Diogo Seixas - Learning From Them

Diogo Seixas is a dreamer, thinker, learner, author, and educator. His passion for leadership led him to develop almost 4000 college students and write a self-development book. Currently, Diogo is pursuing his Ph.D. In Business Administration, it is an instructor and academic researcher while also informally writing about life in the 30s and people in organizations. He is the author of Enjoy the Ride. To learn more visit https://www.rideacad.com/.

A Quote From This Episode

• "It's been a great experience. I love it. I thought it would be very hard, and it is hard. But, at the same time, it's very fulfilling. The semester just flew by, and I felt very, very good about everything.
  
  

Resources/Authors Mentioned in This Episode

• Zone of Proximal Development 
• Author - Ana Suy

About The International Leadership Association (ILA)

• The ILA was created in 1999 to bring together professionals interested in the study, practice, and teaching of leadership. Plan now for ILA's 25th Global Conference in Vancouver, British Columbia, on October 12-15, 2023.

About The Boler College of Business at John Carroll University

• Boler offers four MBA programs – 1 Year Flexible, Hybrid, Online, and Professional. Each MBA track offers flexible timelines and various class structure options (online, in-person, hybrid, asynchronous). Boler’s tech core and international study tour opportunities set these MBA programs apart. Rankings highlighted in the intro are taken from CEO Magazine.

The International Studying Leadership Conference

• ISLC at Copenhagen Business School from December 10-12, 2023

About  Scott J. Allen

• Website

My Approach to Hosting

• The views of my guests do not constitute "truth." Nor do they reflect my personal views in some instances. However, they are views to consider, and I hope they help you clarify your perspective. Nothing can replace your reflection, research, and exploration of the topic.

Transcript

Note: Voice-to-text transcriptions are about 90% accurate, and conversations-to-text do not always translate perfectly. I include it to provide you with the spirit of the conversation.

Scott Allen  0:00  

Okay, everybody, welcome to the Phronesis podcast. Thank you so much for checking in wherever you are in the world. Today, I have a returning guest, Diogo Seixas. And he is a dreamer, a thinker, a learner, and an educator. He talks about life in the ‘30s. Occasionally, he geeks out on people in organizations and that whole kind of world. And you were an early, early guest, G, and I think we had committed at the end of that episode to talk annually. Well, I failed. I apologize. But we're back together today. And you are in year three of your Ph.D. program, and you have published a book; tell us a little bit about you. Bring us up to speed. And I know you've been teaching as well, so maybe we get into that conversation about work in the classroom.

Diogo Seixas  0:53  

Yeah, that'd be cool. Thanks, Scott, for having me back. Just making the collegial connection now because, when you were reading my bio now, I was like, “Wow, that's a great summary of what happened this past three years.” So honestly, I know that it's been three years, but it feels like one year, to be honest, because everything went by so fast. You just say, “Well, three years.” For me, it's kind of the same thing. I remember when I first started a Ph.D., I was, “Well, four years if everything goes right, that's like a big commitment.” Especially, I started, I was, I think, about 27, 28 years old, I think. So yeah, I was, like, “Man, this is going to be a long journey,” but it turns out, three years, I'm here, I am almost done. So yeah, it's been interesting, definitely. It's been an interesting journey. Well, from where we left last time in 2020, so yeah, back then, I was just starting the Ph.D. I think I started that fall, if I'm not wrong. And I was kind of in that transition period; I was working a lot with leadership development, and I had my company back in Brazil. And then, that [Inaudible 2:10] development for students. And then, I was about to move to the Ph.D., so I was in this transition process, that I wasn't sure what I wanted to do. And then the book came about, which was when I made the decision of, okay if I want to be a great professional, a great professor, a great researcher, I do have to dedicate a lot of time in my Ph.D. So, I decided to, I don't know if it's put a period in the time of my life, maybe a comma, colon, something like that, I don't know how I’d call it.

Scott Allen  2:47  

An ellipse. Probably a dot, dot, dot. (Laughs)

Diogo Seixas  2:53  

I think so. Yeah.

Scott Allen  2:54  

Or an em dash. It could be any of these.

Diogo Seixas  2:56  

Yeah, definitely not a period, I think. We'll see. We'll see where life will take me. So yeah, it was like that transition period. And the book came to represent that transition from one life to the Ph.D. program. So basically, as my bio also says dreamer, I put that always in front because I always believe that, for things to happen in the real world, you've got to think; you've got to dream about things first. And I used to help people a lot in like, “Okay, what do you do for life? What's your career goal?” Or, “What's your life goal? And even if you don't have one, let's do little things so we can get closer to that one goal.” So, the book it's called ‘Enjoying the Ride.’ I like to say that it's almost like an album of songs when you put all your favorite songs in one album. So the book is this. I put all my favorite reflections, all my favorite exercises, this kind of course that I created to help people, not to find their dreams, specifically, but at least, to get a more clear vision of what that looks like and enjoy the ride towards that point. So that's where the book's name comes from. Yeah, so that came out in December of that year. So, it's almost three years in December this year that the book’s been out. And it was an interesting journey writing that, and editing and putting it out. And definitely, I'm super happy that I could finish that. It was pretty cool.

Scott Allen  4:34  

Good. And talk to me about the Ph.D. program. What have been a couple of observations, maybe, the wonderful things that have occurred? What are some of the challenges you've experienced? I think listeners definitely, for anyone out there thinking that they want to do a Ph.D., they want to go through that process; what has your experience been?

Diogo Seixas  4:57  

It's been very different than what I imagined it would have been, not in a bad way, but really because I saw things I was not expecting. I got into the Ph.D. program because I want to become a college professor. I always talked about education, leadership, and teams, and always looked from the outside. But then, one day, it hit me; I was like, “Well, why not start that change from inside you?” So, that's what the main goal was, it’s like, “Okay, I want to become a college professor.” And I knew the research would be a component of the Ph.D. Here at SIU, it's more research-focused than actually teaching-focused. So, in the first two years of the program here, we go through all the different topics that you can think of, and our focus is management and organizational behavior. So yeah, so the first few years, it's a broad view of all the topics. So, we get a good idea of what it's out there, we find our passions, and then we decide on what we want to work on. And I've been working a little bit with teams, a little bit with career, I worked a little bit with the romance of leadership, which is a super interesting topic that got me, I remember, on my first semester in, I started doing research on that later too. So it's nice because I was able to translate all my passions into the research world too. It was way harder than I thought it would have been because, having English as a second language, I'm from Brazil, originally, so having English as a second language, I like to write, but I write as I talk; it was a challenge to kind of adapt that type of writing to the research writing. And I was fortunate enough that, right at the beginning, we had a lot of topics on how to write papers. And I remember one specific paper, I don’t remember the author, but I remember them talking about how we are responsible also to translating very specific and very research words to the people that are not from that environment so that information is available to everybody. I always have that in my mind, so every time I write now, I try to blend both styles. Something more academic-wise, but also never losing my essence, who I am in writing. So yeah, those were my first two years, and it was good. Comprehensive exams finished that. And then, now, I'm actually a Ph.D. candidate after that whole process. So, all but dissertation, that’s what we call it here. And our third year is when we actually start teaching. So that's why, when we first started talking, I had a lot of experience in teaching, coaching, and mentoring before, but it wasn't the same culture; it wasn't the same system, the same structure as it is the classroom. So, instead of starting from scratch, saying, “Okay, from zero,” based on all the experiences I've ever had with other professors, and a little bit of what I learned also with teaching, I thought about reaching out to people I knew that are good with teaching, and have been doing that for a while, that's how we reconnect.

Scott Allen  8:31  

Yes. So yeah. So, what did you experience? What were some of your observations of being in the classroom, in that setting as the professor? (Laughs)

Diogo Seixas  8:41  

So that's a great observation to start with because I think, as soon as I jumped in the classroom, I was like, “I am the professor, the instructor.”

Scott Alen  8:55  

(Laughs)

Diogo Seixas  8:57 

I'm not a student anymore, although I'm still a student in the Ph.D. program. And it was so funny because, many times, most of my friends, are Ph.D. students also, and we are teaching classes. And it was just funny to realize that the future of the student, the current students where we leave, they are in our hands. So, we are responsible for their education. So, it gives you a different type of motivation when you think like that. When you think that it's not about just sharing information but yes, you are part of the educational process of many people. And those people are going to influence other people whatever they're going to go work for. So, that was kind of scary at the beginning, but then it became a big motivational factor. But I think one of the big struggles I had was, I teach organizational behavior, 300 level class, and we were talking about teams and groups, and we talked about role conflict. It’s basically when… We have multiple roles, so I am an instructor, I’m also a student, I'm also a son, and I'm also a brother. So we have different roles, and sometimes, the decisions you make, get those roles into conflict. And, a lot of times, the decisions I have to make inside the classroom, I have my student role, and my professor role in conflict because it's one of those things where, well, I am responsible for your education, but, at the same me, as a student, I'm always asking, “Okay, do they really need to know this? Or if they do, what's the best way that I can teach, I can pass that knowledge?” And I think that was also another struggle was, how far, how different can I be without altering the system, educational system that we have today? Thinking about the exams, and multiple choices, or true or false, and group presentations, and quizzes, how different can you be, and how far can you go in such things in a way that it's not scary for students, it's not beyond expectations of the college as well? So, I think that's where I was and where I am. So, I'm always trying to do things. And I think, almost every day, every time I have to teach a class, I have to step back and say, “Okay, from the professor's perspective, yes, this makes sense. But from a student perspective, does it make sense? Are they going to use this? Do they need to know this? And what level, what depth, do they need to know all those things?” So yeah, so it's been a journey. And I've done competitions between them, helping them study for exams. I try to bring as much as I can from outside the classroom. And I was always, “Oh, this could be a great topic, but I already taught this lesson.” And it was, “Well, it doesn't have to be perfect, so even though the topic, it's not in the future or is not in the past, how can I still bring this topic because I know that's relevant for students and they can learn from it?” So, it was a deconstruction process that happened while I was constructing my own classroom. So, it was interesting.

Scott Allen  12:24  

(Laughs) Deconstructing while constructing. 

Diogo Seixas  12:29  

Yeah. Pretty much. But it was cool; it was a great experience. We have another, I think, two, three weeks because we were done about the first week of May here with the classes, and then they have finals, and then the semester is over. But yeah. And one last thing that really, really got me was when I was about to start teaching, I was talking to my parents and talking about, like, professors they had, and professors I had, we had good professors, bad professors, different experiences. And my mom said something like, “We need more humane professors.” I said, “Wow, that's very deep. Let's explore more of that.” And it's more to the level of we have classes that there are size of 10, and size 25, 30, 300, how can you treat people one by one and understand each one's case? I understand that that can be very overwhelming and hard for people, but that was always the perspective that I tried to have from day one. It's seeing each one as an individual, and just trying to help if they need help, and if they want help, of course.

Scott Allen  13:50  

Well, you're making me think of, it because I wrote down, literally, the piece of paper before you shared what your mom said; in undergrad, I went to a large public institution where I really don't remember more than one or two things a professor ever said, nor can I remember any of their names. And I didn't come across just really great professors until my graduate program into my Ph.D. program, where I came across some people, who were not only incredibly knowledgeable about their domain, but were incredibly skilled at building relationships. That's always, for me, been the north star that, if I can build a relationship… And obviously, these are not becoming my friends; maybe after they're graduated, and we go to lunch every once in a while, and keep the relationship going, they become a friend, but not in that teacher-student dynamic. But building that relationship and actually trying to get to know them, what they're involved, in what they're passionate about, what it is that they are kind of turned on by the topic, what they enjoy about the topic, and really building a relationship, for me, probably no one ever said that to you except for your mom, but that humanity, connecting with someone on a person to person level and letting them know that you care, boy, having that modeled for me was such a gift because, again, I didn't have it model as an undergrad. And it is what it is. But that care, and that genuine desire to build a relationship, for me, has just really, really, really been beneficial. And then, I did an exercise maybe three weeks ago right now, I have a group of juniors in college. And this is a course in leadership, I was modeling feedback, and receiving feedback. And I said to them, “Okay, what have you really enjoyed about this class? What should I consider changing for next time? What should I never do again?” And they were almost blown away that a professor would ask them for feedback, that a professor would say, “Your opinion matters.” And, of course, I'm not going to act on all of it, I can't act on all of it. I'm not going to get rid of a book, or some other things that sometimes you hear the students say, but I learned, I learned a lot. I learned a lot about what fires them up, what's de-energizing, what's exciting, what they want more of, and what they want less of. And then, I can go away and design again, and try a new iteration. So sometimes, I hear people say, “Oh, I can't stand working with millennials.” That's what I would hear years ago. And now, it's, “Oh, Gen Z.” Well, if you talk with them, and you build a relationship, and you connect, and you listen to their perspective, you hear some pretty interesting things. So, for me, those two things have been so helpful in the classroom, building relationship. Now, there are times when I've had an online class of 70 students, and it's just very difficult to do. But if I'm face-to-face, and it's 25, 30 students, which, at my institution, is generally the number, then I can hone in, and go, and try and get to know them, and then learn from them. And hear from them what their experience is like, and adjust, and shift, and tweak, and then design moving forward.

Diogo Seixas  17:32  

I think that's a key point. It's learning from them because we teach, like in business, or whatever we do, we always say, “Understand your customer,” right? And they're saying, who you're doing that for. So, getting that feedback and trying to understand, it's trying to meet halfway. It's, “Okay, what do you want? What's good for you, and what's not? And how can I meet those expectations based on the boundaries I can?” Is definitely an important thing. I did a similar activity on day one of the classroom. I asked them, “What makes a great professor? What makes a great class? What makes a great student also?” And I will share their plans for the future. My idea was to connect the class to the things that are important to them. I don't think I did a good job at that just because of the variety of career goals that they had. But every time I had a one-on-one conversation with them, I was able to always really, like, “Oh, I remember that you wanted to become an entrepreneur. So yeah, this makes sense for you or not.” So, I try to create that level of connection and feedback. So, I think that that's key, just because, very often, the only feedback we get, it's at the end of the semester. So, I want to kind of keep it going with the feedback.

Scott Allen  18:58  

As soon as you find out that their passion is football, or lacrosse, or Greek life, or student government, or that they're working at Whole Foods, as soon as you learn some of those things about them, then I think you can also get into some things where, especially with organizational behavior, you can start contextualizing the content in a little bit of a different way. You can say, “How does this apply on the football team?” And you're talking about teams, you're talking about culture, or you're talking about norms, or you're talking about any number of other different topics we discuss, all of a sudden, what I love is having those light bulbs go on of, “Oh, wow. I'm literally swimming in this every day. This content. This is so cool. If I open my eyes and just look around me, it's all over this swimming and diving team; it's all over the Residence Hall Association. It's here.” And so, contextualizing the content, too is something I'm always thinking about because I've written a textbook. Now, we tried very hard to do what I'm about to say in that textbook. But, at times, they can come off as these kinds of just white-walled kind of plastic, not in any way, shape, or form irrelevant to me kind of experience when some of these concepts are so cool. Organizational behavior concepts are all over the film, any film about the Avengers. A lot of the concepts are there, if we see it. So, that's another thing I'm always thinking about is, how do we contextualize this content to make it relevant to where they are. 

Diogo Seixas  20:44  

That's beautiful. One thing I've been doing, too is, for example, I treat the classroom as an organization as well. So, for example, when I'm talking about personality and values, I'm like, “Okay, how can we apply that to the classroom? Imagine that first day of classes I asked you, ‘Let's see who you are. Let's assess your personality. Tell me about your values.” And how can we apply that motivation? How can you have more autonomy? How can you create mastery? How can you have a purpose?” So, I'm always picking their brains on how to apply the class content to the classroom because a wish in the future, I can get that knowledge and reapply again to the class. And then, we get out of the regular format of the classroom, and we can start putting in a few new things, to improve the scenario. 

Scott Allen  21:40  

And you just mentioned something really important there; regular format. So, what does that mean? Well, oftentimes, that's another PowerPoint slide deck with about 50 slides in about 50 minutes. And another thing I often think about is, how do I make this experience feel, not only just different from a normal class, that it's not going to be the same old thing every day where we are opening up a slide deck, we're on a PowerPoint death march, dark room, talk at you for 50 minutes. And, in some cases, we have to do that. I'm not, for listeners, suggesting that's not the case. But are we switching up how we deliver the content? And so, I think of it almost as a recipe. I might have a TED talk, we might have a quick dialogue, I might lecture for seven minutes, I might do a case with a student in their organization that they're a member of, how this stuff applies in the hockey team. And then, all of a sudden, we're at 50 minutes. And I do something a little bit different next time. And it's not this sing-songy type experience, the same thing over and over, or, at least, that's my goal, is that it doesn't always feel the same. And we're using reading, we're watching documentaries, we're listening to podcasts, we are engaged in dialogue, we're doing activities, we're doing live cases, we have alumni speaking about how the content is relevant. We're weaving in different instructional strategies to help communicate the content, not only for different learning styles but just so that the course, people come, and they're kind of, “Well, what are we going to do today? This has been interesting.” (Laughs)

Diogo Seixas  23:35  

I saw once that… It was a friend that told me that quality, it's basically when expectations are exceeded. So, when students come to class and they have expectations that it’s just going to be 50 slides, and the professor is going to be talking all the time, whatever you do that's different than what they are expecting, you’ll have good quality, you’ll have a good classroom. And, of course, you are raising the bar every time you do that, but that's also a great thing because… That's another thing that I was very much afraid. I was like, “Well, what if, down the line, after teaching 10, 20 years, you, of course, you have good days and bad days, but what if you let the bad days influence you more than the good days?” Then you're going to go back to that same format of doing the same things. And if you do that, you're just creating that format culture, basically, in which classes are not engaging, classes are not fun. And then, students also think that classes are not fun, and we create a culture that education was not fun. And it shouldn't be like that. So, every time we go to the classroom, and we bring one different team, it doesn't matter if it's a conversation, a TED Talk, a podcast, or whatever, we're not only influencing their culture and their education, but we are creating a different culture in education, that if we can do, we can be examples, other people are going to do the same. And then, little by little, we can change the educational system. I know that it's your topic, but honestly, I think that's even my main goal going into academia is to do differently than I've gone through, basically.

Scott Allen  25:23  

Sure. And I think you said something there that really stood up for me also; you said, “Raise the bar.” And I think we can challenge the heck out of students. We can challenge them. And challenge them to work at higher levels than they have. But I think it's Vygotsky, I don't know if that's the correct… Vygotsky. The zone of proximal development, or another easy way to say that is challenge and support. I think we can push them to work above and beyond what they thought was capable. But we also have to combine that with that support, and that developmental eye because they're in different places, they're individuals. Some of them want to be there, some of them, we’re influencing them or challenging them to want to be there. Some of them, we don't ever get through to in certain cases. They're not ready for it, or they're not motivated, or I wasn't the person to deliver the communication that would resonate for them. There are a number of different dynamics. But that challenge and support, and them accomplishing some things that they didn't think they could, is also so much fun to see. And so, I love the classroom because I really do view it as a laboratory where, again, I don't want listeners to think that this is some freewheeling, non-intentional experience. We have learning outcomes, we have learning objectives, and we have a place that we're trying to get, but can we ultimately spark curiosity in the students? Can we ultimately develop a passion for them in the topic, help them see this topic and its relevance all around them, and engage? 

Diogo Seixas  27:12  

It's almost like, it's not about reinventing the wheel; it's just like improving the conditions so their ride is more smooth. That's it. The solution is the same. We just want to get there a little more… Enjoying the ride a little better, I guess.

Scott Allen  27:38  

(Laughs) Yes. It's a really fun conversation. And I'm excited that you are in the classroom, and you have this opportunity to experiment and to explore. And again, just like I view parenting as an opportunity to practice leadership, I really do view the classroom as an opportunity to practice leadership. And sometimes, I do better than others. Sometimes I've failed. Sometimes it has not worked the way I'd hoped it would. But again, 9 times out of 10, if I build a relationship, if they know that I'm open to hearing their feedback, the students are very forgiving when things don't work. I have this thing coming up in a couple of weeks where we're going to do some VR activities, virtual reality activities, team building in virtual reality, and that could fail miserably. I don't know. I'm a little bit actually kind of anxious about it. And I know that they'll be forgiving if they experience it as a terrible experience because they'll be able to look at me and say, “Yeah, don't do that again, Scott,” or, “That was awesome. I liked that.” (Laughs)

Diogo Seixas  28:44  

Yeah. That's it. So I told you earlier that I did accomplish it with them, right? Because they always ask me, “Oh, can we do…” This is organizational behavior, we go through a bunch of topics, and there's like a bunch of theories, and definitions. So it is hard to remember everything when we go through at the exam. And they're always, “Oh, you got to do a review.” And then, the night before, I was like, “How can I review four chapters of definitions?” It was boring, even for me. And I've been coaching tennis also. And usually, when you teach little kids, so age like eight to even, I think, five to 10, they love competition. So, whatever you do that you put them to compete against each other, they love it. I was like, “Well, I'm going to try to do something similar in the classroom.” And as soon as I got there, I told them, I was like, “Guys, this can be a complete failure, or it can be like one of the best things we've ever done. We won’t know until we try, so let's just see how he works.” And I kind of just created a game on how they were organized in groups, and answering questions. And depending on how they did it, they could steal questions from another person, they could get points, there was a prize towards the end. And I got very good feedback from that too. But it's one of those things where, like, just try it., if it doesn't work, you're going to have another 30 lessons to try something different just in that semester plus all the other years you're going to keep teaching. So, yeah, it's been a great experience. I love it. I thought it would be very hard, and it is hard. But, at the same time, it's very fulfilling. The semester just flew by, and I felt very, very good about everything.

Scott Allen  30:35  

And then another benefit of building the relationships, at least, for me, is that I am -- you said 10 to 20 years in -- I am 16 years in roughly. If I'm building relationships, you know what? It keeps me in, it keeps me engaged, it keeps me curious, it keeps me wanting to do better because that's what they deserve. And again, I also just love the puzzle of, okay, how do we make an online course incredible? Does the recipe exist? I think it can. I think I had some colleagues who were like, “Nope, it doesn't exist, it can't happen.” Well, I believe we can create a good course, or HyFlex, that's very challenging where you have some folks on the internet, some folks live in the room, and that's a challenging context. But I view that as a puzzle to be figured out. And I view that as an opportunity to experiment, and to learn. And again, ultimately, how do I create the best learning experience for these individuals? Because online is going nowhere. HyFlex; probably going to be a thing. In person, yes. So, if I can master those three different domains, those mediums, then that's a good skill to have. It just is. So, I just have great respect for the fact that you're, not only kind of standing at the precipice of, I imagine, starting all of the climb of the dissertation, but you're also in the classroom, and getting that experience, and experimenting, and exploring. But I wish someone would have said to me, “It's about the relationships you build.” And again, I'm so lucky to have that modeled for me. But, woof, right? I can't tell you the name of one of my professors in undergraduate, I can't. That's too bad. That's tragic. It's tragic. Now, it's great professors in graduate school, incredible human beings that, you know what? I got a Ph.D. because my graduate professor, one of my primary graduate professors, said, “Scott, have you ever thought about it? You could do it.” And it's those people, Brenda Gardner, who, thankfully, I crossed paths with her because it made all the difference in my life. (Laughs)

Diogo Seixas  33:04  

Wow. Yeah. That's the beauty of the professionals. So it's having that impact, right? That's powerful.

Scott Allen  33:12  

Yep. Well, as we wind down our time today, sir, what have you been listening to, reading, streaming? What's caught your attention in recent times? I imagine you've been reading a lot of journal articles. So, other than journal and academic work, what's caught your attention in recent times?

Diogo Seixas  33:31  

So, it's funny that you asked because I've always been a big reader of leadership teams, emotions, whatever is people related. But again, from my bio, I talk about life in the ‘30s. I became 31 last year, so 30 a couple of years ago, and that was a weird transition. Weird because you keep asking, okay, am I in the right path? And then, you compare yourself to other people, and all those existential questions that you have about life. So, lately, I've been reading more about death, about life in general. A couple of authors from Brazil, actually Ana Suy. She talks a lot about relationships and love, which was pretty cool. I also started writing another book on the ‘30s. Yeah. Because I think talking to people in writing is my way of connecting to the world also. So, every time I go through some sort of existential crisis such as like the first book, all of those things are questions I had myself, and I think I found a reasonable answer, and then I wrote about it. And here, if people want to share that kind of line, they can. With the ‘30s, it’s the same thing. So, I've been getting a lot of Brazilian authors lately. So it's one of them. But it's mostly about life at 30 and how weird this transition is where you are an adult, but you don't feel like you are an adult, and you don't know what makes you an adult. So yeah. So there are a lot of questions like that. Do you feel like an adult?

Scott Allen  35:22  

Do I feel like an adult? Well, I just turned 50. So you were turning 30 and I was turning 50. And every decade for me, I'm thankful for this, has been better than the previous decade. So, my ‘20s were so much better than my teens, and my ‘30s were so much better than my ‘20s, and my ‘40s were so much better than my ‘30s, and ‘20s, and teens. So, I feel very, very, very fortunate. No, I don't have it all figured out, but it's fun exploring, and it's fun being curious about the world. And I pay close attention to where's my energy. And this podcast, and having conversations with people like you is where my energy is right now. I just love it. And so, another interesting thing we could explore down the road is that, at times, I think if you're a part of the ‘academy,’ quote-unquote, and you've gone through this Ph.D. program, and you're going to be a scholar, etc, etc. I think, at times, it can be fairly narrowly defined as to what that means. But you can contribute in new and different ways like this podcast has been a contribution. And, for me, it's so energizing, much more energizing than writing a journal article. (Laughs) That's part of the gig, you got to do that. I'm going to say, and my energy, if I'm paying close attention, is in this space. So, having conversations, having dialogue, highlighting other people's work, and getting their good work out into the world. I love that. I absolutely love that. So, well, sir, we'll do it again. We'll do it again. Let's have our next conversation before your defense. Okay?

Diogo Seixas  37:16  

Okay.

Scott Allen  37:18  

Can you reach out? 

Diogo Seixas  37:20  

I can, yes. It’s going to be soon, I think. Yes.

Scott Allen  37:23

The defense of your actual dissertation?

Diogo Seixas  37:24  

No, the defense, hopefully, is going to be May next year, actually. The proposal, it's by the summer now. So, proposal summary, and then start looking for jobs already, and all that stuff. So, I'm excited about everything that is about to come, definitely.

Scott Allen  37:38  

Good. Well, let's talk before your defense of the dissertation. 

Diogo Seixas  37:43  

Okay, cool. I will do that.

Scott Allen  37:46  

Okay, Sei. Be well.

Diogo Seixas  37:46  

Thank you, Scott. Thanks for having me. Bye. Bye.

[End Of Audio]