It’s great that people like Dawn Bazely, a biology and ecology professor at York University, take the time out of their schedules to sit down ad have a chat to record a podcast for others to listen in. There is so much to learn from guests of podcasts, and Dr. Bazely was recently able to take part of one recently in Podcast or Perish which dives into the world of academics hosted by Cameron Graham, a professor of Accounting at York University.
It is a roughly 50-minute long podcast, but I’d like to point out something that was brought up between the 8:40-12:00 mark – observe and ask questions! We won’t learn and fully understand if we don’t as questions. We only know what we know and nothing more, and we can only go so far on our own. That is where others step in to share their knowledge to fill in any gaps or misunderstandings you may have had. And who knows, maybe others will pick up something from you too. We’re all always learning, after all.
This also ties into communication as an extremely important skill. You could have all the knowledge in the world, know the deepest darkest secrets of the universe, or know the meaning of life, but it’s all somewhat meaningless if you don’t have a way to communicate it out to others in ways they will understand. It’s also important to make sure that you communicate you knowledge and ideas clearly to avoid misinterpretations.
So take it one step at a time and practice those skills. They aren’t skills exclusive to science or academics. They are skills that are useful for everything in life and will undoubtedly make the journey to your next destination a little easier.
Applied Plant Ecology Winter 2020 