March 25, 2025 • 45 mins
This episode is about influencing others at work with Joanna Royle and Orla Kelly. Joanna is a Researcher Development Manager at the University of Glasgow. Orla is Scotland's Knowledge Exchange and Innovation Collaboration Manager based at the University of the West of Scotland.
Sarah, Joanna and Orla talk about
- What the term influence means to them
- How the need to influence others shows up for research-adjacent professionals
- Examples of how they have used their influence at work
- Tips for influencing others, including more senior people
Find out more
- Read the show notes and transcript on the podcast website
- Connect to Orla on LinkedIn
- Connect to Joanna on LinkedIn or via the University of Glasgow website
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Joanna Royle (she/her) (00:00):
I think the way you get influence, or
you have influence, probably isto be the kind of person that
sees the challenges, wishes toaddress the challenges, and then
works out how to connect thepeople.
Orla Kelly (00:12):
This is how I see it. How do you see it? Right?
That should be the start ofevery conversation if you're
trying to influence people.
Joanna Royle (she/her) (00:17):
In fact, it's sometimes harder, but
sometimes easier without the jobtitle, depending on how you
position that conversation,
Unknown (00:24):
We can be that trusted voice to help them process that
and make a more roundeddecision.
Sarah McLusky (00:31):
Hello there. I'm Sarah McLusky, and this is
Research Adjacent. Each episode,I talk to amazing
research-adjacent professionalsabout what they do and why it
makes a difference. Keeplistening to find out why we
think the research-adjacentspace is where the real magic
happens.
(00:52):
Hello and welcome to ResearchAdjacent. I am, as always, your
host, Sarah McLusky, and thisepisode is the fourth part of
the Challenges mini seriestoday, we're talking about
influencing others, and I havenot one but two fantastic
guests, Joanna Royle and OrlaKelly. Joanna is a Researcher
Development Manager at theUniversity of Glasgow, while
(01:13):
Orla is Scotland's KnowledgeExchange and Innovation
Collaboration Manager based atthe University of the West of
Scotland. If you recognizeOrla's voice, it might be
because you remember her fromEpisode 9 of Research Adjacent
and if you haven't listened tothat episode yet, put it on your
listening queue for after thisone. So why are we talking about
influencing others? Well, thechallenges of influencing others
(01:34):
comes up a lot in myconversations with
research-adjacent professionals,whether it's getting senior
buy-in for a major project orjust getting colleagues to
submit some paperwork on time,we often find ourselves
persuading people to do things,sometimes things they really
don't want to do, or to let themlet us do things for ourselves.
(01:54):
Orla and Joanna have greatinsights to share in this topic.
Orla spends a lot of her timeconnecting universities,
industry and partnerorganizations subtly trying to
influence them to innovate orcollaborate more. Joanna, on the
other hand, does most of herinfluencing within the
university, perhaps encouragingcolleagues to take up
development opportunities or tomake processes more efficient.
(02:15):
In our conversation, we talkabout what the term influence
means for them. They share someexamples of how they use
influence, and have lots of tipsfor how you can increase your
influence at work, whetheryou're influencing up, down,
sideways or out. Listen on tofind out how to get stuff done
without using any evil mindcontrol tactics.
Welcome along to the podcastOrla and Joanna. It's fantastic
(02:39):
to have you here to talk to us abit today about influencing
other people. We'll come on towhat we mean by that in just a
moment. But can I begin byinviting you to introduce
yourselves? Orla, would you liketo go first?
Unknown (02:52):
Yeah, thanks, Sarah, really happy to be here. A bit
nervous to be here, but happy tobe here. So my name is Orla
Kelly. I am a Knowledge Exchangeand Innovation Collaboration
Manager. I am hosted by theUniversity West of Scotland, but
I work across all 19universities in Scotland.
Sarah McLusky (03:09):
Thank you. And Joanna,
Joanna Royle (she/her) (03:11):
Hi, echoing that nervousness for
sure, Orla. I'm Joanna Royle.I'm the Researcher Development
Manager at the University ofGlasgow, as part of the research
culture and researcherdevelopment team.
Sarah McLusky (03:24):
Fantastic. Thank you. Joanna and Orla, very big.
Welcome to you. And the reasonthat we've got the two of you
along today is because both ofyou are in positions where you
have to kind of persuade people,influence people in order to get
things done, Orla mainly workingwith partners outside of your
(03:45):
organization, and Joanna mainlyworking within your
organization. And the reasonthat I want you to do a podcast
on this episode is this issomething that comes up again
and again in the conversationsthat I have with research
adjacent professionals about thesorts of things that they're
struggling with and many, manyresearch adjacent professionals
(04:05):
are in these positions whereit's their job to get a certain
thing done, whether it's, youknow, to get a project completed
or to get a report done, or tocompile some statistics for the
department, or, you know, bringtogether a collaboration. So
there's this, and they'reworking with other people who
are really busy. They've got alot on their plate, and
(04:26):
sometimes just actually gettingpeople to do what they need them
to do can be a little bit of achallenge. So that's the reason
why I wanted to do a podcast onthis particular topic. So
beginning maybe just with whatwe call this sort of work, in
(04:46):
terms of getting other people todo things that you want to do, I
framed it as influencing others.But how do you feel about that
term? I know some people don'tlove it, or that maybe you could
give us your thoughts first.
Unknown (04:57):
Thanks. I. I find it really interesting, because I
don't think of myself as aninfluencer in that, you know,
inverted commas, but Idefinitely do do it, so I don't
mind the term. And I do talkabout, you know, when I'm
talking about gettinguniversities to collectively
(05:19):
engage with policy makers. I dotalk about influencing policy
and strategy and funding, so Ido use the word, actually, quite
a lot, but I don't considermyself an
Sarah McLusky (05:28):
An influencer. Yeah
Orla Kelly (05:30):
Yeah. But for me, I think, I think the influencing
side of things is mostly aboutcommunication more than anything
else, and socializing ideas. Ireally related a lot to one of
your other podcast guests,Andrew Millar, talking about
navigating change and bringingpeople along the journey. I
(05:50):
think that's influencing. Yeah,it's a strange term. It can mean
a lot of different things todifferent people.
Sarah McLusky (05:58):
I think so it can be so what do you when you said
there about socializing,socializing ideas, was it you
said, tell me a bit more whatyou mean by that.
Unknown (06:06):
Well, so, so I work across 19 universities. They're
all different shapes and sizes,geographies, demographics,
different approaches to how theycould solve a problem or
approach a big, you know,strategy thing that's come out
of Scottish Government orelsewhere. And so if these
policy makers sitting ingovernment are making this
(06:28):
blanket decision that is that isgoing to impact on 19
institutions, there's a there'sa challenge there to make sure
that it, it suits the Universityof Glasgow, as well as the Royal
Conservatoire in Glasgow, whichare two very different sizes.
They're different, evendifferent types of institution.
And so socializing ideas andbringing people along with you
(06:50):
so they feel like they have somekind of control over what's
happening to them. I thinkthat's that's influencing,
influencing up and and out, Ithink is
Sarah McLusky (07:03):
Yes yeah, influencing up is definitely
something that comes up withresearch adjacent professionals.
Maybe we'll come to that in amoment. Joanna then tell us, how
do you find the terminfluencing? What does it mean
for you?
Joanna Royle (she/her) (07:17):
Little bit like Orla, as soon as you
said it's a problematic word. Ithought, Oh, it's a problematic
word, but until you said that,it didn't really think of it as
a problematic word for me. Forme, it's about having a voice in
the room. It's about being thatkind of person that's that's a
(07:37):
go to, person that's consideredexpert and also, and I guess
this is why I don't think of itas a bad word collegiate. So
when I'm thinking aboutinfluencing, I'm not trying to
make someone else consume thething that I want them to, or do
the well, sometimes I'm tryingto make them do the thing I want
them to, but not in that kind ofdirect way. It's about people
(08:00):
wanting to know what I have tosay on x, or to say, oh, Joanna
will have something tocontribute to this. That's where
i i That's how I use the word. Ialso don't have Instagram,
though, so maybe, maybe I'mprotected from the more
problematic uses of theexpression.
Sarah McLusky (08:21):
I think also some people just find that that
influence. It's almost like akind of evil thing. It's like
getting people to do stuff theydon't want to do. And, I mean, I
guess sometimes maybe it isthings people don't want to do,
like, you know, if it'spaperwork or something that
needs to be completed, but yeah.But something you said there
Joanna, made me think about thisidea of when you said people
(08:43):
feeling like you've gotsomething to say, or that you've
you've got some expertise arounda particular topic, and and also
that idea you said all thatabout, about influencing up, is
this idea of being an authorityon something, rather than
necessarily having authority.And I think a lot of research
adjacent professionals findthemselves in positions where
(09:04):
they don't necessarily haveauthority that comes with their
job title, but without doubt,many of them are authorities on
the work that they do. I wonderif either get any thoughts on
that.
Unknown (09:19):
In prep for this, I wrote down the word advocacy,
and I think that's that's whatwe're talking about here.
Because advocacy work is reallyimportant. We work in really
higher education. Is a reallycomplex environment. Lots of
really opinionated people, anddecisions are made in a complex
(09:39):
environment based on notnecessarily bad data, but
limited data, and it doesn'tnecessarily tell the whole
picture of what's going on. Andso I think that's then us in our
research adjacent roles beingthat kind of that sensible
voice. Mm. To to help thosepeople who maybe don't have the
(10:03):
time or capacity to really getto the the the you know,
understand every single facet ofof this complex higher education
environment, but needs to make adecision quickly about something
we can be that trusted voice tohelp them process that and make
a more rounded decision. Yeah,
Sarah McLusky (10:21):
yeah, that's a good way to think about it.
Yeah, Joanna, do you have anythoughts on that?
Joanna Royle (she/her) (10:25):
I do think that bridging piece is so
valuable, I noted down thephrase it takes a village. The
I think Joanna, what you'resaying, there is a really nice
research ecosystem, very muchlike Orla says, is unbelievably
complex, and we each have ourown kind of areas of expertise
and responsibility. I think theway you get influence, or you
have influence, probably is tobe the kind of person that sees
(10:49):
the challenges, wishes toaddress the challenges, and then
works out how to connect thepeople. And that, I think, is a
lot of influence. It issomething you can do without the
point to lead into, maybetalking about some concrete
job title. In fact, it'ssometimes sometimes harder, but
sometimes easier without the jobtitle, depending on how you
examples of situations whereyou've had to use your influence
(11:09):
position that conversation. Sothere definitely is a piece
about how you position thatconversation and make sure that
your that your expertise issurfaced, and people know who
you are, and they know thatyou're the kind of person that
bring people together.
(11:39):
to get something done withinyour organization or with
partner organizations. SoJoanna, could you tell us about
a particular example?
Yes, I can. It's quite a bigexample, I suppose. In terms of
it might not sound it when Itell it, who knows? But in terms
of a piece of work I've beendoing over a really long period
(11:59):
of time, but I would say a lotof the things we're going to
pull out of that are very muchapplicable to much smaller
things that you're trying to do.It's also, and we're going to
have to forewarn your listeners,a bit of a boring example. I'm
about an IT system.
Sarah McLusky (12:17):
So I think that so much though, I think that
that's just keeping it real.That is the reality of what most
research adjacent professionalsare working on. It's stuff like
that. So yeah, tell us about it.
Joanna Royle (she/her) (12:30):
It totally is. So we were really
struggling as a team researcherdevelopers, provide development
opportunities for researchers. Isay says it on the tin. So lots
of training, lots of events,lots of mentoring partnerships,
those kinds of things. And wewere really, really struggling
with the absolute basics ofbooking and tracking. And when
(12:52):
you do hundreds of events in ayear, that is administratively
very, very difficult. And wealso knew that the approaches we
were taking were causing a greatdeal of dissatisfaction amongst
our researchers, and finding aroute out of that that both
(13:12):
addressed the needs of my teamand the needs of our researchers
that we were serving becausepeople didn't want to come to
our stuff because the bookingsystem was so horrendous, was
probably, I mean, I'm still inthe middle of it, but probably a
sort of year and a half longproject, two year project, to
get to the point of convincingthe university to invest in a
new booking and managementsystem for events. And I'm sure
(13:38):
you hear in your circles ofpeople saying, Oh, do we? Do we
Eventbrite? Do we Ticket Tailor,what do we do? And having
something in house that doesthat. So the journey was
definitely about finding otherpeople that were having similar
problems. I knew everybody was,because it was the kind of thing
you had people chuntering aboutat conferences and events,
(14:01):
finding the people that werehaving the same kinds of
problems, and then working outwhat the steps were to solving
that problem. And I suppose alot of what it was was about
thinking about what the end goalwas, and not being committed to
what the answer would be to getto the end goal, but to approach
it. For me, it was almost like aresearch problem. I went and
(14:22):
which is, you know, we areresearch adjacent professionals,
and we do a lot of research assuch, a lot of scholarship. So I
did a lot of, you know,benchmarking and setting the
consultation and reviewingpossible platforms, as I say,
none of that sort of superexciting. But it was doing the
work and then being able sogetting people on side,
(14:45):
understanding what theirproblems were, doing the work
for them that would get them tothe solution. We all knew kind
of what the end goal was, andthen being able to present
options. So it was working out,and then also working out what
else would be impacted, becausethere's all sorts of ripple
effects of a project like that,where you're trying to get the
(15:06):
university to invest and if theydo this, then they don't do
that, or if they do this, youneed to change that. So it was a
very long term. It took quite alot of patience to go on this
journey of getting an IT system.And there was a lot of the
influencing piece about workingout, what would work working
(15:27):
out, what would get people onside, having conversations. I
think a lot of influence isabout good, positive working
relationships. It doesn'tnecessarily mean that someone
likes you, although that, to behonest, that's the approach I
tend to use, because that's whoI naturally am. I'm quite loud.
I was going to use a nicer word,like bubbly, but, you know,
(15:49):
quite social, but, but makingsure that you've got that
positive sense that they think,Well, what Joanna is trying to
do here is going to help me, andshe's going to bring me along
for the ride. She's going tokeep listening to what I need.
So you've kind of got the theground swell behind you, and
then it was about working outwho I needed to influence up the
(16:14):
way. So actually it's gettingyour groundswell behind you,
who's your team, who's yourvillage. But then how do I make
that change? And again, a lot ofthat's about personal
conversations. Of like you doneed to get it to this
committee. You do need tounderstand that that sort of
paper would need to be put in.This is what the process looks
like for procurement. Some of itwas about volunteering to do
(16:37):
things for people upwards, orcommittees upwards that made you
useful to them, that you wereworking towards a solution.
You'd brought a problem, you'dseen the gap, but you were also
the person that was really goingto do the work towards the
solution. And you were really, Iwas trying to be really, really
clear about what I then neededfor that from them, and keep
that quite minimal, keeping theminformed. So, yeah, it's an
(17:02):
awful lot that story has anawful lot of building
relationship in it, despite thefact that the actual product was
an IT system. I would also say,I when you when you set us this
challenge you said is, is thereanything you could tell us about
when you're influencing reallywent wrong? And I would also say
this story embeds that, becausethere was definitely moments
(17:24):
along the way where theUniversity of Glasgow is very
big, and what we were trying todo towards actually probably the
same goal as other teams whowere also seeing the same
problem came into tension and attimes navigating that tension
and actually knowing when youneeded to bring in the big guns,
(17:47):
knowing when you needed to say,actually this much as I feel
very empowered to have thatinfluence, and I do think to
have that influence, it helps ifthe team around you and your
direct line management isencouraging of it, but also
knowing when to say, I needsomeone to step in here and
help. So that was, that was lessa story, I've tried to keep it
(18:08):
quite vague story, but moreabout some of the things that
helped. I do have an IT systemthat's quite key.
Sarah McLusky (18:15):
We got there, yes
Joanna Royle (she/her) (18:16):
I can book my events much more
quickly, it's been a mob. We'vecut it down, cut our admin time
down from sort of by threequarters, which has been
fantastic, wild and amazing, bitdull, but very important in
terms of, okay, we've got muchhappier researchers. So the
outcome was good, but it was, itwas a long journey of
(18:38):
relationship building and doingthe work?
Sarah McLusky (18:41):
Yeah I think that's, it's a really nice
example of just what it takes.People often say, and it's so so
often it comes up in theconversations I have in this
podcast about how hard it can beto change things in a big
organization. And that is just,you know, you've said, just to
do one thing that seems quitesmall, like change an IT system
(19:01):
has all these different movingparts and all these different
things going on and, but alsothe fact that it's really just
about people. So yes, on thesurface, it's about IT systems,
you know, it's about a piece oftechnology, but ultimately, it's
about people and, and, yeah,really nice examples of all the
different strategies and thingsyou use. Think we'll maybe come
(19:23):
back to some of those. I'vewritten a bit of a list, but for
now, maybe we'll see what Orlahas to add to that list. So Orla
tell us about an example ofsomething you've done to which
involved influencing others.
Unknown (19:36):
There's one piece of work that happened a couple of
years ago when Scottish FundingCouncil were going through a
review of their knowledgeexchange and innovation funding,
and so going through all the allthe usual consultation and and a
lot of uncertainty at the time,people are a bit worried about
what, what does this mean?What's going to happen in 12
(19:59):
months time? 18 months time. Andso we brought in, or I brought
in Hamish McAlpine, who you'vehad as a guest on the podcast
before, to lead a session on, onmeasuring knowledge exchange
through a Scottish lens is how Ikind of branded it. So there's
lots of influence in that, in inencouraging the people in our in
(20:20):
the different institutions, tosay this conversation is a good
It was a really lovely day stillin my memories of one of my
idea. You're going to leave thisthis workshop with more
confidence in what lies ahead,and influencing the Funding
Council that that this is alsogoing to potentially be valuable
to help you shape the decisionsthat you're going to make. Yes,
(20:40):
you're, you're doing this veryformal consultation, but
there's, but there's more thatyou can do beyond that, and so
trying to influence that. Butthe reason I wanted to bring
that, that particular exampleup, is because during this time,
I had a conversation with aprincipal in a university in
Scotland who is no longer aprincipal there, who was quite
(21:03):
rude and really quite difficultwith me and challenging me to
say, basically, who are you toto enable this conversation to
happen? Why do you think theprofessional services staff
should have any kind of say overthis? And it was, it was really
quite difficult, but that was areally good lesson for me,
because you can't pleaseeverybody all of the time, no,
(21:26):
and, and just because this oneperson doesn't like it doesn't
favorite work days, actually.
matter that that where they sitin the hierarchy, right? The
And we're up in the beautifulStirling campus and looking out
fact that we had mostuniversities in Scotland come to
this, this whole day workshop tocontribute, says to me that it
was important. So, yeah, youcan't be bogged down by this one
person's, you know, challengingopinion. But I'll, I'll, I'll
(21:48):
over the loch and, you know,we're gorgeous, we had
throw in another example that'smore relevant to Joanna,
actually, because Joanna and Ioccasionally cross paths through
Skillfluence come in to do apiece of work around the
the ScotHERD, Scottish HigherEducation Researcher Developers,
yeah, and it's a, it's a greatpeer network in Scotland that
that meets regularly, sharesbest practice. You know, really,
(22:10):
really brilliant example ofcollaborative, collaborative
working. I'm particularlyinterested in, in where
researcher developers andresearch culture collides with
researcher developers role infeeding that early pipeline
knowledge exchange andinnovation. And I don't see the
two things as separate, but wequite often treat them as as
these separate things. Lots ofreasons for that. But a couple
(22:33):
of years ago, in the summer,beautiful sunny day in Stirling,
Joanna, if you remember, and we had
(22:55):
towards knowledge exchange andinnovation, right? And so
brilliant room full of researchdevelopers talking through some
really enthusiastic discussion,like wonderful and then
Skillfluence came and gave methe report at the end of it, and
I just looked at it like, Idon't know what to do with this.
This is almost too big, yeah.And so we're nearly two years on
(23:18):
from that meeting Joanna, and Ihaven't dropped that, but I just
haven't necessarily doneanything more with it. But it's
still that thing, of of ofquietly influencing people,
planting seeds, right? This is,this is an important topic. I
don't know the solution. I don'tknow the route to get there,
necessarily. It you Joanna,you've already said the phrase,
it takes a village, you know?How can we? How can we address
(23:39):
this as a collective, not just,you know, me sitting at my desk
saying this is a problem, andJoanna, you need to fix it,
because Joanna's going to shrugher shoulders and put it, you
know, bullet point number 39 onher of her list of things to do.
So that's another example ofwhere I've tried to influence
and not conquered it, yeah, butit's rumbling on, let's say
Sarah McLusky (24:04):
Yeah.
Joanna Royle (she/her) (24:04):
But I think what's nice about that
story is you're talking abouthow you become the voice in the
room, the go to person and thatevent, although I I'm going to
be quite frank, I suspect, likea lot of researcher developers,
certainly me, was slightly gladthat some more work didn't
emerge out of that. We'd hadthis lovely, lovely
(24:24):
conversation, and then we werequite happy to bat it down the
road. But what it meant wasright the way across my
community in Scotland, andScotHERD was one of the examples
I was going to use, actually,but I won't now, because you
have, your name is known. OrlaKelly have have, oh, that thing.
But have you asked Orla and andit's socializing your expertise.
(24:47):
As someone that people can go toshould go to for challenges
where maybe they, they actually,my story was like, I knew what
the end goal was, but they thinka lot of stories, you don't know
what the end goal is you justknow what the challenge is and
and knowing who those voices arethat you can get in a room is is
(25:10):
part of and being one of thosevoices is part of that
influencing piece.
Sarah McLusky (25:14):
Yeah, and I think it's lovely. It's a lovely
example of this the things I'vewritten down my on my notebook
here planting seeds and being aquiet influence. So not always,
and I think that applies toloads of people in our
community, that you're notnecessarily the one standing at
the front of the room tellingeverybody what to do, but by
(25:37):
just the things that you dobehind the scenes. Actually, it
makes a huge difference. Andit's how things start to move
and change, and it's how peopleso often, when I talk to people
who feel like they don't have alot of influence, but it's
sometimes, it's recognizing,well, what are the things that
(25:57):
you do have influence over, andwhat are the things that you can
do, or maybe that more of thosequiet and subtle things that
that help to shift and change,even if it's a very slow
process, even if you don't knowwhat the end goal is going to
be, but you're just nudging itin a particular direction, and
over time, those things start toend up where they end up. I
(26:21):
mean, that's it, yeah, you don'talways know, but certainly
taking them off into changethings happening down the road,
whatever that might be. So,yeah, so loving the two well
through the kind of threereally, but really nice,
contrasting examples ofdifferent, different ways of
approaching it. And that's thething, isn't it? Is? It's not
(26:43):
this sense of influencing otherpeople. It's not like there's
only one way to do it. It's notlike, and it's not like, it's
something that's only forcertain personality types, or,
you know that it's somethingthat everybody can do in some
way and in some way that feelsauthentic to them. And I think
both nice examples that help toillustrate that. That said, I
(27:04):
think, well, maybe because Ithink both of you will have
different examples of these, thethings that you've seen that
really help to make adifference. Both of you have
talked a lot about relationshipsand communication, but I think
would you say that's the kind offundamental thing? I don't know
if, either if he wants to jumpin on that.
Joanna Royle (she/her) (27:26):
I think it's one of the fundamental
thing. I think it's aboutrelationships, but it's also
about understanding yourpathways. So it's the
relationships are absolutely thegroundwork, and having influence
is partly about putting thatgroundwork in before you, before
(27:46):
you know how you want to haveinfluence, being in the spaces,
being encouraging, beingpositive about what other people
are doing. But it's also you'renot going to get anything done
if you don't know what kinds ofwho's going to make that
decision? Where are those? Whereare those points of power and
decision making, and what is thejourney to them? What kinds of
(28:09):
evidence do the people that canmake decisions need? What do
they value? How does this fitinto bigger strategic alignment?
So I think you need your peopleabsolutely baseline, but you
also need to understand yourpathways and understand your
route into those pathways. Icertainly speak to, as you said,
(28:29):
a lot of people, perhaps don'tfeel like they have influence.
And when I speak to researcherson your leadership programs, and
we do, we do a Covey circle orsomething like that, and and you
have quite complex and difficultconversations about their sense
that they don't have thatinfluence themselves, because
perhaps they're thinking, Well,I am going to be the one that
(28:52):
addresses precarity in thesector. Well, I can't do that.
No, you can't, personally, onyour own. No one. But what are
your pathways to influence? Whoare your people that can go to
the committees, and what do theyneed? Yeah, so I think it's
about people. I also think it'sabout pathways.
Sarah McLusky (29:11):
Yeah, I think knowing those places with the
you know, how it fits into thebigger picture, and certainly
that's something that's reallyimportant for the work that you
do, or isn't it, is knowingwhat's the vision, what's the
the goal?
Orla Kelly (29:22):
Yeah, I spinning on some of the things you've
already said. Joanna, I thinkit's really important to put,
put yourself in that person'sshoes, and understand where
their pressures are and wherethe opportunities are and and
take it from from theirperspective. Because you should
not assume that people know whyyou're doing this thing, or know
(29:42):
your background, or know, knowthe context, and so putting
yourself in other people'sshoes, it just come to mind. I
work at I work a lot withsomeone called Ross Tuffee,
Sarah, and you know Ross, orknow of Ross, when
Entrepreneurial Campus Blueprintwas published by Scottish
Government a few years ago, andit was quite naive in its
(30:05):
thinking, certainly in terms of,you know, we need to transform
the curriculum, and we need toembed enterprise in the
curriculum. Sounds great onpaper, right? Wonderful. This is
going to be brilliant for ourstudents, brilliant for society,
brilliant for our economy, butthe reality of of getting your
(30:26):
program director in, in the theSchool of History, or whatever,
to recognize the need to embedenterprise in the curriculum, I
mean, it's just it, you knowthat so, so you're so right,
Joanna, about the the pathways,and making sure that that you're
communicating in the languagethat people understand, and that
that you recognize the thechallenging environment that
(30:49):
we're all working in, and we allhave different pressures. So,
yeah, put yourself in otherpeople's shoes, I think is, is,
and don't make assumptions.
Sarah McLusky (31:00):
Yeah.
Orla Kelly (31:00):
Do you know problem 101? Right? This is, this is,
this is how I see it. How do yousee it? Right? That should be
the start of every conversation.If you're trying to influence
people.
Sarah McLusky (31:10):
Yeah, I'm and I think it's that as well that
you, you said earlier, Joanna,it's that kind of, what's in it,
for me is helping people tounderstand, you know, this
change, this report, thisproject, you know, whatever it
is, why is that going to beimportant to me? Why is this
something that I have to do? Andthat's where all that
(31:31):
relationship building,identifying the pathways, the
routes and things like that,comes in, also that that what's
in it for me as well, is reallyimportant when it comes to
influencing up, isn't it?Joanna, influencing people who
are maybe in more seniorpositions, or who are in the
position to actually make someof the decisions about things.
(31:55):
And I liked the some of thethings you said about, you know,
making it easy for them. Youknow, being clear, but then also
making it easy. Any otherthoughts about what can help if
you're influencing, trying toinfluence, somebody who is in a
more senior position, inwhatever way that might find
(32:16):
itself.
Joanna Royle (she/her) (32:17):
I think adjusting your comms style so
learning to write a really well,tight, well constructed email
that prefaces the things theyneed to do. I certainly have
some slightly embarrassingexamples from the start of my
career as a researcherdeveloper, where I presented
(32:38):
Deans with all the things, allthe information, absolutely
everything. And they reallyweren't getting through it. I
was having to send too long,didn't read follows ups, so
learning how to really get tothe heart of what they need to
know, not the things that areworrying you, not, oh my
goodness, my administratorsspending forever on this. Or I
(32:58):
need to work out the cateringfor that at what or I can't work
out how it's going to work likesuch and such. Those details are
not important to them, becausethat's not their agenda. What
they need to know sounderstanding how to communicate
what they need to know thingsaround. How is this
strategically aligned? What doesit cost? How is it going to have
(33:19):
a ripple effect on other teams?How is it going to accomplish
goals that they have? And so notonly in emails, also in reports
that you can send so people canpre read, also in conversations
that you have, those kinds ofconversations take a lot more
(33:39):
well for me, take a lot moreplanning. You know that classic
quote, is it? I can't rememberwho it is. I didn't, I didn't
have time to write a shortarticle, so I wrote a long one.
Yeah, who was that?
Sarah McLusky (33:53):
I'll see if I can find it. I'll put it in the in
the show notes, yeah,
Joanna Royle (she/her) (34:00):
influencing up. It's really a part of it,
for me, is about communicatingin a way that they're going to
have capacity to hear.
Sarah McLusky (34:10):
Yeah, yeah. And it's still part of that, as you
said, or putting yourself inother people's shoes, isn't it?
Orla Kelly (34:16):
Yeah, I 100% agree with what Joanna just said, I've
engaged with a few universitywide committees before, you
know, Pan Scotland committees.And you see, every so often
there'll be someone that comesand says, Oh, this is, this is a
thing, asks the question, Canyou respond to me with feedback
(34:39):
in within two weeks? And thenthey get three responses, you
know? And so, and actually whatyou need to go in is actually be
more solution focused, yeah, andgo in and say, this is, this is
what I'm going to do, unless youtell me not to. And you're,
you're not, you're not causing,you're not causing problems.
(35:00):
Rooms are giving people work.You are. You are being strategic
with how you're going to to makethis thing happen for the
benefit of whoever's in theroom. And this is the process to
do it if you feel differentlyand want to contribute, come,
come join the party. Otherwiseit's going to happen. And having
that kind of more proactiveapproach to but, but you need
(35:20):
to, you need to make sure thatit's the right room that you can
go in and be as bold as thatright so reading the room and
understanding who your audienceis is really important. And you
can't be a newbie and talkedabout those building
relationships. You can't be veryfresh faced and go in very bold
without people having that faiththat you can deliver what you
(35:45):
say you're going to deliver. Sobut really complex reading the
room is really important.
Sarah McLusky (35:50):
Yeah, I can definitely resonate with that.
And once going into situationwhere I didn't know the
backstory, and going in, yeah,very confidently with all the
things I was going to do, andthen it totally backfired, and
it took months to sort out. Soyes, I've been there. We've all
had our influencing failuresalong the way.
Joanna Royle (she/her) (36:07):
And I think there's also in that isn't
there, is sometimes you'reinfluencing, is finding the
person who does already have thevoice in the room, that you
trust, that you that you can geton board. So you're influencing
the person that's going to dothe influencing, who can be that
bold, and also strategicallymaking sure you're in the room
(36:27):
next to the person so you'rerecognizable. And of course,
they are necessarily then goingto say, Joanna's done this work,
or Orla's done this work. Sothey are, you said advocacy
earlier, they are advocating foryour work. So there is also
journey pieces around. And Ithink that's where the the
(36:50):
people in the pathways kind ofintersect a little bit, and then
gradually you become therecognized face, the go to
expert, the collegiate person,the voice in the room that I was
talking about at the start, andthen, and then, ultimately, you
can rock up to those spaces withthat boldness. I think a lot of
what we're talking about herewith influencing, though it's,
(37:11):
it's starting to sound like avery long journey.
Sarah McLusky (37:15):
I think, Well, I think it can be or or not. I
think it depends on thesituation, doesn't it, and and
the scale of the change thatyou're trying to bring about.
But yeah, I think, well, that'smaking it sound like a very long
journey. I don't know. Do eitherof you have examples of where
just a tiny little thing hasmade a big difference that's
(37:36):
putting you on the spot a littlebit, so don't worry. If not,
Unknown (37:39):
I'm not sure. I'll think about that, but I will say
that that we've already kind oftouched on it. We are all
influencers, whether we identifyas one or not, and so and so,
recognizing those levers that wedo pull, that we are we're doing
all the time.
Sarah McLusky (37:54):
Yeah, yeah.
Joanna Royle (she/her) (37:55):
It's not really an answer to your
Sarah McLusky (37:56):
Yeah. And that's and, I mean, it's a hugely
question, Sarah, but I thinkthere are ways of fast tracking
that visibility and make sure,making sure that your expertise
is surfaced with pieces of workthat you you already hold. But
powerful technique that I'veused myself, and I've seen work
actually, you don't have to doany influencing with at all,
really. They're your job. Buthow do you then get them into
(38:17):
the spaces I'm thinking rightnow, in my case of the
University of Glasgow's TalentLab, for example, that's a very
big piece of work that sits inmy purview. It's all our
really well when you just youcome with the solution, not the
leadership programs across ourfull research ecosystem, and
it's just literally my job tomake it happen. But the
influencing has been making surethat reports are going to key
(38:40):
committees, that key people havetheir or maybe not committees,
but, you know, groups of deansor whoever we're just saying,
problem, but also what you'retalking about there. Brings us
Oh, by the way, this is the,this lovely thing that we're
doing for you, and we'veevaluated, and it's really, it's
really cool. And so you aresocializing the expectation that
you're someone that does useful,good, impactful things. So then
(39:03):
when you rock up and say, I wantto do this, you've also, you've
right back to the beginning ofour conversation. It's probably
done that pre trust building,yeah, and, and it can have knock
on effects. So I didn't, I didall of that, making sure my
expertise is surface. And maybeat that point we're starting to
be a bit showy, offy, maybe itsounds a little bit Instagram
a nice place to kind of wrapthings up is when we talked
now in a work context, but thenactually, at the moment, we are
(39:27):
going through a review of ourstrategic environment and having
those numbers to hand and meable to talk about them is
something that I'm now seeing.Oh, those numbers have rocked up
in that report or this report,or they're being kind of
about the sense of being anauthority on something, even if
socialized in other spaces. Doesthat actually? Is that about me
having influence to solve aproblem? No, absolutely not. I'm
(39:51):
not well, I am, but only my ownproblem. It's my, literally, my
job, but that recognizable faceof having done a thing means
you are not in a position ofauthority, and you're talking
that I'm much more confidentwhen I then go in and say, I
want this other tiny thing. Andin fact, I quite literally just
did that. Another boring IT onerecently, I went to a senior
committee and said, Can we movethis information from this, it
(40:14):
system to that, it systemexcruciatingly dull. These are
there about how you candemonstrate over your kind of
my four reasons. Is that allright? And I just got a complete
green light. And being, havingdone that kind of groundwork
that my expertise would be x, Iwould be expected to come with a
sensible suggestion. And I lovedwhat Orla said, actually, about
track record and your visibilityin an organization, and the
not learning to goodness me,this is taken me time learning
(40:38):
to not invite contributions andbut instead, be like, here's the
problem, here's three solutions.Here's the first solution that I
think's the best one. Here'swhat I'm going to do, unless you
things that you do and how youshow up for work every day, is
tell me otherwise. Here are theother options. Like, you're you
can look at them. I'm notexcluding you from you are the
(40:58):
decision makers. I'm notexcluding you from the
information. But actually, ifreally you just want someone to
do the thing, here's the thing,I'll pop off and do it shall I?
building that sense of authoritythat you are the authority in
Yeah. So that's, I suppose,that's where I'm talking about
the long journey. Is the, is thetrust building, because then you
can do little things quite quick,
(41:28):
this thing, so that when youneed something, you're You're in
a prime position to get it .Orla any final thoughts from you
Orla Kelly (42:06):
I see, I see this conversation relating really
strongly with your otherepisodes in this series Sarah I
know
Sarah McLusky (42:15):
It's like I planned it,
Orla Kelly (42:19):
but, but the whole because we're working in the in
these quite everyone talks aboutuniversities moving slow, but,
but there is quite a dynamicenvironment, right? Things are
changing all the time, and soyou have a you have an episode
on navigating change. You havean an episode on networking.
This is so important. We'retalking about identifying those
people if you're if you're not,the person that holds the keys,
(42:41):
who does hold the keys, right?And how? How do we build up
those personal and professionalnetworks to our advantage? And
and imposter syndrome, Joannaand I both entered this, and we
are, we are not authorities oninfluencing people, but we do do
it all the time. So, yeah, Ithink I, I think having more
(43:04):
confidence in the role that wedo play, no matter what size of
cog we are in the machine thatwe we are making things move and
recognizing where, where wewe're doing that, I think, is
really important.
Sarah McLusky (43:18):
Yeah, we definitely are making things
move without question. I thinkthat the whole wheels of the
Higher Education train wouldfall off if it wasn't for all
the research adjacentprofessionals out there. Well,
just to wrap up ourconversation, if people want to
get in touch with you, connectwith you is there a social media
(43:38):
place or somewhere that you hangout that's a good place to find
you? Orla?
Orla Kelly (43:43):
Yeah, I'm on I'm on LinkedIn. I like LinkedIn.
LinkedIn is really good.
Sarah McLusky (43:48):
Yeah, you're go to your place. Joanna, do you
hang out anywhere online?
Joanna Royle (she/her) (43:55):
Dabble in LinkedIn. I'm not. Perhaps
there very reliably and andabsolutely do just reach out by
email. I'm very findable on theUniversity of Glasgow website.
Orla Kelly (44:06):
Fantastic I'll put links to those in the show
notes. And so yeah, thank you somuch, both of you for coming
along and just sharing what youdo and the difference that you
make. And I think that's theimportant thing. Thank you.
Thank you
Joanna Royle (she/her) (44:20):
Thank you very much for having us.
Sarah, it's been really fun.
Sarah McLusky (44:27):
Thanks for listening to Research Adjacent.
If you're listening in a podcastapp, please check your
subscribed and then use thelinks in the episode description
to find full show notes andfollow the podcast on LinkedIn
or Instagram. You can also findall the links and other episodes
at www.researchadjacent.com.Research Adjacent is presented
(44:48):
and produced by Sarah McLusky,and the theme music is by Lemon
Music Studios on Pixabay. Andyou, yes you, get a big gold
star for listening right to theend. See you next time.
I think the way you get influence, or
you have influence, probably isto be the kind of person that
sees the challenges, wishes toaddress the challenges, and then
works out how to connect thepeople.
Orla Kelly (00:12):
This is how I see it. How do you see it? Right?
That should be the start ofevery conversation if you're
trying to influence people.
Joanna Royle (she/her) (00:17):
In fact, it's sometimes harder, but
sometimes easier without the jobtitle, depending on how you
position that conversation,
Unknown (00:24):
We can be that trusted voice to help them process that
and make a more roundeddecision.
Sarah McLusky (00:31):
Hello there. I'm Sarah McLusky, and this is
Research Adjacent. Each episode,I talk to amazing
research-adjacent professionalsabout what they do and why it
makes a difference. Keeplistening to find out why we
think the research-adjacentspace is where the real magic
happens.
(00:52):
Hello and welcome to ResearchAdjacent. I am, as always, your
host, Sarah McLusky, and thisepisode is the fourth part of
the Challenges mini seriestoday, we're talking about
influencing others, and I havenot one but two fantastic
guests, Joanna Royle and OrlaKelly. Joanna is a Researcher
Development Manager at theUniversity of Glasgow, while
(01:13):
Orla is Scotland's KnowledgeExchange and Innovation
Collaboration Manager based atthe University of the West of
Scotland. If you recognizeOrla's voice, it might be
because you remember her fromEpisode 9 of Research Adjacent
and if you haven't listened tothat episode yet, put it on your
listening queue for after thisone. So why are we talking about
influencing others? Well, thechallenges of influencing others
(01:34):
comes up a lot in myconversations with
research-adjacent professionals,whether it's getting senior
buy-in for a major project orjust getting colleagues to
submit some paperwork on time,we often find ourselves
persuading people to do things,sometimes things they really
don't want to do, or to let themlet us do things for ourselves.
(01:54):
Orla and Joanna have greatinsights to share in this topic.
Orla spends a lot of her timeconnecting universities,
industry and partnerorganizations subtly trying to
influence them to innovate orcollaborate more. Joanna, on the
other hand, does most of herinfluencing within the
university, perhaps encouragingcolleagues to take up
development opportunities or tomake processes more efficient.
(02:15):
In our conversation, we talkabout what the term influence
means for them. They share someexamples of how they use
influence, and have lots of tipsfor how you can increase your
influence at work, whetheryou're influencing up, down,
sideways or out. Listen on tofind out how to get stuff done
without using any evil mindcontrol tactics.
Welcome along to the podcastOrla and Joanna. It's fantastic
(02:39):
to have you here to talk to us abit today about influencing
other people. We'll come on towhat we mean by that in just a
moment. But can I begin byinviting you to introduce
yourselves? Orla, would you liketo go first?
Unknown (02:52):
Yeah, thanks, Sarah, really happy to be here. A bit
nervous to be here, but happy tobe here. So my name is Orla
Kelly. I am a Knowledge Exchangeand Innovation Collaboration
Manager. I am hosted by theUniversity West of Scotland, but
I work across all 19universities in Scotland.
Sarah McLusky (03:09):
Thank you. And Joanna,
Joanna Royle (she/her) (03:11):
Hi, echoing that nervousness for
sure, Orla. I'm Joanna Royle.I'm the Researcher Development
Manager at the University ofGlasgow, as part of the research
culture and researcherdevelopment team.
Sarah McLusky (03:24):
Fantastic. Thank you. Joanna and Orla, very big.
Welcome to you. And the reasonthat we've got the two of you
along today is because both ofyou are in positions where you
have to kind of persuade people,influence people in order to get
things done, Orla mainly workingwith partners outside of your
(03:45):
organization, and Joanna mainlyworking within your
organization. And the reasonthat I want you to do a podcast
on this episode is this issomething that comes up again
and again in the conversationsthat I have with research
adjacent professionals about thesorts of things that they're
struggling with and many, manyresearch adjacent professionals
(04:05):
are in these positions whereit's their job to get a certain
thing done, whether it's, youknow, to get a project completed
or to get a report done, or tocompile some statistics for the
department, or, you know, bringtogether a collaboration. So
there's this, and they'reworking with other people who
are really busy. They've got alot on their plate, and
(04:26):
sometimes just actually gettingpeople to do what they need them
to do can be a little bit of achallenge. So that's the reason
why I wanted to do a podcast onthis particular topic. So
beginning maybe just with whatwe call this sort of work, in
(04:46):
terms of getting other people todo things that you want to do, I
framed it as influencing others.But how do you feel about that
term? I know some people don'tlove it, or that maybe you could
give us your thoughts first.
Unknown (04:57):
Thanks. I. I find it really interesting, because I
don't think of myself as aninfluencer in that, you know,
inverted commas, but Idefinitely do do it, so I don't
mind the term. And I do talkabout, you know, when I'm
talking about gettinguniversities to collectively
(05:19):
engage with policy makers. I dotalk about influencing policy
and strategy and funding, so Ido use the word, actually, quite
a lot, but I don't considermyself an
Sarah McLusky (05:28):
An influencer. Yeah
Orla Kelly (05:30):
Yeah. But for me, I think, I think the influencing
side of things is mostly aboutcommunication more than anything
else, and socializing ideas. Ireally related a lot to one of
your other podcast guests,Andrew Millar, talking about
navigating change and bringingpeople along the journey. I
(05:50):
think that's influencing. Yeah,it's a strange term. It can mean
a lot of different things todifferent people.
Sarah McLusky (05:58):
I think so it can be so what do you when you said
there about socializing,socializing ideas, was it you
said, tell me a bit more whatyou mean by that.
Unknown (06:06):
Well, so, so I work across 19 universities. They're
all different shapes and sizes,geographies, demographics,
different approaches to how theycould solve a problem or
approach a big, you know,strategy thing that's come out
of Scottish Government orelsewhere. And so if these
policy makers sitting ingovernment are making this
(06:28):
blanket decision that is that isgoing to impact on 19
institutions, there's a there'sa challenge there to make sure
that it, it suits the Universityof Glasgow, as well as the Royal
Conservatoire in Glasgow, whichare two very different sizes.
They're different, evendifferent types of institution.
And so socializing ideas andbringing people along with you
(06:50):
so they feel like they have somekind of control over what's
happening to them. I thinkthat's that's influencing,
influencing up and and out, Ithink is
Sarah McLusky (07:03):
Yes yeah, influencing up is definitely
something that comes up withresearch adjacent professionals.
Maybe we'll come to that in amoment. Joanna then tell us, how
do you find the terminfluencing? What does it mean
for you?
Joanna Royle (she/her) (07:17):
Little bit like Orla, as soon as you
said it's a problematic word. Ithought, Oh, it's a problematic
word, but until you said that,it didn't really think of it as
a problematic word for me. Forme, it's about having a voice in
the room. It's about being thatkind of person that's that's a
(07:37):
go to, person that's consideredexpert and also, and I guess
this is why I don't think of itas a bad word collegiate. So
when I'm thinking aboutinfluencing, I'm not trying to
make someone else consume thething that I want them to, or do
the well, sometimes I'm tryingto make them do the thing I want
them to, but not in that kind ofdirect way. It's about people
(08:00):
wanting to know what I have tosay on x, or to say, oh, Joanna
will have something tocontribute to this. That's where
i i That's how I use the word. Ialso don't have Instagram,
though, so maybe, maybe I'mprotected from the more
problematic uses of theexpression.
Sarah McLusky (08:21):
I think also some people just find that that
influence. It's almost like akind of evil thing. It's like
getting people to do stuff theydon't want to do. And, I mean, I
guess sometimes maybe it isthings people don't want to do,
like, you know, if it'spaperwork or something that
needs to be completed, but yeah.But something you said there
Joanna, made me think about thisidea of when you said people
(08:43):
feeling like you've gotsomething to say, or that you've
you've got some expertise arounda particular topic, and and also
that idea you said all thatabout, about influencing up, is
this idea of being an authorityon something, rather than
necessarily having authority.And I think a lot of research
adjacent professionals findthemselves in positions where
(09:04):
they don't necessarily haveauthority that comes with their
job title, but without doubt,many of them are authorities on
the work that they do. I wonderif either get any thoughts on
that.
Unknown (09:19):
In prep for this, I wrote down the word advocacy,
and I think that's that's whatwe're talking about here.
Because advocacy work is reallyimportant. We work in really
higher education. Is a reallycomplex environment. Lots of
really opinionated people, anddecisions are made in a complex
(09:39):
environment based on notnecessarily bad data, but
limited data, and it doesn'tnecessarily tell the whole
picture of what's going on. Andso I think that's then us in our
research adjacent roles beingthat kind of that sensible
voice. Mm. To to help thosepeople who maybe don't have the
(10:03):
time or capacity to really getto the the the you know,
understand every single facet ofof this complex higher education
environment, but needs to make adecision quickly about something
we can be that trusted voice tohelp them process that and make
a more rounded decision. Yeah,
Sarah McLusky (10:21):
yeah, that's a good way to think about it.
Yeah, Joanna, do you have anythoughts on that?
Joanna Royle (she/her) (10:25):
I do think that bridging piece is so
valuable, I noted down thephrase it takes a village. The
I think Joanna, what you'resaying, there is a really nice
research ecosystem, very muchlike Orla says, is unbelievably
complex, and we each have ourown kind of areas of expertise
and responsibility. I think theway you get influence, or you
have influence, probably is tobe the kind of person that sees
(10:49):
the challenges, wishes toaddress the challenges, and then
works out how to connect thepeople. And that, I think, is a
lot of influence. It issomething you can do without the
point to lead into, maybetalking about some concrete
job title. In fact, it'ssometimes sometimes harder, but
sometimes easier without the jobtitle, depending on how you
examples of situations whereyou've had to use your influence
(11:09):
position that conversation. Sothere definitely is a piece
about how you position thatconversation and make sure that
your that your expertise issurfaced, and people know who
you are, and they know thatyou're the kind of person that
bring people together.
(11:39):
to get something done withinyour organization or with
partner organizations. SoJoanna, could you tell us about
a particular example?
Yes, I can. It's quite a bigexample, I suppose. In terms of
it might not sound it when Itell it, who knows? But in terms
of a piece of work I've beendoing over a really long period
(11:59):
of time, but I would say a lotof the things we're going to
pull out of that are very muchapplicable to much smaller
things that you're trying to do.It's also, and we're going to
have to forewarn your listeners,a bit of a boring example. I'm
about an IT system.
Sarah McLusky (12:17):
So I think that so much though, I think that
that's just keeping it real.That is the reality of what most
research adjacent professionalsare working on. It's stuff like
that. So yeah, tell us about it.
Joanna Royle (she/her) (12:30):
It totally is. So we were really
struggling as a team researcherdevelopers, provide development
opportunities for researchers. Isay says it on the tin. So lots
of training, lots of events,lots of mentoring partnerships,
those kinds of things. And wewere really, really struggling
with the absolute basics ofbooking and tracking. And when
(12:52):
you do hundreds of events in ayear, that is administratively
very, very difficult. And wealso knew that the approaches we
were taking were causing a greatdeal of dissatisfaction amongst
our researchers, and finding aroute out of that that both
(13:12):
addressed the needs of my teamand the needs of our researchers
that we were serving becausepeople didn't want to come to
our stuff because the bookingsystem was so horrendous, was
probably, I mean, I'm still inthe middle of it, but probably a
sort of year and a half longproject, two year project, to
get to the point of convincingthe university to invest in a
new booking and managementsystem for events. And I'm sure
(13:38):
you hear in your circles ofpeople saying, Oh, do we? Do we
Eventbrite? Do we Ticket Tailor,what do we do? And having
something in house that doesthat. So the journey was
definitely about finding otherpeople that were having similar
problems. I knew everybody was,because it was the kind of thing
you had people chuntering aboutat conferences and events,
(14:01):
finding the people that werehaving the same kinds of
problems, and then working outwhat the steps were to solving
that problem. And I suppose alot of what it was was about
thinking about what the end goalwas, and not being committed to
what the answer would be to getto the end goal, but to approach
it. For me, it was almost like aresearch problem. I went and
(14:22):
which is, you know, we areresearch adjacent professionals,
and we do a lot of research assuch, a lot of scholarship. So I
did a lot of, you know,benchmarking and setting the
consultation and reviewingpossible platforms, as I say,
none of that sort of superexciting. But it was doing the
work and then being able sogetting people on side,
(14:45):
understanding what theirproblems were, doing the work
for them that would get them tothe solution. We all knew kind
of what the end goal was, andthen being able to present
options. So it was working out,and then also working out what
else would be impacted, becausethere's all sorts of ripple
effects of a project like that,where you're trying to get the
(15:06):
university to invest and if theydo this, then they don't do
that, or if they do this, youneed to change that. So it was a
very long term. It took quite alot of patience to go on this
journey of getting an IT system.And there was a lot of the
influencing piece about workingout, what would work working
(15:27):
out, what would get people onside, having conversations. I
think a lot of influence isabout good, positive working
relationships. It doesn'tnecessarily mean that someone
likes you, although that, to behonest, that's the approach I
tend to use, because that's whoI naturally am. I'm quite loud.
I was going to use a nicer word,like bubbly, but, you know,
(15:49):
quite social, but, but makingsure that you've got that
positive sense that they think,Well, what Joanna is trying to
do here is going to help me, andshe's going to bring me along
for the ride. She's going tokeep listening to what I need.
So you've kind of got the theground swell behind you, and
then it was about working outwho I needed to influence up the
(16:14):
way. So actually it's gettingyour groundswell behind you,
who's your team, who's yourvillage. But then how do I make
that change? And again, a lot ofthat's about personal
conversations. Of like you doneed to get it to this
committee. You do need tounderstand that that sort of
paper would need to be put in.This is what the process looks
like for procurement. Some of itwas about volunteering to do
(16:37):
things for people upwards, orcommittees upwards that made you
useful to them, that you wereworking towards a solution.
You'd brought a problem, you'dseen the gap, but you were also
the person that was really goingto do the work towards the
solution. And you were really, Iwas trying to be really, really
clear about what I then neededfor that from them, and keep
that quite minimal, keeping theminformed. So, yeah, it's an
(17:02):
awful lot that story has anawful lot of building
relationship in it, despite thefact that the actual product was
an IT system. I would also say,I when you when you set us this
challenge you said is, is thereanything you could tell us about
when you're influencing reallywent wrong? And I would also say
this story embeds that, becausethere was definitely moments
(17:24):
along the way where theUniversity of Glasgow is very
big, and what we were trying todo towards actually probably the
same goal as other teams whowere also seeing the same
problem came into tension and attimes navigating that tension
and actually knowing when youneeded to bring in the big guns,
(17:47):
knowing when you needed to say,actually this much as I feel
very empowered to have thatinfluence, and I do think to
have that influence, it helps ifthe team around you and your
direct line management isencouraging of it, but also
knowing when to say, I needsomeone to step in here and
help. So that was, that was lessa story, I've tried to keep it
(18:08):
quite vague story, but moreabout some of the things that
helped. I do have an IT systemthat's quite key.
Sarah McLusky (18:15):
We got there, yes
Joanna Royle (she/her) (18:16):
I can book my events much more
quickly, it's been a mob. We'vecut it down, cut our admin time
down from sort of by threequarters, which has been
fantastic, wild and amazing, bitdull, but very important in
terms of, okay, we've got muchhappier researchers. So the
outcome was good, but it was, itwas a long journey of
(18:38):
relationship building and doingthe work?
Sarah McLusky (18:41):
Yeah I think that's, it's a really nice
example of just what it takes.People often say, and it's so so
often it comes up in theconversations I have in this
podcast about how hard it can beto change things in a big
organization. And that is just,you know, you've said, just to
do one thing that seems quitesmall, like change an IT system
(19:01):
has all these different movingparts and all these different
things going on and, but alsothe fact that it's really just
about people. So yes, on thesurface, it's about IT systems,
you know, it's about a piece oftechnology, but ultimately, it's
about people and, and, yeah,really nice examples of all the
different strategies and thingsyou use. Think we'll maybe come
(19:23):
back to some of those. I'vewritten a bit of a list, but for
now, maybe we'll see what Orlahas to add to that list. So Orla
tell us about an example ofsomething you've done to which
involved influencing others.
Unknown (19:36):
There's one piece of work that happened a couple of
years ago when Scottish FundingCouncil were going through a
review of their knowledgeexchange and innovation funding,
and so going through all the allthe usual consultation and and a
lot of uncertainty at the time,people are a bit worried about
what, what does this mean?What's going to happen in 12
(19:59):
months time? 18 months time. Andso we brought in, or I brought
in Hamish McAlpine, who you'vehad as a guest on the podcast
before, to lead a session on, onmeasuring knowledge exchange
through a Scottish lens is how Ikind of branded it. So there's
lots of influence in that, in inencouraging the people in our in
(20:20):
the different institutions, tosay this conversation is a good
It was a really lovely day stillin my memories of one of my
idea. You're going to leave thisthis workshop with more
confidence in what lies ahead,and influencing the Funding
Council that that this is alsogoing to potentially be valuable
to help you shape the decisionsthat you're going to make. Yes,
(20:40):
you're, you're doing this veryformal consultation, but
there's, but there's more thatyou can do beyond that, and so
trying to influence that. Butthe reason I wanted to bring
that, that particular exampleup, is because during this time,
I had a conversation with aprincipal in a university in
Scotland who is no longer aprincipal there, who was quite
(21:03):
rude and really quite difficultwith me and challenging me to
say, basically, who are you toto enable this conversation to
happen? Why do you think theprofessional services staff
should have any kind of say overthis? And it was, it was really
quite difficult, but that was areally good lesson for me,
because you can't pleaseeverybody all of the time, no,
(21:26):
and, and just because this oneperson doesn't like it doesn't
favorite work days, actually.
matter that that where they sitin the hierarchy, right? The
And we're up in the beautifulStirling campus and looking out
fact that we had mostuniversities in Scotland come to
this, this whole day workshop tocontribute, says to me that it
was important. So, yeah, youcan't be bogged down by this one
person's, you know, challengingopinion. But I'll, I'll, I'll
(21:48):
over the loch and, you know,we're gorgeous, we had
throw in another example that'smore relevant to Joanna,
actually, because Joanna and Ioccasionally cross paths through
Skillfluence come in to do apiece of work around the
the ScotHERD, Scottish HigherEducation Researcher Developers,
yeah, and it's a, it's a greatpeer network in Scotland that
that meets regularly, sharesbest practice. You know, really,
(22:10):
really brilliant example ofcollaborative, collaborative
working. I'm particularlyinterested in, in where
researcher developers andresearch culture collides with
researcher developers role infeeding that early pipeline
knowledge exchange andinnovation. And I don't see the
two things as separate, but wequite often treat them as as
these separate things. Lots ofreasons for that. But a couple
(22:33):
of years ago, in the summer,beautiful sunny day in Stirling,
Joanna, if you remember, and we had
(22:55):
towards knowledge exchange andinnovation, right? And so
brilliant room full of researchdevelopers talking through some
really enthusiastic discussion,like wonderful and then
Skillfluence came and gave methe report at the end of it, and
I just looked at it like, Idon't know what to do with this.
This is almost too big, yeah.And so we're nearly two years on
(23:18):
from that meeting Joanna, and Ihaven't dropped that, but I just
haven't necessarily doneanything more with it. But it's
still that thing, of of ofquietly influencing people,
planting seeds, right? This is,this is an important topic. I
don't know the solution. I don'tknow the route to get there,
necessarily. It you Joanna,you've already said the phrase,
it takes a village, you know?How can we? How can we address
(23:39):
this as a collective, not just,you know, me sitting at my desk
saying this is a problem, andJoanna, you need to fix it,
because Joanna's going to shrugher shoulders and put it, you
know, bullet point number 39 onher of her list of things to do.
So that's another example ofwhere I've tried to influence
and not conquered it, yeah, butit's rumbling on, let's say
Sarah McLusky (24:04):
Yeah.
Joanna Royle (she/her) (24:04):
But I think what's nice about that
story is you're talking abouthow you become the voice in the
room, the go to person and thatevent, although I I'm going to
be quite frank, I suspect, likea lot of researcher developers,
certainly me, was slightly gladthat some more work didn't
emerge out of that. We'd hadthis lovely, lovely
(24:24):
conversation, and then we werequite happy to bat it down the
road. But what it meant wasright the way across my
community in Scotland, andScotHERD was one of the examples
I was going to use, actually,but I won't now, because you
have, your name is known. OrlaKelly have have, oh, that thing.
But have you asked Orla and andit's socializing your expertise.
(24:47):
As someone that people can go toshould go to for challenges
where maybe they, they actually,my story was like, I knew what
the end goal was, but they thinka lot of stories, you don't know
what the end goal is you justknow what the challenge is and
and knowing who those voices arethat you can get in a room is is
(25:10):
part of and being one of thosevoices is part of that
influencing piece.
Sarah McLusky (25:14):
Yeah, and I think it's lovely. It's a lovely
example of this the things I'vewritten down my on my notebook
here planting seeds and being aquiet influence. So not always,
and I think that applies toloads of people in our
community, that you're notnecessarily the one standing at
the front of the room tellingeverybody what to do, but by
(25:37):
just the things that you dobehind the scenes. Actually, it
makes a huge difference. Andit's how things start to move
and change, and it's how peopleso often, when I talk to people
who feel like they don't have alot of influence, but it's
sometimes, it's recognizing,well, what are the things that
(25:57):
you do have influence over, andwhat are the things that you can
do, or maybe that more of thosequiet and subtle things that
that help to shift and change,even if it's a very slow
process, even if you don't knowwhat the end goal is going to
be, but you're just nudging itin a particular direction, and
over time, those things start toend up where they end up. I
(26:21):
mean, that's it, yeah, you don'talways know, but certainly
taking them off into changethings happening down the road,
whatever that might be. So,yeah, so loving the two well
through the kind of threereally, but really nice,
contrasting examples ofdifferent, different ways of
approaching it. And that's thething, isn't it? Is? It's not
(26:43):
this sense of influencing otherpeople. It's not like there's
only one way to do it. It's notlike, and it's not like, it's
something that's only forcertain personality types, or,
you know that it's somethingthat everybody can do in some
way and in some way that feelsauthentic to them. And I think
both nice examples that help toillustrate that. That said, I
(27:04):
think, well, maybe because Ithink both of you will have
different examples of these, thethings that you've seen that
really help to make adifference. Both of you have
talked a lot about relationshipsand communication, but I think
would you say that's the kind offundamental thing? I don't know
if, either if he wants to jumpin on that.
Joanna Royle (she/her) (27:26):
I think it's one of the fundamental
thing. I think it's aboutrelationships, but it's also
about understanding yourpathways. So it's the
relationships are absolutely thegroundwork, and having influence
is partly about putting thatgroundwork in before you, before
(27:46):
you know how you want to haveinfluence, being in the spaces,
being encouraging, beingpositive about what other people
are doing. But it's also you'renot going to get anything done
if you don't know what kinds ofwho's going to make that
decision? Where are those? Whereare those points of power and
decision making, and what is thejourney to them? What kinds of
(28:09):
evidence do the people that canmake decisions need? What do
they value? How does this fitinto bigger strategic alignment?
So I think you need your peopleabsolutely baseline, but you
also need to understand yourpathways and understand your
route into those pathways. Icertainly speak to, as you said,
(28:29):
a lot of people, perhaps don'tfeel like they have influence.
And when I speak to researcherson your leadership programs, and
we do, we do a Covey circle orsomething like that, and and you
have quite complex and difficultconversations about their sense
that they don't have thatinfluence themselves, because
perhaps they're thinking, Well,I am going to be the one that
(28:52):
addresses precarity in thesector. Well, I can't do that.
No, you can't, personally, onyour own. No one. But what are
your pathways to influence? Whoare your people that can go to
the committees, and what do theyneed? Yeah, so I think it's
about people. I also think it'sabout pathways.
Sarah McLusky (29:11):
Yeah, I think knowing those places with the
you know, how it fits into thebigger picture, and certainly
that's something that's reallyimportant for the work that you
do, or isn't it, is knowingwhat's the vision, what's the
the goal?
Orla Kelly (29:22):
Yeah, I spinning on some of the things you've
already said. Joanna, I thinkit's really important to put,
put yourself in that person'sshoes, and understand where
their pressures are and wherethe opportunities are and and
take it from from theirperspective. Because you should
not assume that people know whyyou're doing this thing, or know
(29:42):
your background, or know, knowthe context, and so putting
yourself in other people'sshoes, it just come to mind. I
work at I work a lot withsomeone called Ross Tuffee,
Sarah, and you know Ross, orknow of Ross, when
Entrepreneurial Campus Blueprintwas published by Scottish
Government a few years ago, andit was quite naive in its
(30:05):
thinking, certainly in terms of,you know, we need to transform
the curriculum, and we need toembed enterprise in the
curriculum. Sounds great onpaper, right? Wonderful. This is
going to be brilliant for ourstudents, brilliant for society,
brilliant for our economy, butthe reality of of getting your
(30:26):
program director in, in the theSchool of History, or whatever,
to recognize the need to embedenterprise in the curriculum, I
mean, it's just it, you knowthat so, so you're so right,
Joanna, about the the pathways,and making sure that that you're
communicating in the languagethat people understand, and that
that you recognize the thechallenging environment that
(30:49):
we're all working in, and we allhave different pressures. So,
yeah, put yourself in otherpeople's shoes, I think is, is,
and don't make assumptions.
Sarah McLusky (31:00):
Yeah.
Orla Kelly (31:00):
Do you know problem 101? Right? This is, this is,
this is how I see it. How do yousee it? Right? That should be
the start of every conversation.If you're trying to influence
people.
Sarah McLusky (31:10):
Yeah, I'm and I think it's that as well that
you, you said earlier, Joanna,it's that kind of, what's in it,
for me is helping people tounderstand, you know, this
change, this report, thisproject, you know, whatever it
is, why is that going to beimportant to me? Why is this
something that I have to do? Andthat's where all that
(31:31):
relationship building,identifying the pathways, the
routes and things like that,comes in, also that that what's
in it for me as well, is reallyimportant when it comes to
influencing up, isn't it?Joanna, influencing people who
are maybe in more seniorpositions, or who are in the
position to actually make someof the decisions about things.
(31:55):
And I liked the some of thethings you said about, you know,
making it easy for them. Youknow, being clear, but then also
making it easy. Any otherthoughts about what can help if
you're influencing, trying toinfluence, somebody who is in a
more senior position, inwhatever way that might find
(32:16):
itself.
Joanna Royle (she/her) (32:17):
I think adjusting your comms style so
learning to write a really well,tight, well constructed email
that prefaces the things theyneed to do. I certainly have
some slightly embarrassingexamples from the start of my
career as a researcherdeveloper, where I presented
(32:38):
Deans with all the things, allthe information, absolutely
everything. And they reallyweren't getting through it. I
was having to send too long,didn't read follows ups, so
learning how to really get tothe heart of what they need to
know, not the things that areworrying you, not, oh my
goodness, my administratorsspending forever on this. Or I
(32:58):
need to work out the cateringfor that at what or I can't work
out how it's going to work likesuch and such. Those details are
not important to them, becausethat's not their agenda. What
they need to know sounderstanding how to communicate
what they need to know thingsaround. How is this
strategically aligned? What doesit cost? How is it going to have
(33:19):
a ripple effect on other teams?How is it going to accomplish
goals that they have? And so notonly in emails, also in reports
that you can send so people canpre read, also in conversations
that you have, those kinds ofconversations take a lot more
(33:39):
well for me, take a lot moreplanning. You know that classic
quote, is it? I can't rememberwho it is. I didn't, I didn't
have time to write a shortarticle, so I wrote a long one.
Yeah, who was that?
Sarah McLusky (33:53):
I'll see if I can find it. I'll put it in the in
the show notes, yeah,
Joanna Royle (she/her) (34:00):
influencing up. It's really a part of it,
for me, is about communicatingin a way that they're going to
have capacity to hear.
Sarah McLusky (34:10):
Yeah, yeah. And it's still part of that, as you
said, or putting yourself inother people's shoes, isn't it?
Orla Kelly (34:16):
Yeah, I 100% agree with what Joanna just said, I've
engaged with a few universitywide committees before, you
know, Pan Scotland committees.And you see, every so often
there'll be someone that comesand says, Oh, this is, this is a
thing, asks the question, Canyou respond to me with feedback
(34:39):
in within two weeks? And thenthey get three responses, you
know? And so, and actually whatyou need to go in is actually be
more solution focused, yeah, andgo in and say, this is, this is
what I'm going to do, unless youtell me not to. And you're,
you're not, you're not causing,you're not causing problems.
(35:00):
Rooms are giving people work.You are. You are being strategic
with how you're going to to makethis thing happen for the
benefit of whoever's in theroom. And this is the process to
do it if you feel differentlyand want to contribute, come,
come join the party. Otherwiseit's going to happen. And having
that kind of more proactiveapproach to but, but you need
(35:20):
to, you need to make sure thatit's the right room that you can
go in and be as bold as thatright so reading the room and
understanding who your audienceis is really important. And you
can't be a newbie and talkedabout those building
relationships. You can't be veryfresh faced and go in very bold
without people having that faiththat you can deliver what you
(35:45):
say you're going to deliver. Sobut really complex reading the
room is really important.
Sarah McLusky (35:50):
Yeah, I can definitely resonate with that.
And once going into situationwhere I didn't know the
backstory, and going in, yeah,very confidently with all the
things I was going to do, andthen it totally backfired, and
it took months to sort out. Soyes, I've been there. We've all
had our influencing failuresalong the way.
Joanna Royle (she/her) (36:07):
And I think there's also in that isn't
there, is sometimes you'reinfluencing, is finding the
person who does already have thevoice in the room, that you
trust, that you that you can geton board. So you're influencing
the person that's going to dothe influencing, who can be that
bold, and also strategicallymaking sure you're in the room
(36:27):
next to the person so you'rerecognizable. And of course,
they are necessarily then goingto say, Joanna's done this work,
or Orla's done this work. Sothey are, you said advocacy
earlier, they are advocating foryour work. So there is also
journey pieces around. And Ithink that's where the the
(36:50):
people in the pathways kind ofintersect a little bit, and then
gradually you become therecognized face, the go to
expert, the collegiate person,the voice in the room that I was
talking about at the start, andthen, and then, ultimately, you
can rock up to those spaces withthat boldness. I think a lot of
what we're talking about herewith influencing, though it's,
(37:11):
it's starting to sound like avery long journey.
Sarah McLusky (37:15):
I think, Well, I think it can be or or not. I
think it depends on thesituation, doesn't it, and and
the scale of the change thatyou're trying to bring about.
But yeah, I think, well, that'smaking it sound like a very long
journey. I don't know. Do eitherof you have examples of where
just a tiny little thing hasmade a big difference that's
(37:36):
putting you on the spot a littlebit, so don't worry. If not,
Unknown (37:39):
I'm not sure. I'll think about that, but I will say
that that we've already kind oftouched on it. We are all
influencers, whether we identifyas one or not, and so and so,
recognizing those levers that wedo pull, that we are we're doing
all the time.
Sarah McLusky (37:54):
Yeah, yeah.
Joanna Royle (she/her) (37:55):
It's not really an answer to your
Sarah McLusky (37:56):
Yeah. And that's and, I mean, it's a hugely
question, Sarah, but I thinkthere are ways of fast tracking
that visibility and make sure,making sure that your expertise
is surfaced with pieces of workthat you you already hold. But
powerful technique that I'veused myself, and I've seen work
actually, you don't have to doany influencing with at all,
really. They're your job. Buthow do you then get them into
(38:17):
the spaces I'm thinking rightnow, in my case of the
University of Glasgow's TalentLab, for example, that's a very
big piece of work that sits inmy purview. It's all our
really well when you just youcome with the solution, not the
leadership programs across ourfull research ecosystem, and
it's just literally my job tomake it happen. But the
influencing has been making surethat reports are going to key
(38:40):
committees, that key people havetheir or maybe not committees,
but, you know, groups of deansor whoever we're just saying,
problem, but also what you'retalking about there. Brings us
Oh, by the way, this is the,this lovely thing that we're
doing for you, and we'veevaluated, and it's really, it's
really cool. And so you aresocializing the expectation that
you're someone that does useful,good, impactful things. So then
(39:03):
when you rock up and say, I wantto do this, you've also, you've
right back to the beginning ofour conversation. It's probably
done that pre trust building,yeah, and, and it can have knock
on effects. So I didn't, I didall of that, making sure my
expertise is surface. And maybeat that point we're starting to
be a bit showy, offy, maybe itsounds a little bit Instagram
a nice place to kind of wrapthings up is when we talked
now in a work context, but thenactually, at the moment, we are
(39:27):
going through a review of ourstrategic environment and having
those numbers to hand and meable to talk about them is
something that I'm now seeing.Oh, those numbers have rocked up
in that report or this report,or they're being kind of
about the sense of being anauthority on something, even if
socialized in other spaces. Doesthat actually? Is that about me
having influence to solve aproblem? No, absolutely not. I'm
(39:51):
not well, I am, but only my ownproblem. It's my, literally, my
job, but that recognizable faceof having done a thing means
you are not in a position ofauthority, and you're talking
that I'm much more confidentwhen I then go in and say, I
want this other tiny thing. Andin fact, I quite literally just
did that. Another boring IT onerecently, I went to a senior
committee and said, Can we movethis information from this, it
(40:14):
system to that, it systemexcruciatingly dull. These are
there about how you candemonstrate over your kind of
my four reasons. Is that allright? And I just got a complete
green light. And being, havingdone that kind of groundwork
that my expertise would be x, Iwould be expected to come with a
sensible suggestion. And I lovedwhat Orla said, actually, about
track record and your visibilityin an organization, and the
not learning to goodness me,this is taken me time learning
(40:38):
to not invite contributions andbut instead, be like, here's the
problem, here's three solutions.Here's the first solution that I
think's the best one. Here'swhat I'm going to do, unless you
things that you do and how youshow up for work every day, is
tell me otherwise. Here are theother options. Like, you're you
can look at them. I'm notexcluding you from you are the
(40:58):
decision makers. I'm notexcluding you from the
information. But actually, ifreally you just want someone to
do the thing, here's the thing,I'll pop off and do it shall I?
building that sense of authoritythat you are the authority in
Yeah. So that's, I suppose,that's where I'm talking about
the long journey. Is the, is thetrust building, because then you
can do little things quite quick,
(41:28):
this thing, so that when youneed something, you're You're in
a prime position to get it .Orla any final thoughts from you
Orla Kelly (42:06):
I see, I see this conversation relating really
strongly with your otherepisodes in this series Sarah I
know
Sarah McLusky (42:15):
It's like I planned it,
Orla Kelly (42:19):
but, but the whole because we're working in the in
these quite everyone talks aboutuniversities moving slow, but,
but there is quite a dynamicenvironment, right? Things are
changing all the time, and soyou have a you have an episode
on navigating change. You havean an episode on networking.
This is so important. We'retalking about identifying those
people if you're if you're not,the person that holds the keys,
(42:41):
who does hold the keys, right?And how? How do we build up
those personal and professionalnetworks to our advantage? And
and imposter syndrome, Joannaand I both entered this, and we
are, we are not authorities oninfluencing people, but we do do
it all the time. So, yeah, Ithink I, I think having more
(43:04):
confidence in the role that wedo play, no matter what size of
cog we are in the machine thatwe we are making things move and
recognizing where, where wewe're doing that, I think, is
really important.
Sarah McLusky (43:18):
Yeah, we definitely are making things
move without question. I thinkthat the whole wheels of the
Higher Education train wouldfall off if it wasn't for all
the research adjacentprofessionals out there. Well,
just to wrap up ourconversation, if people want to
get in touch with you, connectwith you is there a social media
(43:38):
place or somewhere that you hangout that's a good place to find
you? Orla?
Orla Kelly (43:43):
Yeah, I'm on I'm on LinkedIn. I like LinkedIn.
LinkedIn is really good.
Sarah McLusky (43:48):
Yeah, you're go to your place. Joanna, do you
hang out anywhere online?
Joanna Royle (she/her) (43:55):
Dabble in LinkedIn. I'm not. Perhaps
there very reliably and andabsolutely do just reach out by
email. I'm very findable on theUniversity of Glasgow website.
Orla Kelly (44:06):
Fantastic I'll put links to those in the show
notes. And so yeah, thank you somuch, both of you for coming
along and just sharing what youdo and the difference that you
make. And I think that's theimportant thing. Thank you.
Thank you
Joanna Royle (she/her) (44:20):
Thank you very much for having us.
Sarah, it's been really fun.
Sarah McLusky (44:27):
Thanks for listening to Research Adjacent.
If you're listening in a podcastapp, please check your
subscribed and then use thelinks in the episode description
to find full show notes andfollow the podcast on LinkedIn
or Instagram. You can also findall the links and other episodes
at www.researchadjacent.com.Research Adjacent is presented
(44:48):
and produced by Sarah McLusky,and the theme music is by Lemon
Music Studios on Pixabay. Andyou, yes you, get a big gold
star for listening right to theend. See you next time.
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