This podcast is all about people who have embraced the opportunity to combine their academic work with entrepreneurial ventures.
This is a short introduction to the series. It includes a taster of some of the upcoming interviews, the story and the people behind the podcast, who we hope will listen and what we hope they will get out of it.
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[This podcast was a collaboration between the University of the West of Scotland, Converge and Sarah McLusky. The podcast team includes Orla Kelly, Adam Kosterka, Jen Black and Sarah McLusky. It was funded by the Scottish Ecosystem Fund 2023-24.]
Andy Porter
When you have really difficult pinch points, that's when I think I've learned the most. And also, I think the fact that I've got through them means that I'm much calmer about the similar things come along now.
Genevieve Patenaude
It's a real rock and roll. It's not an easy journey, right? It's so much harder than academia. It's harder than anything else I've done, but I love it.
Marc Reid
These are the times where you should be taking these risks. The worst thing that can happen is they don't work out. But the thing that would be worse than that is never having taken the chance at all.
John Storm
Trust, integrity has been a defining point because of what happened through that failure. Failure can change us and it can shape what we learn and how we approach life.
Kavi Jagadamma
This process has made me redefine what creativity is. And also, I've realized that I do have an entrepreneurial mindset.
Catriona Liddle
Hopefully you get there in the end. But even if you don’t, what’s that line, you either win or you learn.
Sarah McLusky
Hello, I'm your host, Sarah McLusky, and welcome to this introductory episode of the Academic Adventures podcast. After this one, you'll have 10 weekly episodes of academic adventures to look forward to. Each episode is an interview with someone who combines or has combined university work with business ventures, although the exact way they do that is as varied as the people themselves. This podcast is the brainchild of Orla Kelly, Scotland's Knowledge Exchange and Innovation Collaboration Manager, and she's based at the University of the West of Scotland. Here's Orla to say a bit about how the podcast started.
Orla Kelly
So we initially wanted to talk about failure itself. We really wanted academics to come and say, We tried this and it failed and this is what I learned really hard for any academic anybody to talk about failure in that way is really not that black and white actually. It's much more about hurdles and challenges and needing to pivot. And so while this project initially started around failure in academic entrepreneurship, it really very quickly evolved to a much bigger discussion around our attitudes to risk and how we overcome problems and really make a success of these projects and it might not be the way that you intended but it's a success nonetheless.
Sarah McLusky
With funding from the Ecosystem Fund, Orla roped in me, I'm an independent research communication specialist, as well as Adam Kosterka and Jen Black from Converge to help create and distribute the podcast series.
Orla Kelly
We can't look at our entrepreneurial ecosystem in Scotland without unpicking that culture around entrepreneurship and our institutions and the attitudes to risk. And so this was just the perfect, perfect time in the perfect project. And I hope this is a limited series, 10 episodes, 10 interviews that will go out. But I hope it has legs beyond this time frame. I'd love to see the project evolve into something else and continue that storytelling.
Sarah McLusky
With our guests, we explore a huge range of entrepreneurial activities which are happening in higher education. Our guests have connections to universities across Scotland and you'll hear from a wide range of disciplines and sectors.
Orla Kelly
We wanted to give a platform to lots of different academic entrepreneurs and there is no one size fits all. They come in lots of different flavors, lots of different demographics, lots of different geographies, and lots of different skills as well. They're not all just these high growth companies. There's a whole other, a whole world of enterprises coming out of our universities. And we wanted to celebrate that and just change the picture of what people think of as the academic entrepreneur.
Sarah McLusky
Our guests do include scientific spin-outs, but they also include ventures in music, food technology, retail, education, satellite imaging and physiotherapy. You'll hear from people who started in academia but are now full -time in their business, people who started in business and then moved the other way, those whose heart is still in the university and those who have embraced full -time entrepreneurship, as well as those who still juggle both part -time. Our guests share the highs and lows of their business journey, along with advice for anyone looking to follow in their footsteps.
Orla Kelly
I hope there are researchers in our institutions that are listening to this podcast and they can identify entrepreneurial spirit in themselves in a way that they potentially didn't see it before. There are lots of researchers who would never call themselves an entrepreneur, but that want to make an impact with their research. And a lot of this is actually about making impact. It's about getting your research out from behind a closed door and into communities or into end users and really transforming people's lives.
I really hope there are policymakers and funders listening to this podcast. At certain levels, there's quite a narrow definition of what entrepreneurship is and a limited understanding of the potential of entrepreneurship in our universities. Not all of the companies coming out of our universities are high growth spin rate companies, for example. There's a whole lot of other exciting, really magical things happening. I hope the policymakers and the funders can appreciate this diversity and celebrate it a bit more, give opportunities to more academics that are interested in this space.
Sarah McLusky
If all of this sounds like your kind of thing, make sure you hit the follow or subscribe button in your podcast app so you don't miss an episode. In the show notes for each episode, you'll find links to connect with the guest or to find out more about their work. And we'd also love to hear your feedback about the series or even about individual episodes. You can share your thoughts via our LinkedIn page. You'll find a link in the show notes or just search for Academic Adventures podcast. Thanks for listening and we hope that you enjoy the series.
Outro
This podcast is a collaboration between the University of the West of Scotland, Converge and Sarah McLusky. The podcast team includes Orla Kelly, Adam Kosterka, Jen Black and me, Sarah McLusky. It's funded by the Scottish Ecosystem Fund 2023 to 2025.