ADAPT OR DIE

Heavenly Labs How to Find Them by Beryl Lieff Benderly	Hellish Labs How to Avoid or Escape Them by Lara Pullen
Posted September 17, 1999 · Issue 62

Heavenly Labs
How to Find Them
by Beryl Lieff Benderly

Lately, much attention has been focused on what's wrong with the workaday reality in many of our nation's labs. With thousands of Ph.D.s caught in short-term positions that don't lead to independent research careers, a 1998 National Research Council report, "Trends in the Early Careers of Life Scientists," speaks of a "crisis of expectation" among frustrated younger scientists. The recent suicide of a Harvard graduate student sharpened the fear that some high-profile labs are little more than heartless experiment factories to be judged by their research productivity alone.

Hellish Labs
How to Avoid or Escape Them
by Lara Pullen

Students know which are the bad labs, and they talk quietly about it among themselves. You may not know what I am talking about. If that is the case, then you are lucky or clever or both. Unfortunately, there are many students and postdocs who do know what I am talking about. They know what it feels like to be at the professional mercy of a poor manager (best-case scenario) or an outright bully (worst-case scenario).