It has been a fair few months since I last shared a day in the life of a scicomm officer with you. So, I thought it was about time that I changed that and shared another insight – especially as the last few months have been even more varied than the previous two chapters I’ve shown you – check them out here and here! You can now also find Chapter 4 and Chapter 5. In fact, I have been in this job for 8 months now and only shown you two of those days! Apologies for that. So, it is time to show you the next chapter in my scicomm career diaries.
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07:01 – I still think this is far too early in the morning to be on a train every day. I thought I had got into a routine and dealing well with the mornings, but some days I still really struggle. And while it is great that I am finally travelling to work when the sun is high in the sky, I’m not sure the longer summer days are helping my routine. Either way – I’m on the train and most likely going to fall asleep shortly after snapping this shot!
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08:52 – Train was late arriving – again! So the race is on now to get through the underground and make it to my desk. And it’s boiling hot too! The sooner this bit is over, the better.
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09:51 – Arrived at my desk featuring my brand new desktop – yay! So I have spent the first part of the morning making sure I have all the software I need and connection to all the servers and folders and such.
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11:39 – My job as the science communications officer here doesn’t just involve all the external communications about our institute and research with the rest of the world. It also involves all internal comms too and making sure all my colleagues know about key things that are going on outside and within our institute too. But the current state of our internal comms could be improved to be honest with you. So, this morning we held a focus group meeting with some of the departments where internal comms is essential to them. We discussed what was working well, what wasn’t working so well, and all the content we would like to circulate if time, money and resource wasn’t an issue. We popped each idea onto a post it and mapped out similar ideas so I can go forward and try and find the best platforms and software to improve all of these important notifications. If you want to know more about how we structured this focus group and any internal comms structures we are looking into, please ask in the comments below.
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12:33 – After a quick summary of everything we had chatted about in our focus group, it was time to rush down to the cafeteria to grab a quick bite to eat before another busy afternoon for me. Loving the paninis they do at the moment! hah!
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13:26 – Another new publication to write about! Every time a group head notifies me that they have a paper coming out I ask that they send me a copy so I can give it a read, and then arrange a meeting with them – and any other authors – so I can get some quotes and key info about the work that has happened behind the scenes so I can write an article for our website, and decide whether it is press worthy and write a press release too, and that is what I’m doing now. This paper has now been published and you can read my article about it here.
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14:04 – You can wait a month for a publication to write about and then two come along at once! So, I have another publication to write about too. But these colleagues were also offered the chance to make a video abstract, or summary, which is what I’ve been working on the whole of this particular week. Today it was time to make some final edits to my first video attempt and get it submitted on behalf of the authors. This video is also no published. It is the one I spoke about in this Instagram post below, and you can also check it out here. I would love to know what you guys think!
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16:01 – And I am still not done for the day. It is a particularly busy time at work right now as we are preparing for a big institute review. Each of our groups need to write about all their achievements over the last five years, as well as what they aim to achieve over the next five, and there are many more aspects to it. But with the deadlines swiftly approaching, I am helping out by doing some editing, reviewing and document creation for us to submit in a few weeks time.
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19:02 – Home time! And yes, I’ve become one of those people who buys alcohol in a can for my journey home! But it has been a long day. I’ve had good wedding news today and I’m working from home tomorrow.
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And that’s a wrap on Chapter 3! A very varied day in itself, but also completely different to other days I have shown you in previous chapters too. And I absolutely love it! Wouldn’t change it for the world!
Check out the other chapters here:
Chapter 1 – Chapter 2 – Chapter 4 – Chapter 5
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If you have any questions about anything you have seen in this blog, or about my career in scicomm generally, please ask me in the comments all of your questions!
Is this what you thought a day in the life of a science communications officer would look like?
I’m also thinking about making these style posts into video form – so if you would prefer that or would like that as well then I would love to hear your thoughts.