May 9, 2024 • 58 mins
What's up, Plant People?? It's our first Deep Dive episode in quite a while. I was super excited to get to talk to my friend, Dr. Erica Irlbeck, again on the show. Erica is a Professor of Ag Communications, the Associate Dean of Outreach and Engagement for the Davis College of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources at Texas Tech, and the author of the Crisis Communication Guide for Agriculture, Food, and Natural Resources. We talked about everything from good communication, to working with the media, to life in academia, and so much more. It was a fun and insightful conversation, and I know you're going to get a lot out of it! Get in contact with Erica and pick up a copy of her book from the links below!
Erica's Faculty Page
Erica's Instagram
The Crisis Communications Guide for Agriculture, Food, and Natural Resources
As always, thanks so much for listening! Subscribe, rate, and review Planthropology on your favorite podcast app. It helps the show keep growing and reaching more people! As a bonus, if you review Planthropology on Apple Podcasts or Podchaser and send me a screenshot of it, I'll send you an awesome sticker pack!
Planthropology is written, hosted, and produced by Vikram Baliga. Our theme song is "If You Want to Love Me, Babe, by the talented and award-winning composer, Nick Scout. Midroll tunes are by Rooey.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
What is up?
Plant people it's time onceagain for the Plantthropology
podcast, the show where we diveinto the lives and careers of
some very cool plant people tofigure out why they do what they
do and what keeps them comingback for more.
I'm your host and humble guidein this journey through the
greenest of the sciences, vikramBaliga, and, as always, my dear
friends, I am so excited to bewith you today.
Y'all, this is the first deepdive episode we've done in quite
(00:23):
a while and if you've beenaround for a minute, you'll know
that every now and then I'llbring a guest back to really
really go into what they study,what they do, a new project they
have.
And my guest today for thisdeep dive episode is Dr Erica
Erlbeck.
She is a friend in the DavisCollege you may have heard her
in the way back when, like inthe first 10 episodes of the
(00:44):
show ever somewhere and sherecently wrote a book called the
Crisis Communication Guide forAgriculture, food and Natural
Resources.
And she is also our new DavisCollege Associate Dean for
Outreach and Engagement.
So I've talked about this alittle bit before, I think, on
the show, but our college hasdone this cool thing where we're
actually prioritizing outreachand engaging with the community,
(01:05):
and that is the best.
And as we were going throughthe process of finding someone
for it, like there's few peopleI can think of who are a better
fit for a job like this and astronger leader in a space like
this than Erica.
And we talked about everythingfrom how do you communicate
after a hailstorm if you work ina greenhouse, to what should
(01:25):
your social media strategy beand how do you work with the
local news media All kinds ofgood stuff.
We talk about her teaching, wetalk about her thoughts on the
future of communication and justhad a really fun conversation,
a really, really, really funconversation.
Erica's great, she's a goodfriend, she's an excellent
person and I think you're reallygoing to learn a lot, not just
(01:49):
about communicating inagriculture that may not be
anything close to what you dobut just communicating more
effectively in general, because,again, erica literally did
write the book on this.
A quick note before we get intothis episode.
I did have a couple oftechnical problems with the
sound at the very beginning, sothe sounds a little strange in
the first like five and a halfminutes or so of the episode,
but the content is really good,so I don't want you to skip it,
(02:10):
so just bear with it, it'll befine.
It's not that bad.
It's very listenable, but itimproves a lot after the first
five minutes or so.
So that was my fault.
I made an oops, but I've mostlyfixed it.
Anyway, I just wanted you to beaware of that, and so, without
any further yammering for me,get yourself ready for episode
107 of Planthropology, a deepdive into crisis communications
(02:38):
in agriculture with Dr EricaEarlbeck.
Well, erica, thanks for comingin and talking to me again.
(02:59):
Thank you for having me After awhile it's.
We've been, for those of youout there listening.
We've been trying to coordinatethis for like six weeks maybe,
and one of us has been sick, Ithink, every time.
Speaker 2 (03:11):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (03:12):
Or something.
Speaker 2 (03:13):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, so glad to be here.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
Yeah, glad to be here without some sort of illness.
Well, and I was looking earlier.
You've been on the show before,but it was like I don't
remember when maybe 2021?
.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
I know that I did it.
I was sitting in my recliner.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
So it was COVID era.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
So because, yeah, I remember sitting in the recliner
Gosh that was a long time ago,yeah it was.
Speaker 1 (03:40):
It's hard to believe sometimes that I've been doing
this for that long.
I guess I started in 2019 andthat just kind of blows by.
Yeah, it does.
It's been like one long daysince then.
Speaker 2 (03:51):
It applies when you're having fun, yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
I think, so that's good.
So I wanted to have you back onfor a couple of reasons.
You've got a new role in ourcollege which I want to talk
about, but also you published abook recently which I also want
to talk about, and that'sactually like as far as deep
diving into content.
I'd like to spend some timetalking about the book and
crisis communication, and thatfeels like it's really important
(04:15):
right now.
Yeah, yeah, I would love to,Just in general.
So first off, I guess to start,if you don't mind, just kind of
reintroducing yourself and talkabout you know what you do and
how you got there a little bit.
Speaker 2 (04:27):
Sure, yeah.
So my name is Erica Ehrlbeck.
I'm the Associate Dean forOutreach and Engagement for the
Davis College of AgriculturalSciences and Natural Resources.
I'm also a professor ofAgricultural Communications here
at Texas Tech University.
I started in the associate deanrole on October 1st, so I have
not even done a year yet in thisrole.
(04:48):
My background comes inbroadcast journalism,
particularly farm broadcasting,so I worked for Ag Day
Television, I worked in Lubbockfor KLBK and then I've been at
Texas Tech, for it'll be 18years in June of 2021.
Wow, yeah, so that includesgrad school, but still I've been
at Texas Tech, for it'll be 18years in June of 2021.
Wow, yeah, yeah, so thatincludes grad school, but still
I've been at Texas Tech forquite a while.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
And yeah, loved every minute of it.
Speaker 1 (05:11):
Well, that's good, yeah, yeah, it's nice, I think,
being able to find somewhere,and I guess my experience is
sort of similar, like I did mymaster's here and my PhD here,
so I've been like haunting thisplace for a little while, but
it's kind of nice to findsomewhere and land somewhere
that you like, actually like,and just get to be there.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
Yes, yes exactly.
You know, it's funny because alot of people will talk about
how Lubbock is a small town.
I'm like, well, maybe, but Imean there's four Walmarts and
two markets in a mall.
I don't know what's so smallabout that.
I grew up in a little big townin Oklahoma.
We had to drive 25 miles toWalmart.
Speaker 1 (05:45):
Oh.
Speaker 2 (05:46):
Yeah, so, lubbock, seems I have everything I need
here and I like it here.
I like the people here, so wechoose to raise our kid here.
We're yeah, we're very happybeing here and we love the
university.
Speaker 1 (05:57):
That's awesome.
Lubbock's a weird like big,small town it is.
It's, and for folks that havenever been through here it's
kind of hard Cause we have like300,000 people here Like it's
not a small town but it feels insome way which I like I
appreciate that I've lived heremy whole life, or most of my
life, and on and off and like Ikeep coming back.
(06:21):
There's something about thisplace that like I just I really
enjoy.
So your new role, associateDean of Outreach and Engagement
with, by the way, all of y'all'sRob Cox was in here a couple of
weeks ago and y'all's titlesare so long To take your whole
door up to put your title on it.
Welcome to academia.
Speaker 2 (06:40):
That's what we do.
Speaker 1 (06:42):
Long titles.
So what all does that entail?
I know it's a new role, it's anew position in general in the
college.
So sort of two questions hereLike what, what does that mean
to begin with and kind of, whatdo you envision for it?
Speaker 2 (06:57):
Right, right, yeah, so it is a new role and there's
not very many other associatedeans for outreach and
engagement across the Texas Techcampus, so I am kind of
creating it as I go along.
But what that is so we canbreak it down into outreach and
engagement.
So if we look at outreachoutreach is the way that I would
(07:20):
describe it is anything thatpromotes the Davis College in a
positive way.
So that could be promoting ourscience in various ways.
So doing podcasts, any kind ofmedia, interviews, any kind of
social media, anything thatinvolves marketing and beyond.
So doing camps in the summer orjust being a guest speaker in a
(07:46):
classroom, or anything whereyou are reaching out into the
broader community.
We can define community anynumber of ways.
Speaker 1 (07:52):
Sure.
Speaker 2 (07:53):
And I've told people when I've gone around and spoken
to the different departments.
I'm like if you don't enjoybeing around kids, then your
outreach does not have toinvolve kids at all.
Or if that is your happy place,then by all means focus all of
your outreach efforts towardkids.
So you know our community canbe anything.
So you know we can look at thebroader agriculture community,
(08:16):
we can look at just the Lubbockcommunity, the Panhandle, south
Plains, texas.
So that can be anything For alot of times with engagement.
It can involve our teaching,where we're getting our students
involved with some sort ofcommunity group in a way that
helps our students learn better.
Or we can create some sort ofan engaged research project
(08:37):
where we're working with acommunity partner in some way.
There's usually some sort of acommunity partner involved with
engagement.
So we're working together andit's a mutually beneficial
relationship.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
Okay, no, I think that's a good summary, because I
think, at least in my mind, andagain because it's new and it's
something that I've done.
Speaker 2 (08:57):
Yeah, it's something that I've done.
Yeah, oh yeah.
Yeah, it's something I do.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
But in my mind that's been one thing and I think the
distinction between the two isactually important because it
lets us in a lot of ways focusin on the ways we do our
communication, we do ourprogramming, we do our
partnerships and those kinds ofthings.
Speaker 2 (09:18):
Yeah, yeah, exactly, and you know there are some
people that never do engagementand that's okay.
There are some people that theydon't like the outreach, but
they love getting their studentsinvolved in the community.
They like having theirclassroom involved in another
classroom like a high schoolclassroom or an element.
And those are all great.
So, yeah, so my job is to helpmake these things happen and
(09:40):
just to help just increase ourpresence, increase our footprint
in the greater community,whatever community looks like in
that situation.
That's cool.
Speaker 1 (09:51):
Yeah, I really like that and it it says a lot, I
think, about our college anduniversity that these are the
kinds of things we're startingto try to prioritize a little
bit to put some effort into,because I guess at the provost
level too, they're focusing onthat a little bit more too.
Speaker 2 (10:07):
Very much so yeah.
Speaker 1 (10:09):
I have long felt, like in academia, that we have a
lot of work to do in closingthe feedback loop, so to speak,
with the research and everythingelse with the public, and it's
just cool that like this isbecoming something that we value
, I think, as an institution.
Speaker 2 (10:25):
Yeah, yeah, exactly.
And yeah, we just hired a viceprovost for outreach and
engagement, so there's somebodyat the university level that is
doing this as well, right?
So yeah, this is somethingthat's very important to Texas
Tech.
It's part of our strategic plan, yeah, so yeah, you will start
(10:45):
seeing Texas Tech a lot more.
You'll start seeing DavisCollege a lot more and there's
lots of audiences.
You know we helped.
We did an event yesterday.
Yesterday was National Ag Day,so we did an event yesterday.
Yesterday was national ag day,um, so we did an event on campus
and that was something toengage our students, but also
engage the the campus community,just to let them know.
(11:05):
Like you know, agriculture isthe backbone of this economy.
It was the basis for thiscampus and you know we're just
here to celebrate it and say hi,we're here and have it, have a
free donut and uh yeah, andenjoy this beautiful first day
of spring.
Speaker 1 (11:20):
And so yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:21):
So that was a fun, just a nice little outreach
event to our little communityright here.
Yeah, that's cool and it hasbeen beautiful outside by the
way, I know this is why we livehere.
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
It's funny when folks come visit this is sort of an
aside, like I always think a lotabout, like when new faculty
from out of town come to visitor they're, you know, here
interviewing.
They always end up being likeat weird times.
Oh yeah yeah, Like it's blowing70 miles per hour or it's two
degrees outside, yeah, whengenerally most of the time it's
pretty pleasant.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
Yeah, yeah, it is yes .
Speaker 1 (11:54):
But yeah, that's always a challenge, just the
weather here.
But again it's been beautiful,it's been spring for a while it
feels like it has been yeah,yeah.
Which is nice.
So with that, with your newposition, with your new role and
everything that comes with that, what does that mean for you in
terms of your professorship andin terms of your teaching and
(12:17):
research and all that?
Speaker 2 (12:22):
Have you had to give a lot of that up?
Yeah, I have, and that's.
You know, with everything andwith growth there's some give
and take.
So in the spring semester I'mnot teaching in the classroom
but I am still supervising ourAg Comm internship program.
So I do still feel connected tothe students in some way.
You know.
But I was at a convention inHouston and saw a.
I could tell she was a studentand you know she had on a tech
(12:43):
sticker or something and so Iwas like I think she's one of
ours and looked at her.
I'm like you're in theinternship class.
I'd never seen the studentbefore in my life, but I
recognized her name and.
I'm like, oh, I am yourprofessor, so so, yeah, so I
don't get that face-to-faceinteraction with them very much,
but I am still interacting withthe students some, and it's
(13:05):
also a good way for me tointeract with some potential
community partners as well.
So that's, and I just enjoydoing the internship piece of
our departmental curriculumanyway.
But yeah, at the moment theonly thing I'm scheduled to be
teaching is the risk and crisiscommunications class, and that's
offered in the falls.
(13:26):
So I have given up quite a bitof teaching.
Speaker 1 (13:28):
Yeah, yeah.
So I think that's interestingto think about too, because
there's always a trade off with,like, the things we do in
academia sometimes, like Irecently gave up my greenhouse
appointment, which is somethingI did for almost six years-
Right yeah.
And like there's days that Idon't miss being sweaty all day,
but it is like it is also nice,or it was nice to be able to
(13:50):
like walk out of my office andthere's plants and like I can
outside and stuff.
So there's always I don't know,it's our careers, I think, as
academics are interesting andthey're diverse, and I think you
know there are some like youngacademics that listen to this
podcast and I think that'ssomething that's interesting to
hear and probably good to hearis that like, in some ways,
you're not just like stuck inone thing, you always move into
(14:13):
other things, differentopportunities.
Speaker 2 (14:15):
Yeah, exactly Exactly .
And you know, like I said, I'vebeen at Texas Tech for 18 years
and I felt like I had done,seen and done pretty much
everything I could have done inthat role and I still enjoyed my
job.
But you know, it's good to beable to get to do something
different.
And but at the same time, likeearlier this week, some students
came by, like they happened tocatch me in my office and they
(14:37):
just needed a quick questionanswered about something.
And I was kind of like wait,don't go.
Wait, tell me about this.
What's happening across thestreet?
Wait, please don't go.
And they're like we have to getto class.
I'm like well, I don't.
Speaker 1 (14:52):
Not important, how about?
Speaker 2 (14:53):
you.
No, please don't go.
So you know it's funny whenthey left, I'm like you know,
because sometimes people willask do you miss it?
And in general, yes, you knowthere are.
You know, with every job thereare parts that you know I don't
miss grading, oh, so, yeah, yeah, so like that, that has been a
(15:15):
nice change.
But you know, I do very muchmiss that student interaction.
I miss being around youngpeople a lot, and so it was a
delight to have them in myoffice for just that short five
minutes.
Come back, come back, that's sofunny, that's so funny.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
Like can we make this a standing meeting?
Speaker 2 (15:34):
That's a week.
Speaker 1 (15:34):
Yeah, no, and I find that and I want to move on here
in just a second to talk aboutcrisis communication, I know,
with students until, like,everything was online for a
(15:56):
while and like our whole sort ofacademic like.
Like I like teaching students,I like talking to students and
hearing their ideas and theirthoughts, and that's so hard
sometimes at a distance.
It's not that it's impossible.
We do a good job of it, I think, in our college.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
But it's hard, it's a lot harder.
So, yeah, yeah, I do like beingin the classroom and you know,
I like, you know I like theirsilly stories.
I like telling them sillystories, I like hearing that
they're doing cool things intheir internships, I like
hearing that they've gotten ajob or that they have an
interview.
Yeah yeah, so yeah, it's fun.
(16:36):
It's fun to be around youngpeople and I am not young people
anymore.
Speaker 1 (16:41):
I'm not either.
You're younger than meno-transcript.
Speaker 2 (17:08):
I know, I do, yeah, yeah and I you know, when I
first started 18 years ago, Iwas just a few years older than
them.
Speaker 1 (17:11):
And now I'm not yeah no, it's, it's a weird
experience, sort of like on thisside of it, on this side of the
lectern, so to speak.
And, uh, one of my colleaguesand I talk a lot about how, you
know, when we work with our TAsfor our class, our teaching
assistants, they like we get toknow them for four or five years
and then they're gone and it'slike, oh, like my friend moved,
(17:33):
like it's weird.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
Yes, yes, that that is one thing that I don't like
about this job is that, like,yeah, they become your friends
and yeah, and then they leaveand they go on to do.
It is so fun to watch them goon to do great things, but, yeah
, but I miss my friend, yeah,and I've got lots of them that I
miss a lot.
So, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:55):
It's an interesting thing.
It's an interesting thing.
Well, I want to change gearsjust a little bit and talk a
little bit about your book,because that's such a cool thing
.
It just just first off likecongratulations on that, that's
super cool.
But then I want to talk.
You know, spend some timetalking about the subject matter
of your book and crisiscommunication and what that
(18:17):
means and, like you know, Idon't want you to give away all
your secrets on the podcast butbut like, what are tips that
people can put into theircommunication, cause we're all
communicators in some way.
Speaker 2 (18:28):
Sure, yeah, yeah, yes , and so so yeah to the.
The title of the book is thecrisis communications guide for
agriculture, food and NaturalResources, and I'll give you a
link and it's also available onAmazon, so yeah, and it's broken
into five units, or there'skind of five steps to crisis
(18:53):
communications and you know it's.
The first is like, first justidentifying and acknowledging
these are some areas that arevery likely to happen to our
organization, and yourorganization is whatever, so it
can be your farm.
It can be your academicdepartment, it can be your
university, so you know what.
(19:14):
What are those, what's theworst thing that could happen
and also what's the worst likelything that could happen.
So, yeah, and there's I've gotsome different formulas that
people can plug in, where youcan look at the magnitude of
something versus the likelihoodof something happening.
(19:35):
Yeah, yeah Versus the likelihoodof something happening, yeah,
yeah, so you know, and theexample that I use in the book
is like a plane crashing into abuilding, which it can happen,
but how likely.
And like that would be one ofthe worst things that could
happen is, yeah, a planecrashing into a building full of
people Right, but how likely.
Like, do we really need to havea crisis communications plan
(19:57):
for this plane falling into ourbuilding?
Speaker 1 (19:59):
Right.
Speaker 2 (19:59):
Probably not Okay, but we do need to have a plan
put in place for something badhappening, and so let's figure
out what that likely thing ishappening.
So, like for the greenhouse,like having some of the pan
pains shattered on thegreenhouse by a hailstorm, you
probably need to have a crisiscommunications plan for that.
(20:21):
If you don't, I'm happy to helpyou.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
Yeah, no, I appreciate that actually yeah.
Speaker 2 (20:26):
But I mean, that's something that's very likely to
happen.
Speaker 1 (20:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
Or just vandalism period.
That could happen.
So yeah, stuff is verybreakable over there.
Yeah, I mean it's an open spaceover there People can trip,
fall, get hurt, yeah yeah.
So those are some things.
So how, how would youcommunicate about that?
Who's your spokesperson?
Like that.
That's one of those tips that Ihave like decide and let this
(20:51):
person know.
So, and, and also, you need tohave more than one spokesperson
designated, because these thingshave a funny way of happening
when your spokesperson is on acruise or in Germany, or you
know they're just out of thecountry or not available.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (21:10):
So have some backup people designated, so those are
that's another big tip that Ihave.
Um, so, uh, so those are,that's another big tip that I
have.
And then also just kind of havesome, some statements decided
on how you're going to handlethat.
Um, so, yeah, so if you didhave this hailstorm, that that
happens, what, what would yousay, like what would be your
(21:32):
statement?
Um, you know how many times doyou think you might need to
utilize the media?
Would you need to use, like,mainstream media?
Would you need to use ag media,or would you just need to send
out a series of emails or justnotify your students?
Like which audiences would youneed to target for this likely
(21:52):
crisis?
Speaker 1 (21:53):
No, and that's such an interesting way to think
about that too, because I thinkoften and I'm thinking about my
own career right Like it tendsto be more like reactive right.
Oh no, my roof is gone rightLike it hailed yesterday and I
should have thought maybe theroof's gone.
And then I get there and theroof's gone.
It's like, oh, this is aproblem, right?
And I think it's so much harderto communicate clearly when
(22:17):
you're being reactive about itright.
Right, yes, yeah, and so I don'tknow that.
You know that may be somethingwe need to talk about, because
those things do happen.
You know, we had, we've hadbreak-ins, we've had x, y and z
and it's like, how do I talk tothe?
The audience thing I think isreally important, um, because
sometimes, like, not all news isfor everyone right, yeah, yeah
(22:39):
you know, like I don't, I don'tneed the the general public
knowing that a plant was knockedoff of a Right, but the
researcher who owns that plantneeds to know.
Speaker 2 (22:50):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (22:51):
So that's, that's really an interesting way to
think about that, yeah, and Iguess, like, how much does the I
don't know if this is even agood question, but it's a
question that's in my head, like, how much does the way we can
and we talked about audiencesand all that.
That's in my head, like howmuch does the way we can we
talked about audiences and allthat like does the severity of
the crisis, even if it is ageneral thing, like how much
(23:12):
does that?
Should that impact the way wethink about communicating about
it?
Speaker 2 (23:15):
I would think a lot right, yeah, yeah, it does, and
it which everything can besomebody's crisis, you know, so
it just kind of depends and youknow, sometimes when you look
back you're like, well, I reallywouldn't classify that as a
crisis, it was probably justmore of an issue.
Yeah, so you know, but that canbe kind of hindsight, but it
(23:42):
does a lot of.
It kind of depends on theseverity of it and and the
audience and the size of theaudience.
So sure you know, and, and youyou know, depending on the
crisis, um, you know, it couldbe something that if you didn't
get it communicated well, uh, inthe early phases of it, then it
(24:03):
can become an even biggercrisis yeah, yeah, that makes
sense so yeah, yeah.
So I'm trying to think.
Let's just say that there was aplant in the greenhouse that a
lot of people are allergic toand they all, you know, you all
forgot to put the signs on thispoison ivy plant that you're
doing research on, and a lot ofthe students in the lab touched
(24:25):
it and now we have this poisonivy outbreak.
Speaker 1 (24:27):
Right.
Speaker 2 (24:28):
You know, just you would probably just need to do a
series of emails and textmessages to those students, tell
them what to do and maybecontact their parents, maybe not
you know, just kind of gaugethe situation.
But if you didn't communicateabout that and you didn't tell
them what to do, then it becomesa bigger problem.
Speaker 1 (24:49):
Gotcha.
Speaker 2 (24:50):
And then you might have local news media involved.
Speaker 1 (24:53):
Yeah, yeah, that's always.
Like you know, I've worked withnews media quite a bit and
usually when they call, I'm like, oh cool, I would love to talk
to you.
But there are times that it'slike, oh, they're calling
because there's a problem and Iwould rather not have this
conversation today.
Speaker 2 (25:13):
And that leads me to another point in crisis
communications, A lot of timesyour communications for a crisis
happens when you're not in acrisis.
So building those relationshipswith local media is really,
really important to do.
And you know, here in the SouthPlains of Texas and just in the
(25:33):
ag world in general, we have agmedia.
So having relationships with agreporters is really really
important as well, Because ifyou do go into crisis mode, you
may need them to help you getinformation out.
Speaker 1 (25:45):
Sure.
Speaker 2 (25:47):
And that was very apparent with the fires that
have been happening in thepanhandle.
You know, ag media have beenvery and even mainstream media
as well.
They've been very good aboutgetting the message out about
how to donate to the fires, howto donate and what they need.
So those two things, I've seenthose two things happen very
well and I've even seen a littlebit of like here's what we
(26:08):
don't need.
So not it's been more of ahere's what we do need and
here's how.
But you know, having those,those groups help you out is
very, very important to do.
Speaker 1 (26:21):
Well, yeah, and I think you bring up a really
interesting point.
I think that, especially insome of our agricultural
communities, which often arevery kind of tight knit and but
it's a large community too,there's so many facets of it.
I like the thought of likerelationship building early, so
you have that network.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
Yes, exactly, yeah, yeah, and it's, and there's also
just the network building.
You said the magic word network, you know, having those people
around you that can help you ifyou are in a crisis, because
some of your crisiscommunications may not
necessarily involve the media ormobilized in some way, or you
(27:07):
may just need some buddies tocome help you do something.
Speaker 1 (27:10):
So yeah yeah.
Speaker 2 (27:10):
So having that group of friends, like maybe you just
need somebody to come answeremails for an hour for you.
You know, just somebody thatyou trust and yeah, yeah, that
can come handle that, orsomebody to go get lunch for you
.
Or you know just little thingslike that that can help you.
So having that network ofpeople that are in similar jobs
(27:33):
to yours that can help you outis really, really important.
Speaker 1 (27:38):
Well, that's you know .
That brings me to anotherinteresting thought that I don't
think I would have considereduntil you were just kind of
talking about it, that it's morethan the.
You know how do I put out apress release, how do I make
phone calls, how do I notifypeople?
It's who can get lunch, who canmake sure that people have
water and food and like thosekinds of things.
(28:01):
Those are, I think, things thatget overlooked sometimes when we
think about the way wecommunicate.
Like, do you have there was asocial media video going around
for a while like how many 3 amfriends do you have, right?
So like, if there's a crisis at3 am, who do you like?
Who could you call?
And I was thinking about that.
I've got a couple people Icould.
Probably, if they answer theirphone, they'd be mad, yeah.
Speaker 2 (28:27):
But they would help, right?
Yes, yes, like I know, I betteranswer if you're calling me at
3am.
Yeah, yeah, and that's that'sanother thing that I kind of
skipped over that part.
But yeah, part of your crisiscommunications plan is who does
what?
So who, who's your social mediaperson?
And you know, in a lot of ag orjust a lot of organizations,
and you know in a lot of ag orjust a lot of organizations
period, there's one personthat's the communicator.
(28:49):
Well, if you are trying tojuggle social media, mainstream
media answer phone calls, answeremails, answer Facebook
messages do all of these thingsat some point.
You can't do it all, so youneed some help.
So, when slash, if we go intocrisis mode, who manages social
(29:10):
media?
Who answers the phone?
Who answers email?
So who does what?
And I put this in the bookbecause I thought it was just.
I was like you know, this isactually very smart.
But one of our alums told us hewas like we even know who's
going to Sonic to get ourafternoon drinks and I was like,
yeah, that's brilliant.
No, it is.
Speaker 1 (29:30):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (29:30):
Cause, like when you're in that phase, like to
have your large diet Coke, easyon the ice, brought to you.
Um, is is really helpful andreally nice, and you know that
it's going to happen.
Speaker 1 (29:42):
Well, and then you think absolutely, and it's like
you have to think about how dopeople stay effective in a high
stress situation I forget to eat.
Like, if I'm like working andteaching all day and doing all
these kinds of things like, I'llskip lunch.
Speaker 2 (29:55):
Well, I don't do that .
I mean, it doesn't OK itdoesn't happen a lot.
Speaker 1 (30:00):
Let's, we'll be very honest.
It doesn't happen a lot, butthere's days that, like I'll
teach like up to like my classgets out at like 12, 30 and then
, if I have something rightafter that, some days I'm like
running to the next thing andlike if it's really hectic some
days I'm just like I have nottaken care of, like my basic
needs exactly and having thesonic guy yeah, yeah, to know
that it's going to be providedand brought to you and set on
(30:22):
your desk and said here eat thisor drink this.
Yes.
Speaker 2 (30:25):
Like you are in a very high stress situation.
Yeah, make sure that youhydrate, yeah, yeah, that's
really good to have that.
Speaker 1 (30:32):
That is.
That's really such an importantthing.
I'm glad you put that in thebook.
Speaker 2 (30:37):
Yeah, Cause that's really cool.
That's good advice.
Speaker 1 (30:38):
It is yes it is, um, so you were talking about, like,
who's your social media person?
Um, I want to talk about socialmedia a little bit, because
this is something we discussed alittle bit last time, like four
years ago.
Speaker 2 (30:52):
But the landscape has changed.
Oh, so much.
Speaker 1 (30:54):
For better and worse Right.
Speaker 2 (30:56):
A lot of ways.
Speaker 1 (30:58):
And I think we could all probably like go through the
list of botched social mediacommunication you know, but then
some that are done really well,like how important.
I don't know how to ask thisquestion again either, because I
know it's important, but like Ifeel like the role of social
media person now is such acritical make or break role in a
(31:21):
lot of situations Because likethere's no putting that lid back
on sometimes.
Speaker 2 (31:27):
No, yeah, yeah.
And once, once you get onsocial media, if you don't
consistently stay on socialmedia, if you're an organization
or business, company, whatever,um, you need to consistently
take care of that and managethat.
And uh, yeah tend to it tend toit like a garden and uh, yeah,
(31:49):
yeah, and when, when you'redoing good things on on there,
then good things will come backto you.
But having that audience builtis very good for for so many
different things but, it's.
It's also very good in a crisissituation, because if you have a
lot of followers following you,you then they know that they
can go there to get information.
(32:09):
And so yeah, so that's a goodthing.
That wasn't really where yourquestion was going, but I
redirected it.
Speaker 1 (32:16):
No, that's a good answer to my question.
I think that's the question Imeant to ask.
Speaker 2 (32:21):
It didn't, of course you did yeah.
Speaker 1 (32:27):
So no, you're're right, having that following is
important, because I do the samething, like if there's
something going on, like likethe news is not going to be up
to date right, but I can jump ontwitter, yes, or whatever, uh,
and see like, okay, has thisorganization posted an update,
like I've.
so an example of this is Ifollow the Texas storm chasers
(32:48):
on Twitter and Instagram andstuff and so like.
If there's bad weather, a lotof times I'll like have the news
on, but I'll pop on there tosee what they're putting out,
cause they put up like regularupdates during severe weather.
Speaker 2 (33:00):
And you don't have to wait for five, six or 10 for
local news to be on.
Yeah, and sometimes the you andsometimes the storms that
they're covering aren't in aplace that the Weather Channel
would grab and host.
So yeah, those are always goodones to follow.
And I want to give a shout outto the Canadian Record.
(33:22):
It's the newspaper in CanadianTexas.
They provided an excellentpublic service.
They were posting informationconstantly, and a lot of the
other small town newspapers weredoing the same as well.
I know quite a few people.
We've had a lot of studentsfrom Canadian, so that was just
(33:45):
the one that I went to and waschecking from time to time just
to see what was needed andthings like that, and they were
doing such a good job.
So you know that was.
You know, historically that's anewspaper.
But they were using Facebookand they may have been using
other social media sites as well.
But I was just looking atFacebook.
But they were using a differentmedium so that they didn't have
(34:06):
to wait for the paper to beprinted, and but they were
posting information, sometimesas soon as they heard it, so
like so-and-so needs this at theMethodist church?
Take, take it down there,please, or they need lunch at
the Methodist church, uh, youknow so, something like that.
I was like that is an excellentpublic service right there and a
good way to use social media.
Speaker 1 (34:26):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (34:27):
In a crisis.
Speaker 1 (34:28):
Well, and with all the struggles that like
especially the small townnewspaper, small town media
outlets in general are goingthrough right now, like it's
cool to hear that, yeah, theyserve a huge role, they serve a
huge purpose.
Speaker 2 (34:41):
Yeah, yeah, so yeah, they so kudos to the Canadian
record.
Speaker 1 (34:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (34:46):
I hope they're listening.
Shout out to you all so.
Speaker 1 (34:49):
Yeah, that's very cool.
Speaker 2 (34:50):
And and all of those panhandle papers.
So yeah, that's.
I can't think of the names ofthe other papers right now I'm
drawing a blank.
But yeah, I just remember thatone.
Speaker 1 (34:56):
So yeah, that's really interesting.
That's good to hear too, cause,yeah, I was in Houston during
not the whole fire, but you knowpart of it and family were
asking like what's going on withthat?
I'm like, well, I'm not there,I don't, yeah.
But yeah, some of those littleoutlets were like we're, you
know X percent contained.
This is who's, you know that's,you're right, that's really
(35:19):
such a good service.
Well, this seems like a greattime to take a quick break, so
we'll go to a quick mid-roll andtalk about some mid-roll things
and when we come back we willtalk more about crises and
communication.
Well, hey there, welcome to themid-roll.
I hope you're doing well andenjoying the episode so far.
Tell your houseplants I said hi.
(35:41):
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(36:03):
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(36:24):
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(37:28):
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Tell a friend, leave me arating and review, connect on
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Okay, bye.
Now I want to take a little bitof a step back and I'm curious
(37:53):
what sort of and I think you'veanswered some of this but like,
what made you want to write thisbook?
Like what was your, like,driving force behind it?
Because it's a lot of work,yeah, and you know, I know how
long that process is and allthat goes into it, and it's not
something I think any of usundertake lightly.
So what made you want to do?
Speaker 2 (38:13):
that it was one of those things that I had done
several research projects aboutrisk and crisis communications
and I just kind of felt like Ihad enough information to pull
it together and it was one ofthose things.
We were in Barnes and Noble oneday and my mom was like have
you ever thought about writing abook?
(38:34):
And I'm like I should.
She's like, well, what wouldyou write it on?
I'm like risk and crisiscommunications.
She's like okay, well then, youshould do that, okay, so, yeah,
so then I applied for a facultydevelopment leave, also known
as a sabbatical.
Speaker 1 (38:53):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (38:54):
And so I did that in the fall of 21.
Okay, and so that's when I didthe big heavy lifting on it.
And then Texas Tech has aprogram, the faculty writing
program, and you get togetherfor three hours a week and
you're just supposed to write.
You're not supposed to checkemails.
(39:15):
You're not supposed to eitherwrite or be reading for
something that you're writing.
And it can be a grant, it can bea book, it can be a journal
article but you're just supposedto write and so in three hour
increments at a time at a time,I got the book finished, wow,
yeah, yeah.
So it went to.
Oh, it was right about thistime last summer or last spring,
(39:40):
so probably last April was whenI had fully decided on the
press that I was using.
So it's a publisher out ofDetroit, they're called Xanadu
X-A-N-E-D-U.
I just they were just nice andI just liked them and they also
they specialized in not hugeruns of books.
(40:03):
I mean this is a niche within aniche.
Speaker 1 (40:06):
Risk and crisis in agriculture.
Speaker 2 (40:08):
So I knew I wasn't going to have just a huge
audience clamoring to buy mybook.
So, um, and another thing thatlike there wasn't a book for
risk and crisis in ag, I meanthere's plenty of risk and
crisis books out there, tons ofthem, but nothing that
specialized in the in the agworld and uh, so that that was
another factor, like the.
(40:28):
You know the book for my classwas fine.
You know the guy that wrote it,he was great and I'd used that
book for a long time and DrDorfurt taught me he used the
same author's book.
But I'm like, yeah, if we can,I feel like I can do something
that's a little more specializedfor the ag industry and so,
yeah, so moved forward with that.
(40:49):
It's cool.
Now it's printed, yeah, andthat's so exciting.
Yeah, it is exciting.
Speaker 1 (40:53):
And that's such a good feeling.
Speaker 2 (40:54):
Oh it is, it is yeah To get that box of books.
Speaker 1 (40:57):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (40:57):
Yeah, Scott took my picture.
Speaker 1 (40:59):
My husband took my picture when I opened the box.
Speaker 2 (41:01):
There's sheer joy on my face, so it's a cute picture.
Speaker 1 (41:04):
That's awesome, the culmination of so much work and
so many hours and the researchand the reading and the thinking
about it constantly.
Speaker 2 (41:15):
Yeah, there were days , or not days, but full mornings
that I typed nothing, I justhad to think.
I just needed to think so yeah,you might pick up a pen and
then do nothing.
Doodle for a while.
Speaker 1 (41:29):
No, I'm writing yeah, yeah.
I'm thinking, I've beenactively trying to talk myself
out of writing a textbook, um,and I think I've mostly gotten
myself there where I'm like Idon't need to do this but you
should write one see, becauseI'm in the space where I'm
teaching a new class in the falland I was looking at textbooks
and I was like there's a couple,it's not, they're not specific
(41:52):
enough.
I don't know, maybe eventuallywe'll see, we'll see.
I'll stick to kids, children'sbooks for a while.
Those are.
Speaker 2 (41:58):
Those are fun.
Those are more fun.
They are fun.
Yeah, yeah, and they're verygood.
Speaker 1 (42:03):
So that's, that's really interesting and I think I
kind of like the story of justyou know you should write a book
, Okay, Okay.
Speaker 2 (42:13):
Cool, I need to make sure that I take this snippet
and play it to my mom, Cause youknow there's it's not very
often that you know, especiallywhen you know she was parenting
me as a teenager and shesuggested something to me, it
was usually met with no, yeah,yeah, Okay.
Speaker 1 (42:28):
Yeah, okay, I think I will.
Speaker 2 (42:30):
That's funny.
Speaker 1 (42:38):
So I guess, as we sort of start to wind down a
little bit, I'm curious to hearwhat your thoughts are going
forward, as far as both you know, in terms of the crisis
communication piece and theclass you teach, but also just
in your role now.
Like, what do you think thefuture holds?
Do you see let me break thisdown into a couple of smaller
questions, because that's a bigquestion In this world of, like
(42:58):
crisis communication do youthink that the sort of the
things that we've done and theways we've done it like hold up,
just maybe move to differentplatforms?
Or do we, like, going forwardin the future, have to think
about, like as the landscapeevolves, how we communicate
about stuff?
Or do the tried and true likeprinciples for communication
(43:22):
just can we apply those todifferent like places fairly
easily?
Speaker 2 (43:26):
Yeah, yes, okay Great .
Speaker 1 (43:30):
And let me clarify that Sure.
Speaker 2 (43:31):
Yes, okay, great, and let me clarify that.
So, in communication period,crisis communications, everyday
communications, it doesn'tmatter.
If you are truthful, if you aretransparent, if you're doing
your best, if you are trying toget the information out with the
best of intentions, you're,you're halfway there.
(43:56):
You're more than halfway thereyou know and let me reiterate
again just tell the truth youknow, just tell the truth and
don't don't try to coveranything up.
And there are some situationswhere, um, there may be some
proprietary information,especially, like you know,
you're working in a researchgreenhouse.
There are some things that youcannot tell people Like it's
(44:16):
proprietary, it is research,it's patentable, you can't talk
about that.
So there are some things thatand you just need to disclose
that that's proprietaryinformation and I can't talk
about that.
But let me tell you what I cantalk about.
I will tell you as much as Ican tell you.
(44:36):
That doesn't change that?
doesn't change if you're writingin a newspaper, if you're
writing a letter or if you'reputting it out on TikTok or
wherever you're going.
Just tell the truth, be astransparent as you can be and do
so with the intention of I amtrying to help people get the
information that they need inthis moment.
As long as you're doing that,you again you're more than
halfway there.
(44:57):
So those core principles holdup and you know, going back to
what we have stood on in agcommunications for years, good
writing like.
There's no substitute for goodwriting.
Sometimes, in a crisis, you'rejust doing the best you can to
crank out the information Um andsometimes your writing is not
your best, um, but just do yourbest and, uh, you know, just do
(45:20):
your best and tell the truth and, um, you know, and try to write
as as, as best you can.
Um, so, so that's.
Those are really those coreprinciples.
Um, as the world has evolvedand everything, there's more
demands to get more informationout.
So 20 years ago we could waituntil 5 o'clock and get our
(45:45):
statement out at 5, 6, or 10when the news was going on the
air and we had a little bit oftime to get stuff together.
Now our audience is looking tosee did we put anything out on
Facebook, instagram, twitter orand the others, but also so is
the news.
Like the news is looking to seehave they put anything out on
(46:05):
on on Instagram right now?
Like what?
What's the statement?
So, like you, you do have towork a little bit faster to get
stuff put out there and theaudience will give you a little
bit of of grace.
You know just to to put stuffout there, but but you do need
to act quickly, but you don'twant to act reactively.
(46:28):
So you know you, you recognizethat you're in a crisis.
Give yourself a moment to gatheras much information as you can
and and craft your statement anddecide how it is you're going
to move forward and also decidewho's our audience in this and
how are we going to communicatewith them.
Speaker 1 (46:47):
So that's, yeah, no, that's great advice.
I think back to uh so when Ifirst started in extension,
which feels like a very longtime ago.
Uh, 2014, no yeah, I don'twhatever, whatever it was you
know, at one of our trainings wedid sort of that and I until I
(47:08):
it's interesting I hadn'tthought about this in a long
time, till I kind of hear youtalking about taking a moment to
collect your thoughts they hadus do this exercise where they
put us in like groups of threeor four and they had a bunch of
journalism students from A&Mthat were in this room like a
press corps, right, yeah, yeah.
And they gave us a little slipof paper with a prompt and they
(47:29):
said you have 10 minutes to puttogether a statement.
Speaker 2 (47:30):
Okay, little slip of paper with a prompt and they
said you have 10 minutes to puttogether a statement.
Speaker 1 (47:32):
Okay crap, yeah, yeah .
And they sent us out in thehall and they called us in like
one at a time, like to do apress conference over this thing
.
So mine was like I was, it waslike the clean water act or
something and it was.
It was they were random, likethey were just random things and
so we had to do like basicresearch and all of that and and
then like students firedquestions at us.
This was like a class thing forthem but a training thing.
(47:54):
It is shocking what, like, somepeople will say and do when
they're put on the spot, likesome of the things that came out
of some of these new agentsmouths.
I was like you can't, you can'tsay that, don't say that.
But but no, I think that whatyou were just talking about of
one being prepared, as preparedas possible- as prepared as you
(48:15):
can be.
But then also just likeoperating in good faith.
Speaker 2 (48:19):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (48:20):
Because there's so many people that don't do that
right now, right right, it'skind of refreshing.
Speaker 2 (48:24):
Yeah, yeah, and you know, just like you said.
So you know you're handedinformation and, okay, now you
have to do a press conference.
So, okay, I'm sorry I don'tknow the answer to that question
.
Let me get that information foryou.
But so many times when we'reput on the spot, we feel the
need to provide an answer andit's okay to say that you don't
(48:45):
know.
It is better to say you don'tknow, and I will get that
information to you, than to saysomething incorrect in in your
moment where you're put on thespot and yeah so.
So yeah, it is, it's okay tosay it's better to say I don't
know, let me get thatinformation for you than to to
be incorrect and then just havethat out there forever yeah, and
(49:07):
to have it out there forever.
Yes, yeah, there.
Yeah, there's Scott Pelley, whois a reporter for 60 Minutes.
He used to be the anchor of theCBS.
Speaker 1 (49:14):
Evening.
Speaker 2 (49:14):
News and a Texas Tech alum, oh cool.
Yeah, and Lubbock native.
He wrote a book several yearsago and I'm not going to have
the quote exactly right, but hehas a quote in his book and I
use it in one of my slideshows.
People will never remember thatyou were first, but they will
(49:35):
always remember that you werewrong.
So that's scary, I know I knowso, and he was saying this to
like.
He has a chapter called to ayoung journalist yeah and so you
know he's, you know, kind ofteaching young reporters.
Like you know, just remember,it's better to not be first on
the air or first online withinformation.
(49:57):
It's better to check yourinformation and make sure you,
you be sure that you're rightyeah and, and then post it yeah,
and I'm like that is excellentadvice, mr pelly it is, and
that's a scary sentence becauseI'm thinking.
Speaker 1 (50:11):
I'm thinking about, like, the implications of that
Right, you want to be first onthe scene, but if you're not, if
you're wrong, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (50:18):
And he goes on to tell some stories about how he
checked his information andother networks were on the air
saying that you know this washappening and he was like you
know.
I don't have a source toconfirm this and you know, I
don't have a source to confirmthis.
And you know he was gettingyelled at in his earpiece and
he's like you know, nobody'sconfirming this for me and I'm
not comfortable going on the airwith this and he didn't and his
(50:38):
producers were yelling at him.
He was like you can yell, butI'm not saying this.
So, yeah, good for you.
Fascinating.
Yeah, it is Fascinating it.
Speaker 1 (50:46):
Yeah, one more question I had and this kind of
is going back to an earlierconversation and talking about,
like you know, your work inoutreach and communications, and
you made an interesting point,a good point, earlier that, like
not everyone does outreach, noteveryone does engagement Not
everyone does, or, you know, wedo it in different facets.
I think that's maybe not ineveryone's skill set or just
(51:10):
desire, because it's a lot.
I'm this goofy guy that puts myface on the Internet all the
time because I like doing it but, like, that is certainly not
for everyone.
For, say, faculty members orpeople in academia that want to
tell better stories about theirresearch, that want to get that
out there but don't know how,like what resources are
(51:31):
available out there for those ofus that are like you know, I
would love to tell people aboutthis cool project I did, but I
don't know where to start.
Speaker 2 (51:40):
Yeah, yeah.
So if you're at Texas Tech,call me.
Yeah, I would love, and that'spart of my job.
So yeah, I would.
That's I love doing that.
I love helping faculty findways to get their research out
into the community, to finddifferent groups to partner with
, to broaden our scope and tobroaden the scope of the
(52:01):
students in their classroom.
So so that's one resource, butTexas Tech's Office of Outreach
and Engagement has a lot ofinformation on their website
that can help spark ideas.
Outreach and Engagement has alot of information on their
website that can help sparkideas.
There's several otheruniversities out there that have
lots of great information onoutreach and engagement.
Michigan State University has areally good website that I
(52:28):
would point somebody to thatoffers some really good ideas
for outreach and engagement.
And there's another nationalgroup, the Engaged Scholarship
Consortium, and they have somereally good ideas.
They have a conference.
I'll go to that one in October.
Speaker 1 (52:36):
Oh cool.
Speaker 2 (52:37):
Yeah, yeah.
So that's another good resourcethat's out there that can help
provide some ideas.
And then another thing, likeone thing that I would recommend
is just go back to that thingthat first sparked your interest
into what it is that you'redoing.
Was it a project that you didfor a science fair?
(52:57):
Was it something you did in 4-Hor FFA, or was it just a guest
speaker that came to yourclassroom?
What was that thing?
And then try to help kids orother adults find that thing or
maybe it was a speaker in one ofyour college classrooms and try
to emulate that and see if youcan help spark that interest and
(53:18):
spread the word about yourresearch in that way as well.
Speaker 1 (53:24):
That's awesome advice .
Yeah, I love the.
Remember why you're excitedabout it.
Yeah, because we lose thatsometimes.
Speaker 2 (53:33):
Yeah, we do.
Speaker 1 (53:33):
We do, I don't know, in the mess of all the stuff we
have to do, like I love that,because there's days that I just
need to go play with plants fora while and need to get my
hands dirty and work with theundergrads at the greenhouse and
stuff and that's yeah.
I really like that advice.
Speaker 2 (53:51):
Plant therapy is good for everybody.
Yeah, yeah yeah, I highlyrecommend that one too, yeah.
Speaker 1 (53:58):
Absolutely so.
One last question I have foryou.
This doesn't have to be justsince you're in your new role,
but just, you know, throughoutyour career do you have like and
I'm putting you on the spot alittle bit maybe Do you have a
favorite outreach activityyou've gotten to do?
Is there a program you did, ora seminar you gave, or something
(54:18):
?
What do you think your favoriteoutreach or engagement thing
has been?
And I didn't warn you aboutthis, so sorry.
Speaker 2 (54:26):
Well, okay, so the book has been my proudest.
Speaker 1 (54:30):
Okay, yeah, sure so.
Speaker 2 (54:31):
I'm proudest of that.
But something that has beenreally fun for me to do here
lately is it's a project thatI've been working on with a
friend of mine from church.
He works in sales at Channel 11, kcbd, the NBC station here in
Lubbock, and it's a segment thathe came up with.
It's called Champions inAgriculture and we feature kids
(54:54):
in 4-H or FFA and the projectsthat they're doing.
So I'm kind of the host of it.
That's awesome.
So I interview these kids thatare either working on a
livestock project, a weldingproject, an agri-science fair
project, and we get to talkabout what they're doing in 4-H
or FFA, and so this really hitson all the things that make me
(55:17):
happy.
So you know I was a 4-H-er, mykid's a 4-H-er, I'm a 4-H-er
leader.
I get to do my broadcast thingbecause I used to be a reporter
and also we get to, you know,promote area youth involved in
agricultural programs.
So that has been really fun forme to do and I think people are
(55:39):
seeing it because people willtell me that they've seen it on
TV.
Nobody has recognized merandomly yet.
But yeah, it's been really funand it's good to bring more
positive attention to these goodkids.
Yeah, that's so cool.
Yeah, and those are goodstories to tell, yeah.
Speaker 1 (55:52):
Yeah, it's been really fun and it's good to
bring more positive attention tothese good kids.
Speaker 2 (55:54):
Yeah, that's so cool, yeah, and those are good
stories to tell.
Yeah, yeah, yes, and they'resuch good kids and they deserve
to be featured.
Speaker 1 (56:00):
Very cool, yeah, very cool.
Well, erica, I appreciate yourtime and you coming in to talk
to me, yeah, and I'm excited tohave you in the position you're
in.
I think you bring a lot to thatand a lot of I don't know
energy and enthusiasm and justexperience to it that we need, I
think, as a college.
So it is I'm happy to have youin that role.
Speaker 2 (56:21):
for sure I'm happy to be here and looking forward to
all the things we get to do.
Speaker 1 (56:28):
Yeah, yeah, very cool , thank you.
Where can people find you realquick as we?
If you want to be found, youdon't have to want to be found.
Speaker 2 (56:34):
The easiest way to catch me is through email, Erika
E-R-I-C-A dot I-R-L-B-E-C-K atT-T-U dot E-D-U.
Or you could just look up theDavis College Dean's Office and
I'm listed on the personnel pagethere.
Email is the easiest way tocatch me.
I'm sometimes slow to answer,but I will answer.
Speaker 1 (56:53):
Awesome, yeah, awesome.
Well, very good, thank you somuch Thank you.
And for those of you out therelistening, plan your next crisis
communication and we'll talk toyou later.
Y'all, if you ever findyourself in a crisis, whether it
is agricultural or otherwise, Ihope you'll remember some of
the stuff that Erica talkedabout today, because I think,
(57:14):
just in terms of thinkingthrough things, having a plan
and just communicating, clearly,there's no one better that you
could learn from than her.
Thanks again, so much forcoming and talking to me, erica.
It was a blast and I alwaysenjoy getting to spend some time
with you.
Thanks to you, the listener,once more for being a part of it
.
Thanks to the Davis College andthe Department of Plant and
Soil Science here at Texas TechUniversity.
Thank you to the PodFix Networkfor letting me be a part of it.
(57:35):
There's great shows, greatcontent, and you should
definitely go check out PodFix.
You know I love you.
You know that I enjoy doingthis for you.
I hope you're still enjoying itand I hope that you'll tell me
if there's other things that Ican be doing to make this show
better.
Planthropology is written,hosted, produced all those other
(57:56):
fun things by me, vikram Baliga.
Our music is by the wonderful,award-winning composer, nicholas
Scout, and we are supported byyou, the listener, and by Texas
Tech University.
Keep being kind to one another.
If you have not, to this date,date been kind to the people
around you.
Maybe give it a shot.
It's a good way to be Keeplearning, keep being safe and
(58:17):
keep being a really cool plant.
Thank you.
What is up?
Plant people it's time onceagain for the Plantthropology
podcast, the show where we diveinto the lives and careers of
some very cool plant people tofigure out why they do what they
do and what keeps them comingback for more.
I'm your host and humble guidein this journey through the
greenest of the sciences, vikramBaliga, and, as always, my dear
friends, I am so excited to bewith you today.
Y'all, this is the first deepdive episode we've done in quite
(00:23):
a while and if you've beenaround for a minute, you'll know
that every now and then I'llbring a guest back to really
really go into what they study,what they do, a new project they
have.
And my guest today for thisdeep dive episode is Dr Erica
Erlbeck.
She is a friend in the DavisCollege you may have heard her
in the way back when, like inthe first 10 episodes of the
(00:44):
show ever somewhere and sherecently wrote a book called the
Crisis Communication Guide forAgriculture, food and Natural
Resources.
And she is also our new DavisCollege Associate Dean for
Outreach and Engagement.
So I've talked about this alittle bit before, I think, on
the show, but our college hasdone this cool thing where we're
actually prioritizing outreachand engaging with the community,
(01:05):
and that is the best.
And as we were going throughthe process of finding someone
for it, like there's few peopleI can think of who are a better
fit for a job like this and astronger leader in a space like
this than Erica.
And we talked about everythingfrom how do you communicate
after a hailstorm if you work ina greenhouse, to what should
(01:25):
your social media strategy beand how do you work with the
local news media All kinds ofgood stuff.
We talk about her teaching, wetalk about her thoughts on the
future of communication and justhad a really fun conversation,
a really, really, really funconversation.
Erica's great, she's a goodfriend, she's an excellent
person and I think you're reallygoing to learn a lot, not just
(01:49):
about communicating inagriculture that may not be
anything close to what you dobut just communicating more
effectively in general, because,again, erica literally did
write the book on this.
A quick note before we get intothis episode.
I did have a couple oftechnical problems with the
sound at the very beginning, sothe sounds a little strange in
the first like five and a halfminutes or so of the episode,
but the content is really good,so I don't want you to skip it,
(02:10):
so just bear with it, it'll befine.
It's not that bad.
It's very listenable, but itimproves a lot after the first
five minutes or so.
So that was my fault.
I made an oops, but I've mostlyfixed it.
Anyway, I just wanted you to beaware of that, and so, without
any further yammering for me,get yourself ready for episode
107 of Planthropology, a deepdive into crisis communications
(02:38):
in agriculture with Dr EricaEarlbeck.
Well, erica, thanks for comingin and talking to me again.
(02:59):
Thank you for having me After awhile it's.
We've been, for those of youout there listening.
We've been trying to coordinatethis for like six weeks maybe,
and one of us has been sick, Ithink, every time.
Speaker 2 (03:11):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (03:12):
Or something.
Speaker 2 (03:13):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, so glad to be here.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
Yeah, glad to be here without some sort of illness.
Well, and I was looking earlier.
You've been on the show before,but it was like I don't
remember when maybe 2021?
.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
I know that I did it.
I was sitting in my recliner.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
So it was COVID era.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
So because, yeah, I remember sitting in the recliner
Gosh that was a long time ago,yeah it was.
Speaker 1 (03:40):
It's hard to believe sometimes that I've been doing
this for that long.
I guess I started in 2019 andthat just kind of blows by.
Yeah, it does.
It's been like one long daysince then.
Speaker 2 (03:51):
It applies when you're having fun, yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
I think, so that's good.
So I wanted to have you back onfor a couple of reasons.
You've got a new role in ourcollege which I want to talk
about, but also you published abook recently which I also want
to talk about, and that'sactually like as far as deep
diving into content.
I'd like to spend some timetalking about the book and
crisis communication, and thatfeels like it's really important
(04:15):
right now.
Yeah, yeah, I would love to,Just in general.
So first off, I guess to start,if you don't mind, just kind of
reintroducing yourself and talkabout you know what you do and
how you got there a little bit.
Speaker 2 (04:27):
Sure, yeah.
So my name is Erica Ehrlbeck.
I'm the Associate Dean forOutreach and Engagement for the
Davis College of AgriculturalSciences and Natural Resources.
I'm also a professor ofAgricultural Communications here
at Texas Tech University.
I started in the associate deanrole on October 1st, so I have
not even done a year yet in thisrole.
(04:48):
My background comes inbroadcast journalism,
particularly farm broadcasting,so I worked for Ag Day
Television, I worked in Lubbockfor KLBK and then I've been at
Texas Tech, for it'll be 18years in June of 2021.
Wow, yeah, so that includesgrad school, but still I've been
at Texas Tech, for it'll be 18years in June of 2021.
Wow, yeah, yeah, so thatincludes grad school, but still
I've been at Texas Tech forquite a while.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
And yeah, loved every minute of it.
Speaker 1 (05:11):
Well, that's good, yeah, yeah, it's nice, I think,
being able to find somewhere,and I guess my experience is
sort of similar, like I did mymaster's here and my PhD here,
so I've been like haunting thisplace for a little while, but
it's kind of nice to findsomewhere and land somewhere
that you like, actually like,and just get to be there.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
Yes, yes exactly.
You know, it's funny because alot of people will talk about
how Lubbock is a small town.
I'm like, well, maybe, but Imean there's four Walmarts and
two markets in a mall.
I don't know what's so smallabout that.
I grew up in a little big townin Oklahoma.
We had to drive 25 miles toWalmart.
Speaker 1 (05:45):
Oh.
Speaker 2 (05:46):
Yeah, so, lubbock, seems I have everything I need
here and I like it here.
I like the people here, so wechoose to raise our kid here.
We're yeah, we're very happybeing here and we love the
university.
Speaker 1 (05:57):
That's awesome.
Lubbock's a weird like big,small town it is.
It's, and for folks that havenever been through here it's
kind of hard Cause we have like300,000 people here Like it's
not a small town but it feels insome way which I like I
appreciate that I've lived heremy whole life, or most of my
life, and on and off and like Ikeep coming back.
(06:21):
There's something about thisplace that like I just I really
enjoy.
So your new role, associateDean of Outreach and Engagement
with, by the way, all of y'all'sRob Cox was in here a couple of
weeks ago and y'all's titlesare so long To take your whole
door up to put your title on it.
Welcome to academia.
Speaker 2 (06:40):
That's what we do.
Speaker 1 (06:42):
Long titles.
So what all does that entail?
I know it's a new role, it's anew position in general in the
college.
So sort of two questions hereLike what, what does that mean
to begin with and kind of, whatdo you envision for it?
Speaker 2 (06:57):
Right, right, yeah, so it is a new role and there's
not very many other associatedeans for outreach and
engagement across the Texas Techcampus, so I am kind of
creating it as I go along.
But what that is so we canbreak it down into outreach and
engagement.
So if we look at outreachoutreach is the way that I would
(07:20):
describe it is anything thatpromotes the Davis College in a
positive way.
So that could be promoting ourscience in various ways.
So doing podcasts, any kind ofmedia, interviews, any kind of
social media, anything thatinvolves marketing and beyond.
So doing camps in the summer orjust being a guest speaker in a
(07:46):
classroom, or anything whereyou are reaching out into the
broader community.
We can define community anynumber of ways.
Speaker 1 (07:52):
Sure.
Speaker 2 (07:53):
And I've told people when I've gone around and spoken
to the different departments.
I'm like if you don't enjoybeing around kids, then your
outreach does not have toinvolve kids at all.
Or if that is your happy place,then by all means focus all of
your outreach efforts towardkids.
So you know our community canbe anything.
So you know we can look at thebroader agriculture community,
(08:16):
we can look at just the Lubbockcommunity, the Panhandle, south
Plains, texas.
So that can be anything For alot of times with engagement.
It can involve our teaching,where we're getting our students
involved with some sort ofcommunity group in a way that
helps our students learn better.
Or we can create some sort ofan engaged research project
(08:37):
where we're working with acommunity partner in some way.
There's usually some sort of acommunity partner involved with
engagement.
So we're working together andit's a mutually beneficial
relationship.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
Okay, no, I think that's a good summary, because I
think, at least in my mind, andagain because it's new and it's
something that I've done.
Speaker 2 (08:57):
Yeah, it's something that I've done.
Yeah, oh yeah.
Yeah, it's something I do.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
But in my mind that's been one thing and I think the
distinction between the two isactually important because it
lets us in a lot of ways focusin on the ways we do our
communication, we do ourprogramming, we do our
partnerships and those kinds ofthings.
Speaker 2 (09:18):
Yeah, yeah, exactly, and you know there are some
people that never do engagementand that's okay.
There are some people that theydon't like the outreach, but
they love getting their studentsinvolved in the community.
They like having theirclassroom involved in another
classroom like a high schoolclassroom or an element.
And those are all great.
So, yeah, so my job is to helpmake these things happen and
(09:40):
just to help just increase ourpresence, increase our footprint
in the greater community,whatever community looks like in
that situation.
That's cool.
Speaker 1 (09:51):
Yeah, I really like that and it it says a lot, I
think, about our college anduniversity that these are the
kinds of things we're startingto try to prioritize a little
bit to put some effort into,because I guess at the provost
level too, they're focusing onthat a little bit more too.
Speaker 2 (10:07):
Very much so yeah.
Speaker 1 (10:09):
I have long felt, like in academia, that we have a
lot of work to do in closingthe feedback loop, so to speak,
with the research and everythingelse with the public, and it's
just cool that like this isbecoming something that we value
, I think, as an institution.
Speaker 2 (10:25):
Yeah, yeah, exactly.
And yeah, we just hired a viceprovost for outreach and
engagement, so there's somebodyat the university level that is
doing this as well, right?
So yeah, this is somethingthat's very important to Texas
Tech.
It's part of our strategic plan, yeah, so yeah, you will start
(10:45):
seeing Texas Tech a lot more.
You'll start seeing DavisCollege a lot more and there's
lots of audiences.
You know we helped.
We did an event yesterday.
Yesterday was National Ag Day,so we did an event yesterday.
Yesterday was national ag day,um, so we did an event on campus
and that was something toengage our students, but also
engage the the campus community,just to let them know.
(11:05):
Like you know, agriculture isthe backbone of this economy.
It was the basis for thiscampus and you know we're just
here to celebrate it and say hi,we're here and have it, have a
free donut and uh yeah, andenjoy this beautiful first day
of spring.
Speaker 1 (11:20):
And so yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:21):
So that was a fun, just a nice little outreach
event to our little communityright here.
Yeah, that's cool and it hasbeen beautiful outside by the
way, I know this is why we livehere.
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
It's funny when folks come visit this is sort of an
aside, like I always think a lotabout, like when new faculty
from out of town come to visitor they're, you know, here
interviewing.
They always end up being likeat weird times.
Oh yeah yeah, Like it's blowing70 miles per hour or it's two
degrees outside, yeah, whengenerally most of the time it's
pretty pleasant.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
Yeah, yeah, it is yes .
Speaker 1 (11:54):
But yeah, that's always a challenge, just the
weather here.
But again it's been beautiful,it's been spring for a while it
feels like it has been yeah,yeah.
Which is nice.
So with that, with your newposition, with your new role and
everything that comes with that, what does that mean for you in
terms of your professorship andin terms of your teaching and
(12:17):
research and all that?
Speaker 2 (12:22):
Have you had to give a lot of that up?
Yeah, I have, and that's.
You know, with everything andwith growth there's some give
and take.
So in the spring semester I'mnot teaching in the classroom
but I am still supervising ourAg Comm internship program.
So I do still feel connected tothe students in some way.
You know.
But I was at a convention inHouston and saw a.
I could tell she was a studentand you know she had on a tech
(12:43):
sticker or something and so Iwas like I think she's one of
ours and looked at her.
I'm like you're in theinternship class.
I'd never seen the studentbefore in my life, but I
recognized her name and.
I'm like, oh, I am yourprofessor, so so, yeah, so I
don't get that face-to-faceinteraction with them very much,
but I am still interacting withthe students some, and it's
(13:05):
also a good way for me tointeract with some potential
community partners as well.
So that's, and I just enjoydoing the internship piece of
our departmental curriculumanyway.
But yeah, at the moment theonly thing I'm scheduled to be
teaching is the risk and crisiscommunications class, and that's
offered in the falls.
(13:26):
So I have given up quite a bitof teaching.
Speaker 1 (13:28):
Yeah, yeah.
So I think that's interestingto think about too, because
there's always a trade off with,like, the things we do in
academia sometimes, like Irecently gave up my greenhouse
appointment, which is somethingI did for almost six years-
Right yeah.
And like there's days that Idon't miss being sweaty all day,
but it is like it is also nice,or it was nice to be able to
(13:50):
like walk out of my office andthere's plants and like I can
outside and stuff.
So there's always I don't know,it's our careers, I think, as
academics are interesting andthey're diverse, and I think you
know there are some like youngacademics that listen to this
podcast and I think that'ssomething that's interesting to
hear and probably good to hearis that like, in some ways,
you're not just like stuck inone thing, you always move into
(14:13):
other things, differentopportunities.
Speaker 2 (14:15):
Yeah, exactly Exactly .
And you know, like I said, I'vebeen at Texas Tech for 18 years
and I felt like I had done,seen and done pretty much
everything I could have done inthat role and I still enjoyed my
job.
But you know, it's good to beable to get to do something
different.
And but at the same time, likeearlier this week, some students
came by, like they happened tocatch me in my office and they
(14:37):
just needed a quick questionanswered about something.
And I was kind of like wait,don't go.
Wait, tell me about this.
What's happening across thestreet?
Wait, please don't go.
And they're like we have to getto class.
I'm like well, I don't.
Speaker 1 (14:52):
Not important, how about?
Speaker 2 (14:53):
you.
No, please don't go.
So you know it's funny whenthey left, I'm like you know,
because sometimes people willask do you miss it?
And in general, yes, you knowthere are.
You know, with every job thereare parts that you know I don't
miss grading, oh, so, yeah, yeah, so like that, that has been a
(15:15):
nice change.
But you know, I do very muchmiss that student interaction.
I miss being around youngpeople a lot, and so it was a
delight to have them in myoffice for just that short five
minutes.
Come back, come back, that's sofunny, that's so funny.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
Like can we make this a standing meeting?
Speaker 2 (15:34):
That's a week.
Speaker 1 (15:34):
Yeah, no, and I find that and I want to move on here
in just a second to talk aboutcrisis communication, I know,
with students until, like,everything was online for a
(15:56):
while and like our whole sort ofacademic like.
Like I like teaching students,I like talking to students and
hearing their ideas and theirthoughts, and that's so hard
sometimes at a distance.
It's not that it's impossible.
We do a good job of it, I think, in our college.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
But it's hard, it's a lot harder.
So, yeah, yeah, I do like beingin the classroom and you know,
I like, you know I like theirsilly stories.
I like telling them sillystories, I like hearing that
they're doing cool things intheir internships, I like
hearing that they've gotten ajob or that they have an
interview.
Yeah yeah, so yeah, it's fun.
(16:36):
It's fun to be around youngpeople and I am not young people
anymore.
Speaker 1 (16:41):
I'm not either.
You're younger than meno-transcript.
Speaker 2 (17:08):
I know, I do, yeah, yeah and I you know, when I
first started 18 years ago, Iwas just a few years older than
them.
Speaker 1 (17:11):
And now I'm not yeah no, it's, it's a weird
experience, sort of like on thisside of it, on this side of the
lectern, so to speak.
And, uh, one of my colleaguesand I talk a lot about how, you
know, when we work with our TAsfor our class, our teaching
assistants, they like we get toknow them for four or five years
and then they're gone and it'slike, oh, like my friend moved,
(17:33):
like it's weird.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
Yes, yes, that that is one thing that I don't like
about this job is that, like,yeah, they become your friends
and yeah, and then they leaveand they go on to do.
It is so fun to watch them goon to do great things, but, yeah
, but I miss my friend, yeah,and I've got lots of them that I
miss a lot.
So, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:55):
It's an interesting thing.
It's an interesting thing.
Well, I want to change gearsjust a little bit and talk a
little bit about your book,because that's such a cool thing
.
It just just first off likecongratulations on that, that's
super cool.
But then I want to talk.
You know, spend some timetalking about the subject matter
of your book and crisiscommunication and what that
(18:17):
means and, like you know, Idon't want you to give away all
your secrets on the podcast butbut like, what are tips that
people can put into theircommunication, cause we're all
communicators in some way.
Speaker 2 (18:28):
Sure, yeah, yeah, yes , and so so yeah to the.
The title of the book is thecrisis communications guide for
agriculture, food and NaturalResources, and I'll give you a
link and it's also available onAmazon, so yeah, and it's broken
into five units, or there'skind of five steps to crisis
(18:53):
communications and you know it's.
The first is like, first justidentifying and acknowledging
these are some areas that arevery likely to happen to our
organization, and yourorganization is whatever, so it
can be your farm.
It can be your academicdepartment, it can be your
university, so you know what.
(19:14):
What are those, what's theworst thing that could happen
and also what's the worst likelything that could happen.
So, yeah, and there's I've gotsome different formulas that
people can plug in, where youcan look at the magnitude of
something versus the likelihoodof something happening.
(19:35):
Yeah, yeah Versus the likelihoodof something happening, yeah,
yeah, so you know, and theexample that I use in the book
is like a plane crashing into abuilding, which it can happen,
but how likely.
And like that would be one ofthe worst things that could
happen is, yeah, a planecrashing into a building full of
people Right, but how likely.
Like, do we really need to havea crisis communications plan
(19:57):
for this plane falling into ourbuilding?
Speaker 1 (19:59):
Right.
Speaker 2 (19:59):
Probably not Okay, but we do need to have a plan
put in place for something badhappening, and so let's figure
out what that likely thing ishappening.
So, like for the greenhouse,like having some of the pan
pains shattered on thegreenhouse by a hailstorm, you
probably need to have a crisiscommunications plan for that.
(20:21):
If you don't, I'm happy to helpyou.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
Yeah, no, I appreciate that actually yeah.
Speaker 2 (20:26):
But I mean, that's something that's very likely to
happen.
Speaker 1 (20:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
Or just vandalism period.
That could happen.
So yeah, stuff is verybreakable over there.
Yeah, I mean it's an open spaceover there People can trip,
fall, get hurt, yeah yeah.
So those are some things.
So how, how would youcommunicate about that?
Who's your spokesperson?
Like that.
That's one of those tips that Ihave like decide and let this
(20:51):
person know.
So, and, and also, you need tohave more than one spokesperson
designated, because these thingshave a funny way of happening
when your spokesperson is on acruise or in Germany, or you
know they're just out of thecountry or not available.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (21:10):
So have some backup people designated, so those are
that's another big tip that Ihave.
Um, so, uh, so those are,that's another big tip that I
have.
And then also just kind of havesome, some statements decided
on how you're going to handlethat.
Um, so, yeah, so if you didhave this hailstorm, that that
happens, what, what would yousay, like what would be your
(21:32):
statement?
Um, you know how many times doyou think you might need to
utilize the media?
Would you need to use, like,mainstream media?
Would you need to use ag media,or would you just need to send
out a series of emails or justnotify your students?
Like which audiences would youneed to target for this likely
(21:52):
crisis?
Speaker 1 (21:53):
No, and that's such an interesting way to think
about that too, because I thinkoften and I'm thinking about my
own career right Like it tendsto be more like reactive right.
Oh no, my roof is gone rightLike it hailed yesterday and I
should have thought maybe theroof's gone.
And then I get there and theroof's gone.
It's like, oh, this is aproblem, right?
And I think it's so much harderto communicate clearly when
(22:17):
you're being reactive about itright.
Right, yes, yeah, and so I don'tknow that.
You know that may be somethingwe need to talk about, because
those things do happen.
You know, we had, we've hadbreak-ins, we've had x, y and z
and it's like, how do I talk tothe?
The audience thing I think isreally important, um, because
sometimes, like, not all news isfor everyone right, yeah, yeah
(22:39):
you know, like I don't, I don'tneed the the general public
knowing that a plant was knockedoff of a Right, but the
researcher who owns that plantneeds to know.
Speaker 2 (22:50):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (22:51):
So that's, that's really an interesting way to
think about that, yeah, and Iguess, like, how much does the I
don't know if this is even agood question, but it's a
question that's in my head, like, how much does the way we can
and we talked about audiencesand all that.
That's in my head, like howmuch does the way we can we
talked about audiences and allthat like does the severity of
the crisis, even if it is ageneral thing, like how much
(23:12):
does that?
Should that impact the way wethink about communicating about
it?
Speaker 2 (23:15):
I would think a lot right, yeah, yeah, it does, and
it which everything can besomebody's crisis, you know, so
it just kind of depends and youknow, sometimes when you look
back you're like, well, I reallywouldn't classify that as a
crisis, it was probably justmore of an issue.
Yeah, so you know, but that canbe kind of hindsight, but it
(23:42):
does a lot of.
It kind of depends on theseverity of it and and the
audience and the size of theaudience.
So sure you know, and, and youyou know, depending on the
crisis, um, you know, it couldbe something that if you didn't
get it communicated well, uh, inthe early phases of it, then it
(24:03):
can become an even biggercrisis yeah, yeah, that makes
sense so yeah, yeah.
So I'm trying to think.
Let's just say that there was aplant in the greenhouse that a
lot of people are allergic toand they all, you know, you all
forgot to put the signs on thispoison ivy plant that you're
doing research on, and a lot ofthe students in the lab touched
(24:25):
it and now we have this poisonivy outbreak.
Speaker 1 (24:27):
Right.
Speaker 2 (24:28):
You know, just you would probably just need to do a
series of emails and textmessages to those students, tell
them what to do and maybecontact their parents, maybe not
you know, just kind of gaugethe situation.
But if you didn't communicateabout that and you didn't tell
them what to do, then it becomesa bigger problem.
Speaker 1 (24:49):
Gotcha.
Speaker 2 (24:50):
And then you might have local news media involved.
Speaker 1 (24:53):
Yeah, yeah, that's always.
Like you know, I've worked withnews media quite a bit and
usually when they call, I'm like, oh cool, I would love to talk
to you.
But there are times that it'slike, oh, they're calling
because there's a problem and Iwould rather not have this
conversation today.
Speaker 2 (25:13):
And that leads me to another point in crisis
communications, A lot of timesyour communications for a crisis
happens when you're not in acrisis.
So building those relationshipswith local media is really,
really important to do.
And you know, here in the SouthPlains of Texas and just in the
(25:33):
ag world in general, we have agmedia.
So having relationships with agreporters is really really
important as well, Because ifyou do go into crisis mode, you
may need them to help you getinformation out.
Speaker 1 (25:45):
Sure.
Speaker 2 (25:47):
And that was very apparent with the fires that
have been happening in thepanhandle.
You know, ag media have beenvery and even mainstream media
as well.
They've been very good aboutgetting the message out about
how to donate to the fires, howto donate and what they need.
So those two things, I've seenthose two things happen very
well and I've even seen a littlebit of like here's what we
(26:08):
don't need.
So not it's been more of ahere's what we do need and
here's how.
But you know, having those,those groups help you out is
very, very important to do.
Speaker 1 (26:21):
Well, yeah, and I think you bring up a really
interesting point.
I think that, especially insome of our agricultural
communities, which often arevery kind of tight knit and but
it's a large community too,there's so many facets of it.
I like the thought of likerelationship building early, so
you have that network.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
Yes, exactly, yeah, yeah, and it's, and there's also
just the network building.
You said the magic word network, you know, having those people
around you that can help you ifyou are in a crisis, because
some of your crisiscommunications may not
necessarily involve the media ormobilized in some way, or you
(27:07):
may just need some buddies tocome help you do something.
Speaker 1 (27:10):
So yeah yeah.
Speaker 2 (27:10):
So having that group of friends, like maybe you just
need somebody to come answeremails for an hour for you.
You know, just somebody thatyou trust and yeah, yeah, that
can come handle that, orsomebody to go get lunch for you
.
Or you know just little thingslike that that can help you.
So having that network ofpeople that are in similar jobs
(27:33):
to yours that can help you outis really, really important.
Speaker 1 (27:38):
Well, that's you know .
That brings me to anotherinteresting thought that I don't
think I would have considereduntil you were just kind of
talking about it, that it's morethan the.
You know how do I put out apress release, how do I make
phone calls, how do I notifypeople?
It's who can get lunch, who canmake sure that people have
water and food and like thosekinds of things.
(28:01):
Those are, I think, things thatget overlooked sometimes when we
think about the way wecommunicate.
Like, do you have there was asocial media video going around
for a while like how many 3 amfriends do you have, right?
So like, if there's a crisis at3 am, who do you like?
Who could you call?
And I was thinking about that.
I've got a couple people Icould.
Probably, if they answer theirphone, they'd be mad, yeah.
Speaker 2 (28:27):
But they would help, right?
Yes, yes, like I know, I betteranswer if you're calling me at
3am.
Yeah, yeah, and that's that'sanother thing that I kind of
skipped over that part.
But yeah, part of your crisiscommunications plan is who does
what?
So who, who's your social mediaperson?
And you know, in a lot of ag orjust a lot of organizations,
and you know in a lot of ag orjust a lot of organizations
period, there's one personthat's the communicator.
(28:49):
Well, if you are trying tojuggle social media, mainstream
media answer phone calls, answeremails, answer Facebook
messages do all of these thingsat some point.
You can't do it all, so youneed some help.
So, when slash, if we go intocrisis mode, who manages social
(29:10):
media?
Who answers the phone?
Who answers email?
So who does what?
And I put this in the bookbecause I thought it was just.
I was like you know, this isactually very smart.
But one of our alums told us hewas like we even know who's
going to Sonic to get ourafternoon drinks and I was like,
yeah, that's brilliant.
No, it is.
Speaker 1 (29:30):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (29:30):
Cause, like when you're in that phase, like to
have your large diet Coke, easyon the ice, brought to you.
Um, is is really helpful andreally nice, and you know that
it's going to happen.
Speaker 1 (29:42):
Well, and then you think absolutely, and it's like
you have to think about how dopeople stay effective in a high
stress situation I forget to eat.
Like, if I'm like working andteaching all day and doing all
these kinds of things like, I'llskip lunch.
Speaker 2 (29:55):
Well, I don't do that .
I mean, it doesn't OK itdoesn't happen a lot.
Speaker 1 (30:00):
Let's, we'll be very honest.
It doesn't happen a lot, butthere's days that, like I'll
teach like up to like my classgets out at like 12, 30 and then
, if I have something rightafter that, some days I'm like
running to the next thing andlike if it's really hectic some
days I'm just like I have nottaken care of, like my basic
needs exactly and having thesonic guy yeah, yeah, to know
that it's going to be providedand brought to you and set on
(30:22):
your desk and said here eat thisor drink this.
Yes.
Speaker 2 (30:25):
Like you are in a very high stress situation.
Yeah, make sure that youhydrate, yeah, yeah, that's
really good to have that.
Speaker 1 (30:32):
That is.
That's really such an importantthing.
I'm glad you put that in thebook.
Speaker 2 (30:37):
Yeah, Cause that's really cool.
That's good advice.
Speaker 1 (30:38):
It is yes it is, um, so you were talking about, like,
who's your social media person?
Um, I want to talk about socialmedia a little bit, because
this is something we discussed alittle bit last time, like four
years ago.
Speaker 2 (30:52):
But the landscape has changed.
Oh, so much.
Speaker 1 (30:54):
For better and worse Right.
Speaker 2 (30:56):
A lot of ways.
Speaker 1 (30:58):
And I think we could all probably like go through the
list of botched social mediacommunication you know, but then
some that are done really well,like how important.
I don't know how to ask thisquestion again either, because I
know it's important, but like Ifeel like the role of social
media person now is such acritical make or break role in a
(31:21):
lot of situations Because likethere's no putting that lid back
on sometimes.
Speaker 2 (31:27):
No, yeah, yeah.
And once, once you get onsocial media, if you don't
consistently stay on socialmedia, if you're an organization
or business, company, whatever,um, you need to consistently
take care of that and managethat.
And uh, yeah tend to it tend toit like a garden and uh, yeah,
(31:49):
yeah, and when, when you'redoing good things on on there,
then good things will come backto you.
But having that audience builtis very good for for so many
different things but, it's.
It's also very good in a crisissituation, because if you have a
lot of followers following you,you then they know that they
can go there to get information.
(32:09):
And so yeah, so that's a goodthing.
That wasn't really where yourquestion was going, but I
redirected it.
Speaker 1 (32:16):
No, that's a good answer to my question.
I think that's the question Imeant to ask.
Speaker 2 (32:21):
It didn't, of course you did yeah.
Speaker 1 (32:27):
So no, you're're right, having that following is
important, because I do the samething, like if there's
something going on, like likethe news is not going to be up
to date right, but I can jump ontwitter, yes, or whatever, uh,
and see like, okay, has thisorganization posted an update,
like I've.
so an example of this is Ifollow the Texas storm chasers
(32:48):
on Twitter and Instagram andstuff and so like.
If there's bad weather, a lotof times I'll like have the news
on, but I'll pop on there tosee what they're putting out,
cause they put up like regularupdates during severe weather.
Speaker 2 (33:00):
And you don't have to wait for five, six or 10 for
local news to be on.
Yeah, and sometimes the you andsometimes the storms that
they're covering aren't in aplace that the Weather Channel
would grab and host.
So yeah, those are always goodones to follow.
And I want to give a shout outto the Canadian Record.
(33:22):
It's the newspaper in CanadianTexas.
They provided an excellentpublic service.
They were posting informationconstantly, and a lot of the
other small town newspapers weredoing the same as well.
I know quite a few people.
We've had a lot of studentsfrom Canadian, so that was just
(33:45):
the one that I went to and waschecking from time to time just
to see what was needed andthings like that, and they were
doing such a good job.
So you know that was.
You know, historically that's anewspaper.
But they were using Facebookand they may have been using
other social media sites as well.
But I was just looking atFacebook.
But they were using a differentmedium so that they didn't have
(34:06):
to wait for the paper to beprinted, and but they were
posting information, sometimesas soon as they heard it, so
like so-and-so needs this at theMethodist church?
Take, take it down there,please, or they need lunch at
the Methodist church, uh, youknow so, something like that.
I was like that is an excellentpublic service right there and a
good way to use social media.
Speaker 1 (34:26):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (34:27):
In a crisis.
Speaker 1 (34:28):
Well, and with all the struggles that like
especially the small townnewspaper, small town media
outlets in general are goingthrough right now, like it's
cool to hear that, yeah, theyserve a huge role, they serve a
huge purpose.
Speaker 2 (34:41):
Yeah, yeah, so yeah, they so kudos to the Canadian
record.
Speaker 1 (34:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (34:46):
I hope they're listening.
Shout out to you all so.
Speaker 1 (34:49):
Yeah, that's very cool.
Speaker 2 (34:50):
And and all of those panhandle papers.
So yeah, that's.
I can't think of the names ofthe other papers right now I'm
drawing a blank.
But yeah, I just remember thatone.
Speaker 1 (34:56):
So yeah, that's really interesting.
That's good to hear too, cause,yeah, I was in Houston during
not the whole fire, but you knowpart of it and family were
asking like what's going on withthat?
I'm like, well, I'm not there,I don't, yeah.
But yeah, some of those littleoutlets were like we're, you
know X percent contained.
This is who's, you know that's,you're right, that's really
(35:19):
such a good service.
Well, this seems like a greattime to take a quick break, so
we'll go to a quick mid-roll andtalk about some mid-roll things
and when we come back we willtalk more about crises and
communication.
Well, hey there, welcome to themid-roll.
I hope you're doing well andenjoying the episode so far.
Tell your houseplants I said hi.
(35:41):
Thanks so much for listening toPlantthropology.
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(36:03):
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(36:24):
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(37:28):
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Tell a friend, leave me arating and review, connect on
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Okay, bye.
Now I want to take a little bitof a step back and I'm curious
(37:53):
what sort of and I think you'veanswered some of this but like,
what made you want to write thisbook?
Like what was your, like,driving force behind it?
Because it's a lot of work,yeah, and you know, I know how
long that process is and allthat goes into it, and it's not
something I think any of usundertake lightly.
So what made you want to do?
Speaker 2 (38:13):
that it was one of those things that I had done
several research projects aboutrisk and crisis communications
and I just kind of felt like Ihad enough information to pull
it together and it was one ofthose things.
We were in Barnes and Noble oneday and my mom was like have
you ever thought about writing abook?
(38:34):
And I'm like I should.
She's like, well, what wouldyou write it on?
I'm like risk and crisiscommunications.
She's like okay, well then, youshould do that, okay, so, yeah,
so then I applied for a facultydevelopment leave, also known
as a sabbatical.
Speaker 1 (38:53):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (38:54):
And so I did that in the fall of 21.
Okay, and so that's when I didthe big heavy lifting on it.
And then Texas Tech has aprogram, the faculty writing
program, and you get togetherfor three hours a week and
you're just supposed to write.
You're not supposed to checkemails.
(39:15):
You're not supposed to eitherwrite or be reading for
something that you're writing.
And it can be a grant, it can bea book, it can be a journal
article but you're just supposedto write and so in three hour
increments at a time at a time,I got the book finished, wow,
yeah, yeah.
So it went to.
Oh, it was right about thistime last summer or last spring,
(39:40):
so probably last April was whenI had fully decided on the
press that I was using.
So it's a publisher out ofDetroit, they're called Xanadu
X-A-N-E-D-U.
I just they were just nice andI just liked them and they also
they specialized in not hugeruns of books.
(40:03):
I mean this is a niche within aniche.
Speaker 1 (40:06):
Risk and crisis in agriculture.
Speaker 2 (40:08):
So I knew I wasn't going to have just a huge
audience clamoring to buy mybook.
So, um, and another thing thatlike there wasn't a book for
risk and crisis in ag, I meanthere's plenty of risk and
crisis books out there, tons ofthem, but nothing that
specialized in the in the agworld and uh, so that that was
another factor, like the.
(40:28):
You know the book for my classwas fine.
You know the guy that wrote it,he was great and I'd used that
book for a long time and DrDorfurt taught me he used the
same author's book.
But I'm like, yeah, if we can,I feel like I can do something
that's a little more specializedfor the ag industry and so,
yeah, so moved forward with that.
(40:49):
It's cool.
Now it's printed, yeah, andthat's so exciting.
Yeah, it is exciting.
Speaker 1 (40:53):
And that's such a good feeling.
Speaker 2 (40:54):
Oh it is, it is yeah To get that box of books.
Speaker 1 (40:57):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (40:57):
Yeah, Scott took my picture.
Speaker 1 (40:59):
My husband took my picture when I opened the box.
Speaker 2 (41:01):
There's sheer joy on my face, so it's a cute picture.
Speaker 1 (41:04):
That's awesome, the culmination of so much work and
so many hours and the researchand the reading and the thinking
about it constantly.
Speaker 2 (41:15):
Yeah, there were days , or not days, but full mornings
that I typed nothing, I justhad to think.
I just needed to think so yeah,you might pick up a pen and
then do nothing.
Doodle for a while.
Speaker 1 (41:29):
No, I'm writing yeah, yeah.
I'm thinking, I've beenactively trying to talk myself
out of writing a textbook, um,and I think I've mostly gotten
myself there where I'm like Idon't need to do this but you
should write one see, becauseI'm in the space where I'm
teaching a new class in the falland I was looking at textbooks
and I was like there's a couple,it's not, they're not specific
(41:52):
enough.
I don't know, maybe eventuallywe'll see, we'll see.
I'll stick to kids, children'sbooks for a while.
Those are.
Speaker 2 (41:58):
Those are fun.
Those are more fun.
They are fun.
Yeah, yeah, and they're verygood.
Speaker 1 (42:03):
So that's, that's really interesting and I think I
kind of like the story of justyou know you should write a book
, Okay, Okay.
Speaker 2 (42:13):
Cool, I need to make sure that I take this snippet
and play it to my mom, Cause youknow there's it's not very
often that you know, especiallywhen you know she was parenting
me as a teenager and shesuggested something to me, it
was usually met with no, yeah,yeah, Okay.
Speaker 1 (42:28):
Yeah, okay, I think I will.
Speaker 2 (42:30):
That's funny.
Speaker 1 (42:38):
So I guess, as we sort of start to wind down a
little bit, I'm curious to hearwhat your thoughts are going
forward, as far as both you know, in terms of the crisis
communication piece and theclass you teach, but also just
in your role now.
Like, what do you think thefuture holds?
Do you see let me break thisdown into a couple of smaller
questions, because that's a bigquestion In this world of, like
(42:58):
crisis communication do youthink that the sort of the
things that we've done and theways we've done it like hold up,
just maybe move to differentplatforms?
Or do we, like, going forwardin the future, have to think
about, like as the landscapeevolves, how we communicate
about stuff?
Or do the tried and true likeprinciples for communication
(43:22):
just can we apply those todifferent like places fairly
easily?
Speaker 2 (43:26):
Yeah, yes, okay Great .
Speaker 1 (43:30):
And let me clarify that Sure.
Speaker 2 (43:31):
Yes, okay, great, and let me clarify that.
So, in communication period,crisis communications, everyday
communications, it doesn'tmatter.
If you are truthful, if you aretransparent, if you're doing
your best, if you are trying toget the information out with the
best of intentions, you're,you're halfway there.
(43:56):
You're more than halfway thereyou know and let me reiterate
again just tell the truth youknow, just tell the truth and
don't don't try to coveranything up.
And there are some situationswhere, um, there may be some
proprietary information,especially, like you know,
you're working in a researchgreenhouse.
There are some things that youcannot tell people Like it's
(44:16):
proprietary, it is research,it's patentable, you can't talk
about that.
So there are some things thatand you just need to disclose
that that's proprietaryinformation and I can't talk
about that.
But let me tell you what I cantalk about.
I will tell you as much as Ican tell you.
(44:36):
That doesn't change that?
doesn't change if you're writingin a newspaper, if you're
writing a letter or if you'reputting it out on TikTok or
wherever you're going.
Just tell the truth, be astransparent as you can be and do
so with the intention of I amtrying to help people get the
information that they need inthis moment.
As long as you're doing that,you again you're more than
halfway there.
(44:57):
So those core principles holdup and you know, going back to
what we have stood on in agcommunications for years, good
writing like.
There's no substitute for goodwriting.
Sometimes, in a crisis, you'rejust doing the best you can to
crank out the information Um andsometimes your writing is not
your best, um, but just do yourbest and, uh, you know, just do
(45:20):
your best and tell the truth and, um, you know, and try to write
as as, as best you can.
Um, so, so that's.
Those are really those coreprinciples.
Um, as the world has evolvedand everything, there's more
demands to get more informationout.
So 20 years ago we could waituntil 5 o'clock and get our
(45:45):
statement out at 5, 6, or 10when the news was going on the
air and we had a little bit oftime to get stuff together.
Now our audience is looking tosee did we put anything out on
Facebook, instagram, twitter orand the others, but also so is
the news.
Like the news is looking to seehave they put anything out on
(46:05):
on on Instagram right now?
Like what?
What's the statement?
So, like you, you do have towork a little bit faster to get
stuff put out there and theaudience will give you a little
bit of of grace.
You know just to to put stuffout there, but but you do need
to act quickly, but you don'twant to act reactively.
(46:28):
So you know you, you recognizethat you're in a crisis.
Give yourself a moment to gatheras much information as you can
and and craft your statement anddecide how it is you're going
to move forward and also decidewho's our audience in this and
how are we going to communicatewith them.
Speaker 1 (46:47):
So that's, yeah, no, that's great advice.
I think back to uh so when Ifirst started in extension,
which feels like a very longtime ago.
Uh, 2014, no yeah, I don'twhatever, whatever it was you
know, at one of our trainings wedid sort of that and I until I
(47:08):
it's interesting I hadn'tthought about this in a long
time, till I kind of hear youtalking about taking a moment to
collect your thoughts they hadus do this exercise where they
put us in like groups of threeor four and they had a bunch of
journalism students from A&Mthat were in this room like a
press corps, right, yeah, yeah.
And they gave us a little slipof paper with a prompt and they
(47:29):
said you have 10 minutes to puttogether a statement.
Speaker 2 (47:30):
Okay, little slip of paper with a prompt and they
said you have 10 minutes to puttogether a statement.
Speaker 1 (47:32):
Okay crap, yeah, yeah .
And they sent us out in thehall and they called us in like
one at a time, like to do apress conference over this thing
.
So mine was like I was, it waslike the clean water act or
something and it was.
It was they were random, likethey were just random things and
so we had to do like basicresearch and all of that and and
then like students firedquestions at us.
This was like a class thing forthem but a training thing.
(47:54):
It is shocking what, like, somepeople will say and do when
they're put on the spot, likesome of the things that came out
of some of these new agentsmouths.
I was like you can't, you can'tsay that, don't say that.
But but no, I think that whatyou were just talking about of
one being prepared, as preparedas possible- as prepared as you
(48:15):
can be.
But then also just likeoperating in good faith.
Speaker 2 (48:19):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (48:20):
Because there's so many people that don't do that
right now, right right, it'skind of refreshing.
Speaker 2 (48:24):
Yeah, yeah, and you know, just like you said.
So you know you're handedinformation and, okay, now you
have to do a press conference.
So, okay, I'm sorry I don'tknow the answer to that question
.
Let me get that information foryou.
But so many times when we'reput on the spot, we feel the
need to provide an answer andit's okay to say that you don't
(48:45):
know.
It is better to say you don'tknow, and I will get that
information to you, than to saysomething incorrect in in your
moment where you're put on thespot and yeah so.
So yeah, it is, it's okay tosay it's better to say I don't
know, let me get thatinformation for you than to to
be incorrect and then just havethat out there forever yeah, and
(49:07):
to have it out there forever.
Yes, yeah, there.
Yeah, there's Scott Pelley, whois a reporter for 60 Minutes.
He used to be the anchor of theCBS.
Speaker 1 (49:14):
Evening.
Speaker 2 (49:14):
News and a Texas Tech alum, oh cool.
Yeah, and Lubbock native.
He wrote a book several yearsago and I'm not going to have
the quote exactly right, but hehas a quote in his book and I
use it in one of my slideshows.
People will never remember thatyou were first, but they will
(49:35):
always remember that you werewrong.
So that's scary, I know I knowso, and he was saying this to
like.
He has a chapter called to ayoung journalist yeah and so you
know he's, you know, kind ofteaching young reporters.
Like you know, just remember,it's better to not be first on
the air or first online withinformation.
(49:57):
It's better to check yourinformation and make sure you,
you be sure that you're rightyeah and, and then post it yeah,
and I'm like that is excellentadvice, mr pelly it is, and
that's a scary sentence becauseI'm thinking.
Speaker 1 (50:11):
I'm thinking about, like, the implications of that
Right, you want to be first onthe scene, but if you're not, if
you're wrong, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (50:18):
And he goes on to tell some stories about how he
checked his information andother networks were on the air
saying that you know this washappening and he was like you
know.
I don't have a source toconfirm this and you know, I
don't have a source to confirmthis.
And you know he was gettingyelled at in his earpiece and
he's like you know, nobody'sconfirming this for me and I'm
not comfortable going on the airwith this and he didn't and his
(50:38):
producers were yelling at him.
He was like you can yell, butI'm not saying this.
So, yeah, good for you.
Fascinating.
Yeah, it is Fascinating it.
Speaker 1 (50:46):
Yeah, one more question I had and this kind of
is going back to an earlierconversation and talking about,
like you know, your work inoutreach and communications, and
you made an interesting point,a good point, earlier that, like
not everyone does outreach, noteveryone does engagement Not
everyone does, or, you know, wedo it in different facets.
I think that's maybe not ineveryone's skill set or just
(51:10):
desire, because it's a lot.
I'm this goofy guy that puts myface on the Internet all the
time because I like doing it but, like, that is certainly not
for everyone.
For, say, faculty members orpeople in academia that want to
tell better stories about theirresearch, that want to get that
out there but don't know how,like what resources are
(51:31):
available out there for those ofus that are like you know, I
would love to tell people aboutthis cool project I did, but I
don't know where to start.
Speaker 2 (51:40):
Yeah, yeah.
So if you're at Texas Tech,call me.
Yeah, I would love, and that'spart of my job.
So yeah, I would.
That's I love doing that.
I love helping faculty findways to get their research out
into the community, to finddifferent groups to partner with
, to broaden our scope and tobroaden the scope of the
(52:01):
students in their classroom.
So so that's one resource, butTexas Tech's Office of Outreach
and Engagement has a lot ofinformation on their website
that can help spark ideas.
Outreach and Engagement has alot of information on their
website that can help sparkideas.
There's several otheruniversities out there that have
lots of great information onoutreach and engagement.
Michigan State University has areally good website that I
(52:28):
would point somebody to thatoffers some really good ideas
for outreach and engagement.
And there's another nationalgroup, the Engaged Scholarship
Consortium, and they have somereally good ideas.
They have a conference.
I'll go to that one in October.
Speaker 1 (52:36):
Oh cool.
Speaker 2 (52:37):
Yeah, yeah.
So that's another good resourcethat's out there that can help
provide some ideas.
And then another thing, likeone thing that I would recommend
is just go back to that thingthat first sparked your interest
into what it is that you'redoing.
Was it a project that you didfor a science fair?
(52:57):
Was it something you did in 4-Hor FFA, or was it just a guest
speaker that came to yourclassroom?
What was that thing?
And then try to help kids orother adults find that thing or
maybe it was a speaker in one ofyour college classrooms and try
to emulate that and see if youcan help spark that interest and
(53:18):
spread the word about yourresearch in that way as well.
Speaker 1 (53:24):
That's awesome advice .
Yeah, I love the.
Remember why you're excitedabout it.
Yeah, because we lose thatsometimes.
Speaker 2 (53:33):
Yeah, we do.
Speaker 1 (53:33):
We do, I don't know, in the mess of all the stuff we
have to do, like I love that,because there's days that I just
need to go play with plants fora while and need to get my
hands dirty and work with theundergrads at the greenhouse and
stuff and that's yeah.
I really like that advice.
Speaker 2 (53:51):
Plant therapy is good for everybody.
Yeah, yeah yeah, I highlyrecommend that one too, yeah.
Speaker 1 (53:58):
Absolutely so.
One last question I have foryou.
This doesn't have to be justsince you're in your new role,
but just, you know, throughoutyour career do you have like and
I'm putting you on the spot alittle bit maybe Do you have a
favorite outreach activityyou've gotten to do?
Is there a program you did, ora seminar you gave, or something
(54:18):
?
What do you think your favoriteoutreach or engagement thing
has been?
And I didn't warn you aboutthis, so sorry.
Speaker 2 (54:26):
Well, okay, so the book has been my proudest.
Speaker 1 (54:30):
Okay, yeah, sure so.
Speaker 2 (54:31):
I'm proudest of that.
But something that has beenreally fun for me to do here
lately is it's a project thatI've been working on with a
friend of mine from church.
He works in sales at Channel 11, kcbd, the NBC station here in
Lubbock, and it's a segment thathe came up with.
It's called Champions inAgriculture and we feature kids
(54:54):
in 4-H or FFA and the projectsthat they're doing.
So I'm kind of the host of it.
That's awesome.
So I interview these kids thatare either working on a
livestock project, a weldingproject, an agri-science fair
project, and we get to talkabout what they're doing in 4-H
or FFA, and so this really hitson all the things that make me
(55:17):
happy.
So you know I was a 4-H-er, mykid's a 4-H-er, I'm a 4-H-er
leader.
I get to do my broadcast thingbecause I used to be a reporter
and also we get to, you know,promote area youth involved in
agricultural programs.
So that has been really fun forme to do and I think people are
(55:39):
seeing it because people willtell me that they've seen it on
TV.
Nobody has recognized merandomly yet.
But yeah, it's been really funand it's good to bring more
positive attention to these goodkids.
Yeah, that's so cool.
Yeah, and those are goodstories to tell, yeah.
Speaker 1 (55:52):
Yeah, it's been really fun and it's good to
bring more positive attention tothese good kids.
Speaker 2 (55:54):
Yeah, that's so cool, yeah, and those are good
stories to tell.
Yeah, yeah, yes, and they'resuch good kids and they deserve
to be featured.
Speaker 1 (56:00):
Very cool, yeah, very cool.
Well, erica, I appreciate yourtime and you coming in to talk
to me, yeah, and I'm excited tohave you in the position you're
in.
I think you bring a lot to thatand a lot of I don't know
energy and enthusiasm and justexperience to it that we need, I
think, as a college.
So it is I'm happy to have youin that role.
Speaker 2 (56:21):
for sure I'm happy to be here and looking forward to
all the things we get to do.
Speaker 1 (56:28):
Yeah, yeah, very cool , thank you.
Where can people find you realquick as we?
If you want to be found, youdon't have to want to be found.
Speaker 2 (56:34):
The easiest way to catch me is through email, Erika
E-R-I-C-A dot I-R-L-B-E-C-K atT-T-U dot E-D-U.
Or you could just look up theDavis College Dean's Office and
I'm listed on the personnel pagethere.
Email is the easiest way tocatch me.
I'm sometimes slow to answer,but I will answer.
Speaker 1 (56:53):
Awesome, yeah, awesome.
Well, very good, thank you somuch Thank you.
And for those of you out therelistening, plan your next crisis
communication and we'll talk toyou later.
Y'all, if you ever findyourself in a crisis, whether it
is agricultural or otherwise, Ihope you'll remember some of
the stuff that Erica talkedabout today, because I think,
(57:14):
just in terms of thinkingthrough things, having a plan
and just communicating, clearly,there's no one better that you
could learn from than her.
Thanks again, so much forcoming and talking to me, erica.
It was a blast and I alwaysenjoy getting to spend some time
with you.
Thanks to you, the listener,once more for being a part of it
.
Thanks to the Davis College andthe Department of Plant and
Soil Science here at Texas TechUniversity.
Thank you to the PodFix Networkfor letting me be a part of it.
(57:35):
There's great shows, greatcontent, and you should
definitely go check out PodFix.
You know I love you.
You know that I enjoy doingthis for you.
I hope you're still enjoying itand I hope that you'll tell me
if there's other things that Ican be doing to make this show
better.
Planthropology is written,hosted, produced all those other
(57:56):
fun things by me, vikram Baliga.
Our music is by the wonderful,award-winning composer, nicholas
Scout, and we are supported byyou, the listener, and by Texas
Tech University.
Keep being kind to one another.
If you have not, to this date,date been kind to the people
around you.
Maybe give it a shot.
It's a good way to be Keeplearning, keep being safe and
(58:17):
keep being a really cool plant.
Thank you.
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