and that triggered a third person to say, ah, you put that
together with what I'm thinking, and we get this, and we had the solution as a
result of those two people speaking up. And I thought it was a beautiful analogue
for the way the scientific community works. And the sense that I had of having
missed out, because I didn't have the confidence to open my mouth and say, this is
incomplete, but I think it moves the ball on. Just I never wanted to feel like
that ever again. Stuart, this is exactly echoing the point you were making about
confidence. There is knowledge, but there is also confidence and there is also that
ability to stand up in public and not worry if what you're saying might be stupid
sometimes in the search for something meaningful. Exactly and it's almost like that
light bulb moment that Tim describes and I think many of us or most of us perhaps
all of us who have done crucible events will have experienced this during that
process because you mix with people from a whole variety of disciplines but within
that setting you come up with ideas together and some of them progress some of them
don't and I mean one of the things which I remember from my time was that there
was a music composer in our cohort and we did meet afterwards and tried to look at
ways in which you know we could musically represent the the signals which we were
seeing from black holes colliding and neutron stars colliding people have done this
in the past but it was just you know is that confidence to to speak to people on
completely different fields and just explore and some of those triggered you know
ideas which are still ongoing just now and others were just where they were nice to
explore for a moment in time. Because I've obviously hosted a few of these events
and sometimes you get projects which come together where you think this is
incredible, these people would never have met but they found some kind of harmony,
I'm not trying to use the musical thing here, other times you know they're kind of
reaching to get that last member of the group in and they haven't really got much
to add but the only way to try it is the only way to do it is to keep trying
these things.
- Yeah, exactly. And I think one of the challenges which many of us face is that
in our regular careers, we don't often get those opportunities and Crucible provides
that opportunity in a really nice setting that's well structured but with the freedom
that new ideas can flourish. - And Stuart, did you have Give us a little moment
like Tim was telling us or is it just the whole thing? It was the whole thing.
There was lots of conversations But you know one of the things which I guess is an
indirect Effect was that I had met at that crucible event someone that I'd
interviewed directly before I think at the Royal Society of Edinburgh for our
research fellowship So someone who was following the same career path as myself,
actually, in a very similar field. They were doing a PhD research fellowship in
physics. And then I realized that it took the crucible event to bring us together
and realize that we could actually work together. And we worked together for many
years after that. And that really challenged me. It challenged me that I essentially
passed this person in the corridor as we were going through our mutual interviews,
and we're both successful in getting that funding. but there was no setting for us
to actually get together and discuss possible projects. And that's, again, I talk
about confidence, but it's not just the confidence, it's realizing that those
opportunities are out there and you just have to explore your networks and realize
that there are people out there that have the solutions that you perhaps need and
you have to go and find them. So, yeah, Crucible really set that in my mind that
had it not been for that, that opportunity would have been missed and I have made
more determined not to miss those opportunities going forward. Yeah, it's what I call
proactive serendipity. You know, you want chance things to happen, but you have to
allow the circumstances to bring those people together for those chance events to
happen. Heather, similar story for you. Yeah, absolutely. And I think it's not just
meeting with people within your cohort, but the way the crucible works is that
you're quite often confronted with people from previous cohorts who come in to do
talks or presentations or facilitation or, you know, the kind of events around that
are more informal networking. And I can remember seeing a colleague of mine who'd
been on the crucible for years prior to me and had then progressed in her career
through the university and thinking, oh goodness, that's kind of accelerated or has
it accelerated? Or, you know, how is that? I'm sort of watching her career
development with interest, and then I suppose thinking, okay, well, how do I want,
sort of more proactively thinking, rather than, okay, I want to get a research
grant, what are the kind of bigger things that I want to do? What do I believe in
in terms of the university? You know, what could I lead on? And having that kind
of bigger thinking that kind of inspired me, and I think the cruise book gives you
the confidence to articulate, to, I suppose, package up perhaps complex stories around
collaborations that don't quite necessarily make sense on the surface or think
activities that you've pursued that don't haven't quite generated that paper yet or
research income yet, but actually being bold in telling the story of why this is
important to do and how it's going to lead to something and then being able to
tell the story backwards to make it useful when you do take um subsequent positions
and I suppose there's an element isn't there of just being at the early stage of
your academic careers your ambitions are governed by your your confidence and you're
looking at these foothills of academia thinking maybe one day I can scale those
foothills but as a result of doing crucible you're looking at the mountains behind
thinking yeah I can I can have a go at that as well yeah I think that That's
really true. And it just awakens you to, I suppose, the range rather than seeing a
sort of direct career path or a mountain in front of you, like you say, it is
actually looking around and not seeing yourself as perhaps alone in forging your
career or not being quite like somebody else, but actually it's sort of what's the
sum of the parts and where do I fit in here? Or what do I want this mountain to
look like or how do I want to shape it or scale it so I think it does it just
it's a way of thinking and seeing. Another aspect of Crucible that a lot of
different people have different reactions to is the speed networking and it's a very
non -traditional way of working you know you normally have whole days or long
meetings to exchange ideas but you're getting to know each other and getting a sense
of each other in just a couple of minutes or so, did you, how did you all find
that? I'll start with you, Tim. Oh, gosh, you're taking me back. I'm just trying to
remember some of the perceptions of these meetings ages ago. Like, I think as you
get more experience in interacting with humans, you realize you have to package your
messages up for consumption in a few seconds or less. And some of that perception
comes from being the person that is moving from meeting to meeting from topic to
topic and they're so vastly different that unless you've got a really short, easy to
receive package of information, you're not really sure what the other person's on
about sometimes. And I think the speed networking was a great example of that
because here's this person in front of you. You've no idea what they know, so you
can't really sort of pitch your message using that background information. So as much
as it potentially was challenging or the introverts getting a little wound up
thinking oh my gosh I've got to talk to all these people. It was a super valuable
experience even if I think I didn't end up in any special project at the crucible
in the end. I did see others form some great things from that speed network but I
think that was right because you're saying sometimes reaching for the extra person in
the group maybe that's not the right thing to do at times. Sometimes it is but I
wanted things to be more natural and organic.
Tim?
I'm sorry, Stuart?
Yeah, so I mean my memory of the speed dating was that you know you go into it
and perhaps this is what you'd expect from a dating thing that you think well maybe
there'd be one or two people that would I'd be interested in following up
conversations but my memory of it was that almost every conversation had something
really interesting. And so during the process, you're, as Tim was saying, you're
trying to make sure that you stick to that, you're one minute describing your
background and what you work on and trying to be succinct, trying to listen to the
other person, but remembering that the last three conversations you just had were
really interesting and you didn't want to forget about it. So it was a real
whirlwind. I just remember at the end of it, trying to hold all these conversations
in my head, and I'm pretty sure many of them I'd forgotten, because there's just so
much that came from it, you know, almost every conversation there was something that
could have been followed up with. Yeah, Heather, it's about not just the way you
interact with others, it's about realising you can deliver a message about yourself
and receive a message about other people in a very short way, a short period of
time. Yeah, I think as well, because you're refining your message each time,
but you're moving along, people are refining their messages too, but obviously the
first interaction you have is probably, well, it might be the best, but it might be
the least refined, so it's kind of interesting how that evolves over time, but also
I think it just shows you that you can have these conversations and it forces you
as well, where like quite often at networking events, you know, you might talk to
some of the people, but not all of the people, even if it's very carefully
coordinated that seating plans and things forced you to move among other people or
work in different groups. I think that speed dating thing just made everybody get to
know something about everybody else and I think that that was the true value because
it just with the best will in the world it wouldn't have happened organically so I
think actually having that very structured way of doing things worked exceptionally
well. Back then you were all relatively early on in your academic careers.
Now you're all senior, seasoned, multi -award -winning experts in your field.
So have you any thoughts about what crucible, and maybe specifically Scottish
crucible, could be doing better, could be doing more of, or less of, or differently?
Heather? Oh, I don't know about better, because when I look at what cruciblists have
achieved. I mean, individually and collectively, there's something about the Scottish
Crucible that works. And I'm saying works in inverted commas. I mean, I think it
introduces you to so many different ideas about the ways that you can work, what
you can do with your research, leadership roles, different sort of job titles and
where you could sort of take your career and what you can do with your work. And
I think it gives you something about building on that confidence, but not just
having the confidence internally to do things, but externally to, you know, to go
forward for awards and believe that you can achieve these things. So I think it
gives you practical tools, but I think it gives you an inner self -belief to sort
of drive things and take responsibility and become a leader. So I think what it
does is it does very well. And I think certainly the range of sessions that you
participate in, I can't imagine that, you know, it seems to sort of be all
encompassing and cover all the angles and certainly the things that I've needed in
my journey. I refer back to Crucible materials and it's there. So I don't know that
I can suggest anything to make it better. That's good in some ways, if there is no
way of improving it, but I thought you'd give you the opportunity. Stuart? Oh, I'm
not too sure. It's difficult to know exactly what you would think should be done
better. I think it's, you know, reflecting on it, it was a fantastic opportunity for
myself and obviously Heather and Tim have the same experience and everyone I've
spoken to has the same experience, which makes you wonder whether more people would
benefit from that. And I know that some of the universities have tried to do their
own local versions of the crucible event, which can potentially feed into the
Scottish crucible. But I do wonder whether there's some way in which the scope could
be broadened and more people could benefit from that type of kind of program. And
I'm really not too sure what else I would suggest other than maybe it would be
useful for those who are alumni many years later to have the chance to come back
together for a similar two -day or multi -lab event and because I think we probably
to a large extent we benefit from it but we probably go back to our previous way
of thinking for the majority of things and perhaps we need to shake up periodically
so some kind of follow -up maybe for us to continue to develop ourselves and to
engage better with the wider communities that we could benefit from and benefit too.
Because there are alumni events occasionally and we've had one this year as we're
recording this 2024 but they're probably more celebratory rather than taking you back
through the process again so maybe would you like to see something that was a bit
more of a let's do the crucible again for us now we're all a bit older and why
is it? Maybe I mean I think just doing the same again perhaps wouldn't be
necessarily So appealing, but I think it's a shame that we don't we don't go back
into that mode of Interacting and reflecting on our practices and trying to you know
improve our skills at how to engage with others To anything you would tinker with
slightly in the crucible formula You know you've given me a few extra minutes to
think about it, but I certainly think it's quite a finely balanced machine and that
there's time spent with the people on it discussing stuff in the margins,
which is valuable, then there's time between the events to think about stuff in slow
time. So I was thinking, you know, major changes to the format might actually not
be super advisable. And then this comment about coming back together later on,
yes, I think a different thing would be needed as a sort of a more senior career
stage. I think, you know, Crucible did what it needed to do at its time and a
repeat of that isn't going to help now. But what has been really great is coming
back to the event and meeting other colleagues that have been through in different
years or going through it at the time and just, you know, I mean, just getting a
chance to reflect on the difference between where my headspace was then and now is
pretty cool at the dinner we had recently. It was quite a blast from the passing
Vivian still still on the course and you know great to see Ellen and Ruth still
there so you know I think the formula is pretty good as it is and and yeah I
probably wonder if maybe there's just a little more we could do with the alumni
network I think there's if others feel the same way I do there'd be a willingness
to come back and contribute in some way if we could because of the value it's
offered us. I'm sure you could okay a couple more slightly stretch your brain type
questions on this. There are many versions of Crucible, but you're all people who've
participated in Scottish Crucible. Do you think there is something about the size of
Scotland, the nature of the academic network in Scotland that makes it particularly
fruitful for Crucibles? Stuart?
- Yeah, absolutely. I think we are fortunate in a country that you know you can
connect quite a diverse range of people together and they don't feel so distant or
separated because in principle we can all travel to each other's locations you know
on the same day even have a meeting and travel back home again and so I think
there is something about the Scottish context and I think Scotland for whatever
reason has historically and continues to be an interesting place to innovate and come
up with ideas. And I think for Scottish Crucible, we benefit because we're in
Scotland and the heritage that Scotland brings, I think that also feeds into the
programme in a sort of background way. Heather? Yeah,
I think that's true. It's right. And I think that ability to move between
universities, but also see the connections between what we're working on, but also
being in Edinburgh for the first session of each crucible and being at the Royal
Society of Edinburgh and being, I don't know, feeling sort of steeped in that
connection with history and the achievements of Scottish universities and academics,
but also then going through to the Scottish Parliament and having those, you know,
connections with MSPs and workshops on communication skills and that kind of really
brings to life the impact that you can have for your research and it makes it real
and accessible and it feels very joined up I suppose. So I think there is something
in that sort of Scottish identity that, yeah, that does perhaps is different to
other crucibles. Tim, anything to add? I'm just thinking about the tensions between
innate desire as humans to belong to groups and have defining characteristics for
those groups and are much more recent understandings that we gain immense thread
through diversity and I think Cruciples threading a bit of a line between those by
finding that commonality in the country we're located in but encouraging a diversity
in the membership of the people that are in the group. And so continuing to be
aware of those tensions and navigate them I think is going to be an interesting
part of the creative process of the continual renewal as it were of the design of
the event. Now the flip side of this is do you think there is such a thing as a
good cruciblist or can anyone be a cruciblist in theory? Tim?
Well I think that picks up really neatly in the point there that was coming to my
mind when we were talking about the value and the structure of the crucible because
I was thinking something that was important to me was the sense that I had to
prove that I had something beyond I just want to be a good electromagnetic
researcher and I remember in my application making a song and dance about the public
engagement work I've done and then getting selected to me felt like somebody saying
hey we see something in you that means you could go beyond just being a discipline
researcher and that you would be open to receiving guidance about doing something
other than just a standard, very narrow focused academic career. And that was
valuable to me. It was kind of the sense of giving me permission to explore parts
of my brain, parts of my feelings, thoughts about what to do that I hadn't
otherwise. And I wonder whether everybody has the potential,
I think everybody should have access to all the opportunities. And I'm just trying
to figure out, I don't really have the answer right now, but there is a tension
there between selecting and filtering for certain characteristics that are already
present and just need developing a bit more versus ones that maybe aren't really
super highly prevalent in somebody. and so I think it would be good to understand
that a little bit more and just make sure that you know we're not shutting the
door to anybody who could really benefit. It's almost like an echo of that old
political dynamic that the kind of people who push themselves forward to be leaders
aren't always the best people to be leaders. It might be there are people who are
very good to be on the crucible but they never think of applying they don't think
they're right. Indeed absolutely and I think somebody who maybe had a warm arm
around their shoulders to say, come join this group. We think this is gonna be
really valuable for you. Could be an absolutely excellent way to do it. So yeah,
I know, I totally agree with you on that. - Stuart?
- I would agree. And I think, you know, what you get out of a program like
Scottish Crucible, you know, does depend on your ability to be curious and your this
to go beyond what you currently do and to explore new things or new grounds that
you haven't previously considered and yes I would completely echo Tim's point that
it's an opportunity that you know many people don't get to partake in and it would
be nice to know that there was some way in which you could expand you know similar
opportunities those who wouldn't traditionally think of applying for this or even to
those in completely different sectors, we're very concentrated within the academic
sector, but within industry, within education, even considering people who are coming
from completely different backgrounds could benefit in some way from a program like
this. But I think it'd be difficult to get much from the program unless you came
to already curious.
That's the key thing is it whatever else you've got you need that curiosity. I
would say so I think you then there needs to be some kind of openness to learn
something new and for looking for that new insight from the people that you're
meeting with so you know you need to be open to engage of course in the Crucible
program you can of course do that with as the example of the network dating
session. But yeah, you need to be curious. There needs to be something in your mind
that's looking to learn from others. Heather, I've left you to last on this because
you're all about encouraging enterprise culture. So would it be more enterprising to
have more crucibles for more people almost to have a compulsory version of crucible
that young academics have to run - Oh, no, that's an interesting one. Yes, yeah,
I think that would be a really, I don't know how the logistics of that would work,
but I do think there's something in that because I was just thinking back to when
I was writing my application and why I was even considering applying and how I came
to find out about it. And it came from a conversation with a senior colleague who'd
said, "Oh, your strength is your weakness "and your weakness is And it was, I was
so busy focused on how do I make my story make sense so I can get this research
grant so I'm so focused on this one thing and I'm an expert and this one thing.
And the crucible application and he said to me, you know, you're not that isn't
really you so it's hard for you to write that bit and convincingly because you do
so many different things and so many different fields and you work with different
people. And I found that the Scottish crucible application form is somewhere I could
put all that other stuff as well and it to be fine and so I think there's
something in perhaps people having to go through the process of writing that
application form actually because it really forced you to sort of see the value and
the connections between things and to start to be able to surface them and
articulate them so I do wonder if there's something in elements of the process I
mean in terms of facilitating that for for everybody. I mean, it would be
incredible. We would, yeah, I mean, Scotland, you would, you would see it from the
moon, I think. You know, if everyone in Scotland, all universities in Scotland went
through that process. But yeah, I do think there's a value and it is kind of sad
that it's limited to 30 people. But I also do think that in that selection process,
and it being very selective, that there is something about being just one of 30
each year that sort of elevates and so I think if it was to be replicated with
larger numbers of people they would have to have different identities perhaps or
different I don't know names or something to enable people to have to connect with
an identity because I think something that Tim said about our need to belong to
something or identify with something. I think if everyone did it, then it wouldn't
be a special. And that's perhaps a selfish reflection, having been very privileged to
have gone through the process. A reflection in one of Tim's laser mirrors. Stuart,
I'm ruining that guy. A reflection in one of Stuart's laser mirrors. Yes, exactly.
Yeah, I wasn't thinking about having larger ones. I was thinking about more, but
there is that trade -off obviously between how special something is and how frequent
it is. We're getting near the end now, but finally if somebody's listening to this
and thinking of applying to Crucible, I presume you would just all go, please do.
Heather? Yes, yeah. In fact, I've recommended it year on year to different
colleagues, particularly, and this is to the previous point, I suppose, particularly
colleagues who maybe have struggled and say well your career hasn't been quite linear
you know have you got any advice and I'll be like Scottish crucible and definitely
put those colleagues in that direction but and I help colleagues I've reviewed I've
shared my application with loads of people just so you know to encourage that but
yeah I think perhaps I'll now reflect out after the the previous question and
comments on actually everyone so yeah. Stuart.
Absolutely and I often will say to people that you know in terms of the time spent
I always saw Scottish Crucible as the best value process that I went through in
terms of you know how much development I saw personally through you know a limited
number of days of engaging with a programme and many of us have done leadership
programmes and all these things and often there's questionable value from some of
those programmes. Scottish Crucible 100 % amazing value and I always recommend people
do it if they get the opportunity, definitely apply. You think it's almost
undervalued for the contribution it has made to so many academic lives?
I think those of us who have gone through it value it for what it is, but maybe
it's undervalued in terms of how it's perceived outside and I think, you know,
within the Scottish context, I would love to see longer term commitment from funding
bodies to support it, because, you know, that is a question mark going forward is,
you know, can you keep the program running and it takes money to run these
programs. And so, yeah, I think maybe it's not valued as much as well as it could
be outside of those of us who have gone through it.
Well, maybe, you know, I think you're, you know, all of you maybe starting companies
of some kind or another, if there's a spin -off for funding available, let us know.
Tim, finally to you, what do you, we'd be saying to somebody who's thinking, shall
I shant I, maybe they're hearing this and they're right at the beginning of their
career, and they're thinking this sounds great, but they were a bit intimidated by
how successful all three of you are and they can't quite focus on them being in
that position 10, 15 years down the line. Yeah, it's really hard to believe it when
somebody says to you, oh, if I can do it, anybody can do it. Because you look at
some who's done it and go, well, surely you had some characteristics that meant that
you were special in some way and surely as the person looking up at that, you
think you don't. But it seems ridiculous to say it. but actually,
yeah, just don't worry about that. The other aspect I was thinking of was the
adjacent possibility concept. You know, we're in a very much KPI focused world where
you measure the hours you put into something against the dollars that you will win
or the pounds in this country, obviously. If you're successful and Scottish Crucible
doesn't give you a big currency return through your investment. So it would be easy
to kind of think, oh, maybe my bosses won't be that pleased with me if I go and
spend this time doing it. But what I would say is that it's gonna enrich your
entire career in a really non -linear way that you won't be able to predict in
advance. And I think that's probably the same message we need to be continuing to
give to the various different funding bodies that are associated with this, which is
that we have a vibrant culture here for research and that events like this
contribute in a very, very non -linear way, but do an immense amount to spark off
the really creative kinds of activities we want happening in the country to keep us
at the forefront of all the really good things that we're doing. Do you think in
some ways it may have got easier with the passage of time? Because when you all
three were all applying to crucible in the early days. Not necessarily everybody's
senior in your department would think this was the best use of your time. Now we've
got people like yourselves in these senior positions going oh yes applied to
crucible.
Yeah that's probably true actually and I think you know some of my experience with
outreach maybe mirrored this a little bit in the early days we were all struggling
with what it meant when a a writer, I mean that dates it a wee bit doesn't it,
would take one person from a team and lionize them into the hero that did
everything by themselves and you're trying to work your collaborators in and now it
feels like both journalists and academics are doing a much better job of
understanding how that kind of outreach process works. So I think there've been quite
a few cultural changes in the you know some of years since I did it. Maybe it is
easier, but again, precious I think have gone up on young academics, looking at the
quality of talent coming into the places I work is really impressive. So while it
might have got easier, I think some of the other goalposts have moved too. So I'd
still really want potential applicants to just approach with some enthusiasm and be
aware there's and all the near benefits here.

- Right, enthusiasm, curiosity, and a few other things as well. Thank you all three of you for sparing us the time today.
We really appreciate it. I will edit this down in some way.
There's not a lot of editing to do because it was all good quality stuff.
The only stumbles were from me.