Lab Etiquette: Don’t Make us Call Supernanny

We wouldn’t sit down to dinner at a friend’s house and slurp up the soup using only our hands.  We wouldn’t start peppering a seminar speaker with questions on their title slide, either.  Why not?  Simply put, it would be rude.  Most situations in our lives are dictated by etiquette – a series of guidelines that suggest the “proper” behavior for a situation.  The lab is no different…

Each lab has their own rules, whether or not they’re explicitly written.  Figuring the new rules out may take some time, but there are a few that will always be a part of good lab etiquette.

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Listen to others

Nobody wins when two points are argued at the same time.  The easiest thing to do is just let the other person get everything out, then state our case.  A transition that references their point will also help since they’ll realize that we actually listened.  “I agree it would be great to functionally characterize every single protein in the human genome, however perhaps we could test our methodology on a few candidates first.”

Reorder chemicals if they’re low

There is nothing worse than going to make a buffer for an experiment that we’ve been planning for two weeks, only to find out that the 5-kg drum of salt now contains 13 mg of material.  When things get low, we should pull our weight and order a replacement.

Take responsibility

If the $2500 FPLC column just slipped out of our hands and shattered on the floor, the correct answer is not to look around and then quickly run back to our bench like nothing happened.  “What!?  Someone broke the column?!”  Everyone makes mistakes.  Sure the boss might be angry, but it’s temporary.  Everyone will figure out who did it anyway so it’s important to step up to the plate and take the opportunity to earn our colleagues’ respect…

Say “Thank You”

Oh, the power of “thank you.”  When someone helps us out in lab, we can think of it as receiving a little present.  Maybe the gift was a reagent, a piece of advice or a bit of their time.  Just because it didn’t come wrapped up with a bow on it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be appreciative.

Clean up after yourself

It’s unclear whether more passive aggressive notes have been left on the scale or the centrifuge…  But, in either case the author was right to be angry.  Leaving a snowstorm of unknown power within a two-foot radius of the scale is not good.  Nor is walking away from a centrifuge after it looks like it was hit by a hurricane of bacterial culture.  When the little devil sitting on our shoulder says “No seriously, that’s exactly how it looked when we got here”, we should turn to the other shoulder…

Don’t be greedy

Labs, like all great teams, need to work together to achieve greatness.  Look at The Detroit Lions, The Spice Girls, Menudo.

It’s important to remember that others also work in the same place and use the same equipment as we do.  Signing up for a two-week block on the PCR machine is excessive.  Reserving the tissue culture hood from 8am – 8pm for 30 minutes of work is inappropriate.  Instrumentation use often cycles between “zero” and “swamped.”  In periods of heavy use, we should be mindful of our colleagues and their needs as well.

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Any other lab etiquette suggestions to make us better labmates?

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