3MT Meet the Judges: Kirsty McLaughlin
Kirsty McLaughlin is a producer director with a passion for making beautiful, engaging factual content. She loves science and the natural world, and has a passion for explaining and portraying its wonder. She has brought science to life for audiences of all ages, from children watching CBeebies to adults tuning into BBC One. With each project she delves into a brand new subject, and relishes constantly get to learn new things. Through her work she is lucky enough to meet lots of really interesting people and travel to some truly amazing places, which her job allows her to share this with millions of others on television.
Can you tell me a bit about who you are and what you do?
My name is Kirsty McLaughlin and I’m a television producer and director. I mainly make factual science programmes or general factual content for a really wide range of audiences: everything from science shows aimed at preschool children all the way up to primetime magazine entertainment shows, plus all the stuff in the middle.
What does your work involve on a day-to-day basis?
My work is incredibly varied – which is one of the things I love about it! It depends on the project itself and what stage of the project we're at. I could be researching and developing an idea, I could be writing a script, I could be out filming on a shoot, or I could be cutting the story together in the edit. I'm really lucky that my job has lots of variety in it.
During the Three Minute Thesis Competition we talk a lot about ‘public engagement’ in an academic sense, as a vital part of disseminating your research to a wider audience. But as someone who doesn’t work in a strictly academic environment, what do you think the value is of connecting and communicating with people outside of your field?
I think sharing is caring, it's really as basic as that! The more you get out there and talk to others, the more opportunities you gain for yourself as well, whether that's the next research grant or furthering your own career. I also think that science has a tendency to happen in a bit of a vacuum. A lot of these amazing ideas stay within academic circles or within a lab but the real world doesn't happen in these controlled environments. So, I think it's really important that people apply their knowledge in an interdisciplinary, real-world context and take a holistic approach to solving problems and that normally means working with others. You’re going to learn so much more from folk outside of your field and they can also learn from your successes and your failures, which generally allows for ideas to move on and progress way more than if they had stayed inside your head. It can only be a good thing - the pros far outweigh the cons.
There’s also something in this about bringing the research to those that need to hear it, but don’t necessarily know that they need to hear it. That could be Joe Public or it could be decision-making politicians or anybody else. Most of the world’s citizens aren’t scientists, but that’s who scientific findings might impact – science isn’t just for scientists.
What are the main features of a good communicator to you?
It's all the usual things really: I want a concise clear presentation that is engaging from start to finish. I think if you care about something then that will make me care - passion definitely translates. You could have no interest in a subject yourself, but if someone really passionately advocates for it to you then it can still put a smile on your face and get you excited.
What will you be looking out for in the presentations which make it to the final?
The winning stuff is going to be the presentation that can translate into a kind of watercooler moment the next day. The kind of thing you’ll want to go off and tell someone about because it's so interesting - not just in an empty factoid kind of way, but something that sparks real interesting conversation and real engagement. I’m looking for the presentations that those conversations are able to happen for, the ones with clear, digestible takeaways that don’t get lost in the retelling or garbled in translation. I’m hoping to see some inspiring and meaningful communication, that we can take away and go on to talk about again and again.
What are you most looking forward to about being involved in 3MT at UofG?
I can’t wait to hear about some really interesting research from some hopefully passionate people. It's always nice to discover new things, and often how my work evolves is I talk to someone and that turns into a little spark of an idea which grows into something more - and a lot of that comes from speaking to scientists and researchers. I think just love hearing ideas from the horse's mouth, as it were, and that’s what I’m most excited about with Three Minute Thesis.
Any final words of wisdom for this year’s 3MT competitors?
When they’re presenting their talks I think their slide has to aid in explaining what they're trying to get across, maybe in a way that their words can't do, or that enhances what they're trying to say with their words. For me, it shouldn’t be an additional thing that I have to read. That can sometimes detract from a presentation, especially for people like me who can listen or can read but struggles to do both at the same time.
The other thing I’d like people to grasp is that science and research in general can be really factual and really straightforward, but to be engaging you have to get people on board and that does mean finding what the story is. It doesn't have to be a made-up story, that's not what I mean at all, but there is always a narrative to whatever you're doing. I think this competition is a great way for PhD researchers to dig in to find that narrative, because that’s what will allow their research to become engaging and to give people a reason to care. It goes back to the interdisciplinary nature of science and the holistic approach that's needed in the real world. Science and art shouldn't be at odds with one another: you should be able to tell a beautiful, amazingly interesting story that’s still factual. I think TV is a great medium that allows me to do that, blending those two worlds of visual storytelling with hard facts underneath.
