One of the concepts we learn in medical school is that the body has a limited number of ways to respond to any external event. Take the inflammatory process as an example, which consists of the following characteristics:

Because the body has these limited ways to respond, many different pathological processes will look the same. A fractured bone may present with swelling, pain, loss of function, and heat while this same presentation may be seen during an infection.

Just as the body has a limited way of responding to various assaults with an overlap of similar symptoms for different disorders, so too do the skills people acquire overlap to be useful in more than one arena. There are fundamental skills that translate across the domains.

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“What skills do you have that can translate or be found useful in your role as a podiatrist?”

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I recently heard an interesting conversation on a podcast called Mindscape. It’s a sciencey podcast by the well-known physicist Sean Carroll (author of The Big Picture: On The Origins of Life, Meaning, and the Universe Itself). Yes, I’m a giant science geek and proud of it! Carroll was interviewing director Scott Derrickson, creator of Marvel’s Dr. Strange. During their discussion Derrickson commented on the overlap of certain skills between life and movie making. He described the useful skills he learned working as a car salesman in his father’s dealership when he was a kid. These sales skills are apparently very useful working in Hollywood when convincing a company to make your movie.

Translational skills such as these, where one skill set is applicable to a new set of circumstances, creates flexibility and adaptability. Certainly this is true for most fields of work and study. It makes sense that many modern skills would overlap into many areas, especially since so many intellectual arenas require multiple skills to be successful. Let’s take the most obvious skill of all: reading. If a person in our modern society is unable to read they will be unable to function in almost any job.

I have noticed over the past few years when I interview applicants for the College or residency program, I’m looking to find out about prior experiences with the understanding that past actions often predict future behavior. Similarly, I’m also looking for those people who have unique experiences that prepared them with skills that are translational across a broad swath of fields.

As an example, for the last several years the Western University College of Podiatric Medicine has published a student run journal. This journal is truly student lead and almost every detail from beginning to end is done by the student committee that runs the journal. In order to shepherd a quality journal from conception to printing and distribution, this committee must utilize multiple skills including teamwork, planning, communication, organization, problem solving, writing/editing, and, in some cases, conflict resolution. We have been lucky to have at the head of each year’s journal a different dynamic editor-in-chief who displays these traits with the addition of leadership and situational awareness to keep control of all the moving parts.

Consider what this would look like in an applicant to a residency program. These students increased their life experiences by participating in something that allowed them to build skills that are translational, from publishing a journal to working in a residency program. They’ve demonstrated the ability to complete something difficult in addition to the other characteristics described above. Clearly these skills would translate well to a successful resident and eventually medical practice.

Building a library of translational skills that will come in handy during residency training is a key aspect of undergraduate training. I would bet that most residency selection committees are looking for the same type of broad-based experiential skill set in their future residents.

Best wishes.