Temper Your Harsh Critic By Looking For A Podcast's Best Trick [S3E55C]

Guest host: Kevin Patton of the podcasts The A&P Professor and The Academic Podcaster.

We all do that, right? We podcasters often listen to podcasts with an overly critical ear. That's natural. Everybody does that. Carpenters naturally check out the quality of construction when they visit your newly built home. Engineers sometimes can't help but analyze the arches and beams and cables as they go over a bridge when they take a road trip.

But I think that sometimes all of us—podcasters, engineers, all of us—develop a habit of going right to those things that we don't like. Right to those mistakes or to those things that could be much better. That is, being critical only in the negative sense. And possibly never really getting around to what's working well.

I recently listened to a podcaster talking about having those critical, negative, responses when listening to other podcasts and pretty much giving up on trying to listen to them. And a thought occurred to me. A thought that brought me back to my youth as an apprentice wild animal trainer.

My mentor made sure that I saw as many wild animal acts as possible. We were working in animal shows at a major zoo at the time. But we'd watch circus acts as they came through town, or the next town, or the town just past that one.

After each of these animal performances, we'd talk about it. He'd always ask me—in his best Socratic style—“Kevin, what was the best trick in that act?” And I’d have to think hard about that, because I knew that he’d be questioning any answer I gave. And I knew he'd not reveal his pick until the very end of the conversation.

And as I answered him, he’d ask why I picked that trick and not this other one, which was a pretty good one, after all. Not that ranking the best of what I saw was all that important itself. What was important was analyzing each one deeply enough that I could rank them. That is, getting past my first impressions and casual judgments and have really analyzed each trick I saw performed.

And you know what? It worked. I learned to look at performing animal acts and how trainers presented themselves and interacted with their animals much more deeply.

My immediate goal back then was to better form an idea of what I wanted to do when I got to be a grown-up lion tamer and developed my own show. And I also learned that the first step in enjoying a wild animal act is to look for the best things about it—not the worst things about it. Even if it was a pretty lousy act, there was always something done well. Or kinda well. Even if it was a very simple trick for a person to teach an animal, but it was executed perfectly, which is probably more about the animal than the trainer, I had learned to notice that and appreciate that.

What happened was that I began to enjoy animal acts way more than I ever had. Even the lousy ones. Reflecting back on that, I realize that the big lesson I learned is appreciation.

I was an assistant sea lion trainer back then, later moving on to become an apprentice lion tamer. After a while, I switched to a slightly different species to train and became a college professor. Now past the middle of my career, I mentor other professors in how to teach well. In a graduate degree program that trains teaching professors, it's my job to critique the teaching skills of my learners. And you know what? Looking first and foremost for their “best trick” serves me really well. Looking for a student's "best trick" is a form of criticism, too—just not the negative part of criticism.

That “best trick” technique has worked very well for me on...

Guest host: Kevin Patton of the podcasts The A&P Professor and The Academic Podcaster.

We all do that, right? We podcasters often listen to podcasts with an overly critical ear. That's natural. Everybody does that. Carpenters naturally check out the quality of construction when they visit your newly built home. Engineers sometimes can't help but analyze the arches and beams and cables as they go over a bridge when they take a road trip.

But I think that sometimes all of us—podcasters, engineers, all of us—develop a habit of going right to those things that we don't like. Right to those mistakes or to those things that could be much better. That is, being critical only in the negative sense. And possibly never really getting around to what's working well.

I recently listened to a podcaster talking about having those critical, negative, responses when listening to other podcasts and pretty much giving up on trying to listen to them. And a thought occurred to me. A thought that brought me back to my youth as an apprentice wild animal trainer.

My mentor made sure that I saw as many wild animal acts as possible. We were working in animal shows at a major zoo at the time. But we'd watch circus acts as they came through town, or the next town, or the town just past that one.

After each of these animal performances, we'd talk about it. He'd always ask me—in his best Socratic style—“Kevin, what was the best trick in that act?” And I’d have to think hard about that, because I knew that he’d be questioning any answer I gave. And I knew he'd not reveal his pick until the very end of the conversation.

And as I answered him, he’d ask why I picked that trick and not this other one, which was a pretty good one, after all. Not that ranking the best of what I saw was all that important itself. What was important was analyzing each one deeply enough that I could rank them. That is, getting past my first impressions and casual judgments and have really analyzed each trick I saw performed.

And you know what? It worked. I learned to look at performing animal acts and how trainers presented themselves and interacted with their animals much more deeply.

My immediate goal back then was to better form an idea of what I wanted to do when I got to be a grown-up lion tamer and developed my own show. And I also learned that the first step in enjoying a wild animal act is to look for the best things about it—not the worst things about it. Even if it was a pretty lousy act, there was always something done well. Or kinda well. Even if it was a very simple trick for a person to teach an animal, but it was executed perfectly, which is probably more about the animal than the trainer, I had learned to notice that and appreciate that.

What happened was that I began to enjoy animal acts way more than I ever had. Even the lousy ones. Reflecting back on that, I realize that the big lesson I learned is appreciation.

I was an assistant sea lion trainer back then, later moving on to become an apprentice lion tamer. After a while, I switched to a slightly different species to train and became a college professor. Now past the middle of my career, I mentor other professors in how to teach well. In a graduate degree program that trains teaching professors, it's my job to critique the teaching skills of my learners. And you know what? Looking first and foremost for their “best trick” serves me really well. Looking for a student's "best trick" is a form of criticism, too—just not the negative part of criticism.

That “best trick” technique has worked very well for me on several levels. Not just for providing useful feedback in college teaching. But on another level, I find that by starting off with acknowledging a student's best trick, it softens that “here’s a suggestion” advice for those weak spots that I've also found in their work.

Besides that, I've found that as I become better at using the best-trick approach, I've often squarely hit those specific things that a student worked particularly hard at…and is most proud of. What a great thing to validate those aspects of their work that THEY value most.

I'm thinking that, well, one could say that the best-trick technique has become one of my best tricks!

So bringing this story back to being a podcaster listening to other podcasts, I've found that I naturally look first for a podcast's “best trick.” And also try to find some other really good tricks—just in case I hear that mentor in my memory asking me if that’s really my final answer.

And I enjoy these podcasts more than I otherwise would. And I think that I learn much more from them than I otherwise would.

So I ask you, what do YOU do when you listen to other podcasts? Maybe you've given up listening to new podcasts because they so often just grate on your finely tuned expert's sensitivity. Maybe you listen, but just can't get past that bad mic technique or disorganized conversation… or that missing call-to-action… or whatever pet peeve pops out at you.

Or…maybe you do try to find what's done well, but more as a secondary thing, perhaps even as an afterthought. I wonder if trying to start out with the goal of first and foremost trying to find the "best trick" might help you enjoy other podcasts more. Maybe preparing yourself for questions like, "why is that the best trick and not this other trick?" will make that work even better for you.

I hope my little story has got you thinking a bit about your thinking, what we educators call meta-cognition. Thinking about your thinking.

I have a podcast called The A&P Professor for anatomy & physiology faculty, but don’t listen to it. It's not for you. But I've recently been collecting a ragtag group of folks who want help in launching or growing their own academic podcast. It's a free online community at AcademicPodcasting.org.

Right now, we're developing a new podcast as a learning activity. It's called The Academic Podcaster and it's for, by, and about academic podcasters. If you are an academic podcaster, or know one, or just want to hang out with us, once again, we're at AcademicPodcasting.org. 

Evo will be back in 2021 with yet another Podcast Pontifications. Cheers!

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Support For Abortion Rights

While Americans overwhelmingly support the right of an individual to make their own decisions about abortion, unfortunately, that right is no longer protected everywhere in the U.S. The Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade on June 24th.

Abortion is a basic healthcare need for the millions of people who can become pregnant. Everyone should have the freedom to decide what’s best for themselves and their families, including when it comes to ending a pregnancy. This decision has dire consequences for individual health and safety, and could have harsh repercussions for other landmark decisions.

Restricting access to comprehensive reproductive care, including abortion, threatens the health and independence of all Americans. Even if you live in a state where abortion rights are upheld, access to safe medical procedures shouldn’t be determined by location, and it shouldn't be the privilege of a small few.

You can help by donating to local abortion funds. To find out where to donate for each state, visit donations4abortion.com.

If you or someone you know needs help, or if you want to get more involved, here are 5 resources:

1. ShoutYourAbortion.com is a campaign to normalize abortion.
2. DontBanEquality.com is a campaign for companies to take a stand against abortion restrictions.
3. Abortion.cafe has information about where to find clinics.
4. PlanCPills.org provides early at-home abortion pills that you can keep in your medicine cabinet.
5. Choice.CRD.co has a collection of these resources and more.

We encourage you to speak up! And spread the word.

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