Let's Talk SciComm

Poured hours into a talk, only to suspect your audience will remember almost none of it? In this short episode, Jen and Michael share how to make your take-home message actually stick. Their advice: your real message isn’t what you say, it’s what people repeat to others afterwards, so decide on the one thing you want them to take away, build your talk backwards from it, and say it more than once (especially right at the end, rather than surrendering your final words to “thanks for listening”). And because people forget facts but remember how you made them feel, attaching that message to an emotion is the glue that makes it last. You can find more great advice here: Ten simple rules for making good oral presentations: Rule 4 says it best: your message is working if people can still recall it a week later. Put your take home message at the top of your slides: Including the “half-life” exercise for distilling your message down to its essence. How to make a scientific presentation: On letting your take-home message drive the whole narrative, and using a “home slide” to reinforce it.

This week we were delighted (and a little bit starstruck) to be joined by Dr Kylie Soanes: conservation biologist, urban ecologist and self-described “friendly neighbourhood wildlife scientist”. Kylie’s work takes the question of how nature and people can live alongside one another and turns it into real, visible change: building rope bridges so gliders can cross busy highways, 3D-printing nesting hollows for powerful owls, and adding floating wetlands to city rivers. She collaborates with councils, community groups, engineers and architects, writes for the likes of The Guardian, The Conversation and Australian Geographic, and has built a wonderful audience of nearly 29,000 people on Instagram with her trademark warmth and wit (and the occasional Jane Austen reference in a peer-reviewed journal). A research fellow in urban biodiversity at the University of Melbourne, she is, by her own admission, probably running late to her next meeting because she got distracted by a cool bird. Join us for a fabulous conversation about why conservation belongs in cities and not just “out there”, how to fill the information vacuum before nonsense does, why storytelling and evidence-based hope beat battering people with data, and Kylie’s lovely reminder that reach is a verb - you have to go to where the people are. You can follow Kylie and find out more about her work here: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-09-29/kylie-soanes-urban-nature-conservation-biodiversity/105315332 https://www.instagram.com/drkyliesoanes/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/kylie-soanes-40975a90/ https://kyliesoanes.com/

Been asked to introduce a speaker: at a conference, on a panel, or at an event big or small, and want to get it right? In this short episode, Jen and Michael share how to do that job well, starting with a reminder of what it’s actually for: warming up the room for the speaker, not showcasing yourself. They talk through the things that make all the difference - speaking to the person beforehand (and checking how to pronounce their name and their pronouns), finding one warm, human detail that no bio would give you, resisting the urge to read out a long list of accolades, and setting a calm, generous tone that the speaker can step straight into. You can find more great advice here: Introducing a speaker? Here are 5 tips: On brevity, genuine enthusiasm, and striking the right balance between personal and professional. How to introduce a speaker (with examples): Practical, example-led advice on opening with a hook and telling a story rather than reading a bio aloud. Chairing sessions: A researcher-focused guide to introducing speakers warmly and chairing a session effectively. Transcript: https://go.unimelb.edu.au/77vh

This week we were delighted to be joined by the wonderful Aśka (pronounced 'Ash-ka'; she/they): award-winning comics maker, visual storyteller, science communicator and former quantum physicist, whose career is a glorious collision of two worlds that rarely meet. Before the drawing board, Aśka earned a first-class honours degree in physics (complete with a university medal) and spent several years in quantum optics labs across Australia, Germany and Denmark, work she describes as tickling atoms until they give up their secrets and glow fluorescent green. Somewhere along the way she swapped the lab for the page, and has since published more than a dozen books and graphic novels, spent seven years touring Western Australia as a travelling science presenter with Scitech, and now teaches students of all ages how to "write with pictures". Their latest young adult graphic novel, The Friendship Paradox, draws all these threads together in the story of Dash, who tries to use the laws of physics to make sense of other people. It’s a stunning book about science, but even more about friendship, difference and self-acceptance. Join us for a wonderful conversation about the leap from quantum optics to comics, why pictures sit unfairly at the bottom of our communication hierarchy, what years on the road taught Aśka about making science feel personal, and her lovely advice to pick up a concept and roll it around in your hands until you find a surprising new way in. You can connect with Aśka and learn more about their work here: Aśka's website: askastorytelling.com The Friendship Paradox (Allen & Unwin): https://www.allenandunwin.com/browse/book/A%C5%9Bka-Friendship-Paradox-9781761181689, a teaser of the book The Cosmic Adventures of Alice and Bob: a free middle-grade comic Aśka co-created about research and searching in science Qublings – Quantum Siblings, an award-winning comic about quantum entanglement: askastorytelling.com/short-comics Aśka's blog post on science communication through pictures: askastorytelling.com/musings Non-fiction middle-grade books Aśka has illustrated: Behind the Screens and How to Save the Whole Blinkin' Planet Instagram: @askastorytelling Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/askastorytelling/ Transcript: https://go.unimelb.edu.au/c7vh

Ever had someone you care about listen to you talk about your work and ask, "so what?". It stings, but what if it's actually a gift? In this short episode, Jen and Michael reframe that deflating moment as one of the most useful questions you'll ever be asked: the very thing every funder, editor and audience member is quietly wondering anyway. They talk through how to answer it well: distinguishing why your work matters in your field from why it matters to the person in front of you, using the "five whys" to dig down to something they genuinely care about, and turning all those answers into a handful of ready-made hooks for different people and situations. You can find more great advice here: The Message Box. The signature (and free) science communication tool whose whole crux is the "So what? Why should your audience care?" question, with a different version built for each audience you want to reach. Research contribution vs significance. A clear, recent piece from the wonderful Pat Thomson framing significance as the "so what?" of your work, warning against both the vague non-answer ("it's important because mental health matters") and underselling what you've done. Transcript: https://go.unimelb.edu.au/w7vh