Feature: Lab managers must take can-do attitude

While securing dangerous substances is certainly a big and growing problem, arguably the main threat to lab manager’s peace of mind comes from within. Take equipment procurement: “You’ll have a senior group leader told by one of his mates that he needs such and such shiny new toy, so he places the order and has it delivered without informing the lab manager,” Young notes.

It’s also becoming increasingly common for lab staff to take it upon themselves to buy next generation sequencers, regardless of whether they have the necessary grounding in bioinformatics to put them to proper use. In addition to being poor scientific practise, it also drains labs of their hard earned money and even threatens their very existence.

And then there’s the actual compliance and administration. “The muddy waters of legislative compliance are a massive burden and it’s become an absolute shambles,” Young laments. “There’s a million monkeys at a million typewriters filling out a million forms which make no positive impact on safety.”

He warns that this increased sense of risk aversion is breeding a particular type of lab manager. This threatens to stifle the very innovation and creativity that is necessary for quality research to occur. He calls them the ‘bunch of cant’s’.

“Researchers can have hundreds of different pieces of legislation that impact a single piece of equipment,” he says. “Lab managers have to work out and simplify for researchers what needs to be assessed in doing their job and ensure that they don’t simply become a ‘bunch of cant’s’.”

On the other hand, the HRI’s Garrett feels that the most dangerous lab manager is one who has developed ‘Cassandra’ syndrome, which refers to the tendency to ignore or disbelieve valid warnings in dangerous situations.

One of the most important pieces of advice he feels that lab managers need to heed comes straight out of the seminal text ‘What they don’t teach you at Harvard Business School’: “Don’t be afraid to say ‘I’m sorry, I don’t know and I need help’.”

He adds that today’s lab managers need to be very versatile. “There’s a greater emphasis on change management and risk management compared to other businesses. There’s a more complex and stringent set of laws, regulations and best practise that you have to abide by.”

However, lab managers will often find themselves sweating over regulations that don’t necessarily apply to them. “Often the sheriff or the regulatory body will get a bee in their bonnet about their jurisdiction,” Young notes. “Lab managers come into play when they want to be the ‘can’ not the ‘can’t’.”

This feature appeared in the November/December 2010 issue of Australian Life Scientist. To subscribe to the magazine, go here.