Faces of Baptcare | Meet Craig Smith

How long have you been working at Baptcare? What is your current role and what does it involve day to day?

I started with Baptcare in July 2021. I recently added the Workforce (Talent Acquisition & Employees Services) functions to my previous portfolios of Remuneration/Compensation and People Systems.

My role involves fixing problems and improving processes to help keep people working and making their working lives easier.

What do you like about working with Baptcare and in your current working space?

I admire anyone who works as a carer and I get a lot of satisfaction from supporting the people who perform that important role.

What surprises you about your job?

People never fail to surprise me, but it doesn’t matter how unique an organisation thinks it is, it is surprising just how often the underlying issues are often the same.

Did you always want to work within this space and what are some other jobs you’ve performed in your career?

I’ve always worked in the “people” space in some capacity. I started out as a payroll officer and worked my way up to my current role.

What did you want to be when you grew up?

I’ll let you know when I figure that out.

We heard that you won Volunteer of the Year Award for your contributions to community radio station 88.6 Plenty Valley FM. Firstly, congrats and secondly – can you tell us a bit about your volunteering and what drew you to get involved with PVFM?

I have always enjoyed music and I thought it might be fun to have my own radio show*. There are a couple of community stations in my area but PVFM offers a formal training course.

PVFM supports the local community by promoting services and events offered by community organisations, and the station is also a designated emergency broadcaster delivering key safety messages to the community. Volunteering involves representing PVFM at community events including broadcasting from the mobile studio and the occasional working bee around the studio building. PVFM as an organisation is a great community of like-minded people to be involved with.

*Ed note: Each week, Craig presents Deep Cuts a motley collection of memories and musical oddities featuring lesser-known music by artists you know – and some you don’t. Live to air on 88.6 Plenty Valley FM: Wednesday from 6:00pm to 8:00pm. More information at the end of this profile.

What was the last good book you’ve read or movie/tv series you’ve watched?

Currently reading Picts: Scourge of Rome, Rulers of the North by Gordon Noble & Nicholas Evans (non-fiction).

Recently enjoyed Everyone Else Burns, a coming-of-age sitcom about a Manchester family who are part of a puritanical Christian sect.

Please complete this question: My favourite weekend would include…

Four days.

What are two things on your bucket list?

Visiting the burial sites of ancestors in the UK.

Visiting standing stone sites across Scotland, especially in the Orkneys.

If you could sit next to someone at a dinner party, who would it be and why?

Geneticist Professor Turi King who worked on the DNA sequencing of the remains of Richard III and consults on the BBC series DNA Family Secrets.

Can you tell us two surprising things about yourself?

I am a published illustrator (No, I’m not the children’s book guy).

I occasionally give presentations at public libraries about using DNA for family history research. This is particularly surprising as I do not generally enjoy public speaking.

You mentioned that you don’t like public speaking and yet you’re a radio presenter? What is it about radio presenting that you like (and is perhaps less scary than public speaking?).

Speaking on the radio is much less daunting than speaking in public because your audience aren’t in the room looking at you.

Tell us more about your illustration side gig. Do you have a favourite illustrator?

The illustrations aren’t that exciting – they were for my wife’s academic papers (she’s an archaeologist), but those papers were published so I am taking that.

My favourite illustrators include Jean Giraud (aka Moebius) who did the production design for The Fifth Element, William Stout whose art appeared on the cover of many bootleg albums in the 1970s and Kerry Callen, a current artist who creates hilarious parodies of classic superhero comics.

Wow – your wife is an archaeologist! That’s pretty interesting.

Yes, I sometimes put that as an answer to the “tell us something interesting about yourself” question – “my wife is an archaeologist.”

From some of your responses above you’ve clearly got a love of history in common. Assuming history wasn’t part of your meeting story?

When we met, my wife was a reference librarian although she did have a Bachelor of Arts in Archaeology. She now has her PhD and is the leading expert on the site she did her thesis on.

Forgive me but there’s a line here that just has to be shared… “Craig and his archaeologist wife, bonded over their love of ancient ruins and genealogy…and the rest, as they say, is history…”

That works.

If you’d like to hear Craig’s radio show, Deep Cuts, here’s how!

Live to air on 88.6 Plenty Valley FM: Wednesday from 6:00pm to 8:00pm

Streaming live: https://www.pvfm.org.au

Repeat broadcast: Sunday from 2:00pm to 4:00pm

Listen any time: https://omny.fm/shows/deep-cuts/playlists/on-demand