Philosophy

…if you are free, you need to free somebody else. If you have some power, then your job is to empower somebody else. –Toni Morrison (from The Truest Eye)

Never pass judgment or put anger on someone too quickly or harshly, because I guarantee you that person is fighting a battle that you know nothing about. –U.S. Army Specialist Douglas Jay Green

• Everyone is an equally valuable member of our team. We respect and support each other’s science and wellbeing. We carry each other through challenges and celebrate each other’s accomplishments. We are curious and enthusiastic about each other’s work. We are all here to learn from one another.
• Transparency is the key to building trust. We share our expectations, our priorities, our work and communication styles, and our goals. We are honest about our challenges and our data, especially when it doesn’t match our hypotheses. We ask for help proactively.
• We assume the best in everyone. We are patient, thoughtful, and understanding. We do our best to work within everyone’s personal work and communication styles. We respect each other’s goals, values, and priorities. We actively listen.
• Everyone contributes to tending the lab ‘garden’. We strive to work collaboratively and mentor others wherever we can. We share our resources and skills to benefit others. We actively contribute to the shared knowledge of the lab. We share our code and data when we publish and release our work as preprints.
• Your time is valuable. There are an infinite number of questions and tasks to pursue and a finite number of hours in your day. I will never ask you to do work that I don’t think would benefit you. I encourage you to say no to me and to other requests when they don’t meet your priorities. We will consider how to use your time in lab as effectively as possible so you have ample time to enjoy your life outside of lab.
• Staying organized to manage your experiments, time, supplies, and resources is critical to great science. We will keep shared resources organized. We will keep our data, records, and samples organized such that our mentees and co-authors can work with us effectively.
• Science goes beyond the bench. We are lifelong learners and will make time for professional development training that meets our needs. We will volunteer for outreach, especially to historically marginalized groups. We will contribute to justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion efforts.
• We take caution and consideration with our experiments. We question each element of our experiments to make sure they’re the most appropriate to test our hypotheses. We think critically about the background literature and data the supports our hypotheses. We design the strongest experiment before diving into data collection. We pause to do intermediate analyses before collecting additional data. We seek feedback early, often, and from many viewpoints.
• We value failure as part of learning. I invite everyone to take risks and will commend you even if it fails. We value the process over the product and resilience over results.
• We build bridges, not fences. We bring everyone into science. Our job is not to gatekeep people or their science from progressing. Our job is to see the best in every person and project and raise them up to their highest potential.

Our lab manual implements the 33 guidelines outlined in the SAFE Labs Handbook. The following are the segments that must be publicly documented:

AI Use

• AI tools may be used for some tasks in our lab with caution and all outputs must be verified.
• Code: AI can be used to assist in writing code (e.g. Github Copilot) if the outputs are thoroughly tested, as you would for any manually generated code. AI cannot be used to write large amounts of code independently (”vibe coding”), as it will likely contain critical errors. All code must be well formatted and documented.
• Transcription: AI may be used for live transcription of meetings if necessary for accessibility and may be used to generate meeting summaries by tools that immediately delete recordings (e.g. Fireflies). Everyone in the meeting must consent first.
• Literature Review: AI can also be used to identify relevant papers for you to read. You must read these papers yourself rather than taking the tool’s summary as fact; these summaries usually have serious flaws in them.
• Writing: AI may be used to suggest minor edits, like reducing word counts or simplifying language. AI may never be used for original writing, including papers, presentations, applications, and reviews, as these should be in your own words.

Green Initiatives

• Transit: I encourage you to take public transportation or share taxis between airports and conference venues whenever possible.
• Electricity: Turn off room lights when not in use and shut down computers between experiments.
• Composting: Put coffee grounds, tea bags, and other compostable food scraps into the lab compost bin on the coffee cart.

Common Lab Language

• You are welcome to speak any language you want, as long as everyone in the conversation speaks that language. Lab notebooks and all documentation must be kept in English so everyone can understand them. All lab business and meetings are held in English.

Work-Life Balance

• Each project and person will work at their own pace, and that pace will change as your life changes. My goal is for you to feel you are meeting your own expectations. During our weekly meetings, share with me what you planned to do last week, what you did, and how you’re adjusting your expectations to meet your pace. We will evaluate how your project is progressing together and create a plan to adjust expectations if necessary. During our annual meetings, we will plan your goals, align them with your career path, and discuss what you can realistically achieve during the next year. Projects in this lab often take multiple years, may continue into your next career stage, and can sometimes require weekend and evening work. I expect that you will have many other commitments besides your lab work; please keep me in the loop about them so we can keep our expectations realistic.
• There are many reasons why you may not meet your own expectations, but I am an ardent advocate against the “just work harder” mindset. Your work pace may feel like the only thing you have control over, but working longer hours almost never gets to the root of the problem. It’s important to set boundaries so you don’t just work all the time. You cannot pour from an empty cup.

Meetings

Lab meetings & open meetings

• When: Lab meetings are Mondays 9:30am-11am in the conference room. Everyone is expected to attend and be on time. If you must miss a lab meeting, let the presenter and Emily know, and talk to the presenter afterwards to learn about what you missed.
• Format: Slides recommended, but not required. If you’re presenting a project update, plan to present background slides establishing the scientific premise for your project. Share with the lab what types of feedback you’re seeking (e.g. overall project direction, new experiments, figure nit-picking). If you’re presenting a journal club, please send a link to or pdf of the paper to the lab via the #journal_club channel at least a week in advance, so everyone has time to read it.
• Topics:
  • 1st meeting of the month is journal club
  • 3rd meeting of the month is a workshop (pick whatever topic and teach us)
  • Whenever someone attends a meeting, take the next available lab meeting to share what you learned.
  • Each lab member gives a formal progress update every 3 months

One-on-one meetings

• Frequency: 1-on-1 meetings with me start at weekly frequency and can slow to less frequent (but at least once a month) when you’re particularly busy (e.g. during data collection or a full-time workshop) or as you gain independence.
• Topics: These meetings are a good time to share personal and professional status updates; lay out future plans for the following week, month or year; share results; get verbal feedback on writing or figures you’ve shared with me in advance; or anything you want to bring up. Anything personal you share with me in our 1-on-1s is kept confidential.
• Prep: Think about how I can be most helpful in your goals. Do you want feedback on a plan? Guidance on where to start? Advice on a professional development topic? Anything you can share with me in advance can help me prepare, from a simple 1-sentence idea of what we’re discussing to a whole folder full of figures.

Responsibilities

• Project Ownership: Every PhD student and postdoc has their own project. First projects for each trainee are initially proposed by me and then designed and implemented with my input. Postdocs may propose their own first project if they choose. Second projects are then proposed by the trainee. You are the driving force behind your project, taking ownership of it and all related elements. Plan ahead and be proactive.
• Project Assistance: Technicians and undergraduate students will help with one or more ongoing projects in the lab. Technicians can expect to contribute as a co-author on at least one paper. Technicians are expected to help manage the lab as well. Undergraduate students will be considered for co-authorship if their contribution meets our guidelines discussed below.

Onboarding

• A complete and frequently updated onboarding checklist is on the lab wiki.

Shared Resources

• Everyone contributes equally to keeping the lab running.
• All tools, equipment, consumables, and lab spaces are shared, except for desks. Sign up for shared rooms and equipment in timely manner on the “rooms and equipment” calendar. Reset the space when you’re done or label as a work in progress.
• We collectively keep the inventory up-to-date to prevent duplicates. Order replacement inventory at least before we reach 2 week’s supply, to allow for shipping time.
• We have an annual lab clean-up in December that everyone is expected to participate in. We use this time to reorganize shared inventory, toss or rehome items no longer in use, and agree on where things should live.

Authorship

• We follow ICMJE authorship guidelines. Authorship is granted when the paper could not have happened without their contribution. This could be a substantial intellectual, data collection, analysis, or data sharing contribution. All authors are expected to contribute to manuscript writing, editing, and journal revisions.

Role Expectations

• I expect technicians to be our lab for 2 years, PhD students 4-5 years, and postdocs 4-6 years. Students and postdocs should at a minimum submit their first author paper and post it to bioRxiv before leaving the lab. If you can complete your publication in less than 4 years, you’re welcome to leave the lab then if you wish. All lab members will remain funded beyond these time ranges, provided they are still maintaining adequate progress. Establish your goals during the annual IDP meeting and keep track of your progress. I will provide feedback on your progress as needed. I expect you to keep on top of deadlines for your graduate program, conferences, fellowships, and trainings.

Conferences

• Every lab member can travel to present at one conference per year. If you want attend more than one conference in a single year or travel to a conference without presenting something, discuss with me so we can determine how we can fund your travel in a way that’s fair to other lab members. These trips are fully funded; I only support travel if I can reimburse 100% of transportation, meals, and hotels.
• Each lab member can attend 1 major external workshop during their time in lab (e.g. Neuromatch) with a tuition budget of about $1000 per person. Tuition for additional courses will be considered on a case-by-case basis.

Prior Work

• You may need to dedicate work hours to completing work from your previous lab. It’s common to have papers still in revision when starting your next career chapter. Communicate your timeline for finishing prior work. Balance it with your current responsibilities. This work should ideally not extend beyond your first year in lab, but paper revision timelines can be unpredictable. I recommend dedicating focused time to paper revisions to turn them around faster, rather than trying to split your time between two projects. If you have a paper not yet finished, I ask that you delay your start date until that paper is submitted. You’re also welcome to travel to give invited posters and talks for your previous work, provided it is funded by your previous lab.

Postdoc Funding

• All positions are fully funded.

Visas

• The visa process in the US is outrageously complicated, cumbersome, and expensive. Work with me and the UMB Office of International Services to ensure your visa paperwork and fees are submitted in a timely manner. Expect the process to take several months at least. Whenever possible, the lab funds all visa application fees. Note that most visas come with expiration dates and are tied to a specific employer. Work with me well in advance of the visa expiration or before moving on to your next job so we can work together to transition your visa.

Offboarding

• Let Emily know as far in advance as possible about your departure plans. She will help you arrange the following:
  • Teaching any skills unique to you to other lab members
  • Leaving your records and data organized
  • Storing, transferring, or discarding your remaining samples, supplies, and desk items
  • Arranging a realistic timeline for remaining papers, or transfer those projects to other lab members
• Please keep Emily updated on your life, your accomplishments, and your contact info. She loves seeing her trainees succeed in whatever their chosen career path is. Her door is always open to you as your mentor.

Interview Process

• Candidates are solicited from public job postings. After screening CVs, I invite a subset to 1-on-1 Zoom interviews, then speak over Zoom with references of a further subset. I use the same set of Zoom interview questions for all candidates and share them with the candidate in advance. For technicians, we have a final round of interviews with select current lab members before making an offer. For postdocs, we invite them to a full-day onsite interview including a seminar, meeting 1-on-1 with lab members and other relevant people, and a meal with lab members before making an offer.
• I decide to invite candidates to join the lab based on the following criteria:
  • Do I have sufficient funding for them and their project?
  • Do their research interests mesh well with the lab’s direction?
  • Do other lab members approve of them joining the lab?
  • Is there a lab member who would be a good fit as their paired mentor and is able to do so?
  • Do I think they would mesh well with our lab’s culture and dynamics?
  • Have they demonstrated growth and resilience in their prior work, showing a potential for growth and future scientific excellence?