The spotlights of this month are all turned to Sara Villa, our Training and Community lead! She’s the happy face behind our warm Slack messages, training onboarding sessions, and our newsletter Roots.
Meet Sara!
Name: Sara Villa
Role in OLS: Training and Community Lead
Contact if people want to have a chat? sara [at] we-are-ols.org or drop me a Slack message!
Socials: LinkedIn
Questions about OLS
What do you do at OLS? What does your day look like?
My work days look very different and that’s what I love about working in OLS. One day I’m focusing on comms and spending time publishing blogs, posting on Slack and social media… Maybe next one I’m preparing training materials and researching new content… and other I’m in meetings all day talking to amazing people and LEARNING A LOT! As community and training lead, I do all this to make sure that OLS training efforts are the best quality and really serve our diversity and inclusion values. I love talking to different people and collaborating with them to improve every bit of work I get out.
What do you like about the OLS community? What makes it ‘different’?
OLS community is made of people who were humble enough to sign up to improve their own work, make it open and more accessible to others… and who love to collaborate with other people! That’s not something you can find in any community. We have global members with different expertise and backgrounds, who yet speak the same language: a love for research and sustainability to make the world better 🫶
How would you like to help people in the OLS community? What kind of help would you like from the OLS community?
I would love to help people get the word out about what an amazing work they’re already doing! If you want to write a blog post about your open work… help me to help you! I also enjoy making connections and putting people in touch so they can get the best of each other.
Questions about you and your interest
What skill/expertise do you have in the open science world? How did you learn it?
Efficient collaboration and facilitation. I think I learnt it by practice, one way or another, and they realised how relevant it is in the open science world. I love applying my skills to research and project management and to help others, so… win-win!
What is a topic that you care a lot about? Why is it important to you?
I care about continuous improvement, whether applying it to yourself, others, projects… anything in life! I think I love being a researcher because it’s the perfect way to improve things while helping yourself and others- so it pairs well with my incapacity to settle ;) I love applying continuous improvement not just as a tangible project management skill, but also as a reflective exercise to see how I can be a better person, a better colleague and a better human in this world.
Silly/short ones
What was your last impulsive buy?
Colouring mandala book
What is your guilty pleasure?
Vanilla ice cream- all day all year long
What is your favourite quote?
‘When you open your mind to the impossible, sometimes you find the truth’ (or really, anything by Walter Bishop in Fringe)
What item would you spend ALL YOUR money on?
Ice cream
What is your favourite movie?
My Neighbour Totoro
What is your favourite rainy day activity?
Watch my Neighbor Totoro while eating vanilla icecream XD
Deeper ones
What gets you out of bed?
My kid, hunger… and the hopes of a new day to have funnnnn!
What do you want to learn next in life?
How to keep doing research and science while nurturing communities.
What makes you sad?
Being 100% honest… hunger and being tired. Otherwise… I’m a pretty optimistic person!
What do you like about society?
The power of people and community. When it all goes to shit, people are always there and being human is what gets us out of any mess.