Making Enemies is Job #1

I started working at Lincoln University in December of last year. Since that time, a colleague and I have been sharing a lab with a faculty member and space has been tight. We were promised a larger lab right next to our office, but it has been previously used as sort of a community lab space by several researchers. And let's just say habits are hard to break. News went out a couple of weeks ago from university administration that the lab had been handed over wholly to my faculty supervisor. Last week my colleague and I watched with delight as equipment and supplies were cleared from the lab. Over the last couple of days, we have been finishing clearing equipment that won't be used and moving supplies into storage that we won't need.

Unfortunately (but not for me) some of the other researchers came by the lab looking for supplies that had already been tossed out. Oops. Sorry about your bad luck, but the lab was supposed to be cleared weeks ago, actually months ago. And pretty much everyone else in the building got mad because we stacked all of the unwanted equipment in the hallway so that LU Surplus Property could haul it away; they considered it an eyesore. So the equipment was scattered throughout other parts of the building where they would not be so obtrusive. My guess is that they will remain in those out-of-the-way corners for a few more decades. Or until the end of time. Whichever comes first.

The way I look at it: my purpose at LU is to help build the cooperative research program into an advanced, innovation-producing machine. It's difficult to do that with fifty-year-old instruments. My purpose at LU is not to make friends, and so I'm not going to worry too much about making a few enemies.