You can do everything “right” on paper and still feel like your career is shrinking.
Kayleigh Bateman sits down with Dr. Niamh Shaw, an Irish engineer, scientist, and award-winning science communicator whose path bends from a PhD and academic research into theatre, broadcasting, astronaut training, and space exploration storytelling. The thread isn’t luck or a perfect plan, it’s the moment she stops treating her biggest passion as unrealistic and starts treating it as a direction.
We dig into the hard parts people rarely say out loud: losing confidence as a teen, feeling isolated in academia, and the quiet pressure to perform a certain kind of success. Niamh shares how values-based career choices changed everything for her, why collaboration beats hierarchy for some personalities, and how “the thing you’re most embarrassed about” can become your unique advantage. If you’re navigating a career change, a non-linear path, or a squiggly career in STEM, you’ll hear language for what you’ve been feeling.
Then we get practical about science communication and public engagement. Niamh explains how she keeps scientific accuracy while making complex research accessible: read deeply, verify what you don’t understand, and translate jargon into clean analogies rooted in everyday life. We also talk about why STEM can feel excluding, how fear of being wrong shuts down curiosity, and why it’s okay to learn while you’re still “in the fog.”
Finally, Niamh breaks down what a simulated Mars mission taught her about resilience, water scarcity, teamwork, and perspective, plus how boldly stating a goal opened doors with the European Space Agency and NASA media work.
