‘Inside Sandia Podcast’ wins gold at New Mexico Public Relations Society of America’s Cumbre Awards

Explosions. Exoskeletons. Hypersonic speed. Metals that heal like skin.

These could be the elements of a Marvel blockbuster. Or just a typical day at Sandia.

But throw in cute burrowing owls, green chile roasted with solar power and career advice from top executives and you have the makings of an award-winning podcast.

The Labs Inside Sandia Podcast, which chronicled these topics and more since debuting in August 2023 as a new way for Sandia to communicate with its employees, claimed a Gold Award for Tactic — Podcast at the New Mexico Public Relations Society of America’s Cumbre Awards. The awards were held Nov. 7 at Albuquerque’s Route 66 Hotel.

Sandia claimed two other Cumbre Awards:

• Our Purpose Presentation Survey (Gold Award for Tactic — Research/Evaluation)
• A Brighter Future Video (Silver Award for Tactic — Videos)

The video was also a Platinum Winner of the 2024 Hermes Creative Awards. Administered by the Association of Marketing and Communications Professionals, the Hermes awards evaluate the creative industry’s best publications, websites, videos and more.

The podcast was launched after 45% of respondents in a 2023 Communications survey said they would be likely to listen to a podcast for Sandians, said Heather Clark, senior manager of Communications.

“With no additional funding or staff, this talented team took it from there, creating an engaging, new way for Sandia to tell its mission and other stories to the workforce,” Heather said. “It’s wonderful to see this team build a quality product and receive recognition from communications experts outside Sandia for their excellent work.”

Kim Vallez Quintana, a corporate communications specialist and frequent host of the podcast, was part of recording an episode at Sandia’s explosives test field.

“There’s always this intrigue about that area, like, ‘what do they do out there?’” she said. “We have the opportunity to take our listeners into places that maybe they wouldn’t visit normally.”

Kim and corporate communications specialist Troy Rummler took listeners along with Sandia volunteers who supported the DOE High School Regional Science Bowl at the Albuquerque Academy in March.

“To step into that world for a day, capture it and share it, that was fun,” Troy said. “There was a lot of energy in the room. Kids were buzzed and excited. The volunteers were happy to be there, and some of them had a history of doing science bowls as a kid. Sandia was going out into the community and making an impact — not just in a scientific way but helping kids and being part of their excitement for science. It was not a world that I had been part of.”

The hosts have enjoyed a front-row seat as Sandians shared the excitement they have for their technical work.

“Andrew Landahl is a great example,” Troy said. “He works in quantum information science and he loves to talk about quantum computing. It’s more than just a job for him. It’s a passion.”

“Learning the stories of how people came to work at Sandia and their backgrounds has been really interesting and fun,” Kim said. “One person that comes to mind is Sal Rodriguez (who was named 2023 Hispanic Engineer National Achievement Awards Conference Scientist of the Year). Sal is the son of immigrants; he was this kid who used to work in the fields with his family and then went on to be a genius. You get to delve into who these people are, how they grew up, how they came to be what they are today.”

Releasing new episodes every other week, the podcast benefited from contributions by a large team of communicators including Johann Snyder, Vince Gasparich, Sheina MacCormic, Katherine Beherec, Dan Ware, Alex Longo and Scott Faulk. Todd Perchert, who recently transferred to a technologist role at the Z Pulsed-Power Facility, also helped launch the podcast.