36 min
Episode 10 - Dr. Natalie Garrett, Private Secretary to the Chief Scientist at the Met Office Beyond Your Research Degree
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- Education
Welcome to the Beyond Your Research Degree podcast from the University of Exeter Doctoral College! The podcast about non-academic careers and all the opportunities available to you... beyond your research degree! In this episode Kelly Preece, Researcher Development Manager talks to Dr. Natalie Garrett, Private Secretary to the Chief Scientist at the Met Office. You can find out more about Natalie on the Met Office website, and the British Federation of Women Graduates scholarships.
Music from https://filmmusic.io ’Cheery Monday’ by Kevin MacLeod (https://incompetech.com) License: CC BY (https://creativecommons.org/licenses
Podcast transcript
100:00:10,880 --> 00:00:23,690Hello and welcome to the Beyond Your Research Degree podcast by the University of Exeter Doctoral College
200:00:23,690 --> 00:00:27,050Hello and welcome to the latest episode of Beyond Your Research Degree.
300:00:27,050 --> 00:00:31,490I'm your host, Kelly Preece, and today I'm going to be talking to Dr. Natalie Garrett.
400:00:31,490 --> 00:00:35,900Natalie currently works as a private secretary to the Met Office chief scientist.
500:00:35,900 --> 00:00:41,120So, Natalie, are you happy to introduce yourself? My name is Natalie Garrett.
600:00:41,120 --> 00:00:45,980I work at the Met office as the private secretary to our chief scientist.
700:00:45,980 --> 00:00:48,650I've been in this role since January of this year.
800:00:48,650 --> 00:01:01,070So more than half my time in this position has now been spent working from home, which has been an interesting kind of journey like before January.
900:01:01,070 --> 00:01:06,530I was working in the international climate services team still at the Met office,
1000:01:06,530 --> 00:01:12,480and I had been in that position for, I think, the best part of four years.
1100:01:12,480 --> 00:01:17,400And the purpose of that role was essentially to manage a project that was all
1200:01:17,400 --> 00:01:23,820about translating climate science into actionable information for decision makers.
1300:01:23,820 --> 00:01:31,260But prior to all of that, I was a postdoc at the University of Exeter working in the Biomedical Physics Group.
1400:01:31,260 --> 00:01:39,150And you might notice that there's a bit of a Segway there from biomedical physics to climate and weather science.
1500:01:39,150 --> 00:01:45,480And it's not necessarily immediately apparent what exactly unifies those two areas.
1600:01:45,480 --> 00:01:54,790But broadly, what motivates me at work is to do something that's meaningful and that will have a positive impact on society.
1700:01:54,790 --> 00:02:05,950So the work I did at the university was primarily translating biomedical advances into kind of taking physical interpretations of them.
1800:02:05,950 --> 00:02:16,650So one of the major projects I worked on my role was to provide mechanistic validation for the claims that were being made in patents for novel
1900:02:16,650 --> 00:02:21,210nano medicines that were aimed to treat things like alzhiemers and brain cancer.
2000:02:21,210 --> 00:02:27,690And having lost a family member to brain cancer, that was obviously an area that was very close to my heart.
2100:02:27,690 --> 00:02:33,200So sometimes I feel like my career has been a little bit of a random walk.
2200:02:33,200 --> 00:02:39,140But ultimately, I've always done what I thought sounded interesting,
2300:02:39,140 --> 00:02:46,230and I perhaps naively assumed that job opportunities would make themselves apparent to me along the way.
2400:02:46,230 --> 00:02:54,160And I've been very fortunate and privileged that that has worked out for me.
2500:02:54,160 --> 00:02:58,120That's brilliant and really interesting to hear about that.
2600:02:58,120 --> 00:03:06,700That from kind of being a postdoc in researching inside inside a university to moving outside.
2700:03:06,700 --> 00:03:11,710I wondered if you could talk a little bit about your experience of that transition.
2800:03:11,710 -->
Welcome to the Beyond Your Research Degree podcast from the University of Exeter Doctoral College! The podcast about non-academic careers and all the opportunities available to you... beyond your research degree! In this episode Kelly Preece, Researcher Development Manager talks to Dr. Natalie Garrett, Private Secretary to the Chief Scientist at the Met Office. You can find out more about Natalie on the Met Office website, and the British Federation of Women Graduates scholarships.
Music from https://filmmusic.io ’Cheery Monday’ by Kevin MacLeod (https://incompetech.com) License: CC BY (https://creativecommons.org/licenses
Podcast transcript
100:00:10,880 --> 00:00:23,690Hello and welcome to the Beyond Your Research Degree podcast by the University of Exeter Doctoral College
200:00:23,690 --> 00:00:27,050Hello and welcome to the latest episode of Beyond Your Research Degree.
300:00:27,050 --> 00:00:31,490I'm your host, Kelly Preece, and today I'm going to be talking to Dr. Natalie Garrett.
400:00:31,490 --> 00:00:35,900Natalie currently works as a private secretary to the Met Office chief scientist.
500:00:35,900 --> 00:00:41,120So, Natalie, are you happy to introduce yourself? My name is Natalie Garrett.
600:00:41,120 --> 00:00:45,980I work at the Met office as the private secretary to our chief scientist.
700:00:45,980 --> 00:00:48,650I've been in this role since January of this year.
800:00:48,650 --> 00:01:01,070So more than half my time in this position has now been spent working from home, which has been an interesting kind of journey like before January.
900:01:01,070 --> 00:01:06,530I was working in the international climate services team still at the Met office,
1000:01:06,530 --> 00:01:12,480and I had been in that position for, I think, the best part of four years.
1100:01:12,480 --> 00:01:17,400And the purpose of that role was essentially to manage a project that was all
1200:01:17,400 --> 00:01:23,820about translating climate science into actionable information for decision makers.
1300:01:23,820 --> 00:01:31,260But prior to all of that, I was a postdoc at the University of Exeter working in the Biomedical Physics Group.
1400:01:31,260 --> 00:01:39,150And you might notice that there's a bit of a Segway there from biomedical physics to climate and weather science.
1500:01:39,150 --> 00:01:45,480And it's not necessarily immediately apparent what exactly unifies those two areas.
1600:01:45,480 --> 00:01:54,790But broadly, what motivates me at work is to do something that's meaningful and that will have a positive impact on society.
1700:01:54,790 --> 00:02:05,950So the work I did at the university was primarily translating biomedical advances into kind of taking physical interpretations of them.
1800:02:05,950 --> 00:02:16,650So one of the major projects I worked on my role was to provide mechanistic validation for the claims that were being made in patents for novel
1900:02:16,650 --> 00:02:21,210nano medicines that were aimed to treat things like alzhiemers and brain cancer.
2000:02:21,210 --> 00:02:27,690And having lost a family member to brain cancer, that was obviously an area that was very close to my heart.
2100:02:27,690 --> 00:02:33,200So sometimes I feel like my career has been a little bit of a random walk.
2200:02:33,200 --> 00:02:39,140But ultimately, I've always done what I thought sounded interesting,
2300:02:39,140 --> 00:02:46,230and I perhaps naively assumed that job opportunities would make themselves apparent to me along the way.
2400:02:46,230 --> 00:02:54,160And I've been very fortunate and privileged that that has worked out for me.
2500:02:54,160 --> 00:02:58,120That's brilliant and really interesting to hear about that.
2600:02:58,120 --> 00:03:06,700That from kind of being a postdoc in researching inside inside a university to moving outside.
2700:03:06,700 --> 00:03:11,710I wondered if you could talk a little bit about your experience of that transition.
2800:03:11,710 -->
36 min