Sociology is not for the faint of heart: on taking the hard path to professional satisfaction and finding ways to transfer knowledge

She@Work

Today I speak with my friend Prof. Ana Fernandez.

We have been knowing each other for nearly 15 years and I can say Ana is one of the finent policy-analyst I have worked with! She has mastered the ability of applying scientific rigour to policy processes and in the episode we will see what it took to get here.

Ana started her adult life planning to be an engineer but soon realised she had to take another, more uncertain, path. She chose to study sociology, got into graduate schools, went to Mexico, the UK, worked for the European Commission and then, in the middle of the Spanish economic crisis, chose to move back to university.

We talked about these different choices, how you realise you make a mistake, the sacrifices you need to make to pursue your goals and (which is a favourite topic of mine) the role of social sciences in "real life" and in "public policy", the importance of a diverse staff in a university.

Weirdly we don't talk about Ana's experience as an entrenpreneur... for that we'll need another podcast!

Thank you Ana for your time!