I think that all these points are interesting and valid.
On Jan 25, 2012, at 10:37, Chris Morris wrote:
Tassos reports:
1. None of the twenty test-users was satisfied with any of the two
solutions - and each was annoyed for a different reason.
This suggests that the choice of ELN is not the most difficult part
of the adoption process. Maybe the test users at the NKI were
annoyed by the idea of using an ELN at all.
That would surely apply to some users. Some were actually very keen,
and thats why they signed up for it.
In my experience, the hardest part is ensuring that it provides
benefits to the people who have to enter the data, and provides them
early. The fact that it will make information retrieval easier in
three years is not enough.
I suggest focussing on electronic support for housekeeping: booking
time on an instrument, finding the files the instrument created,
ordering oligos, recording when you use the last of a reagent.
Scientists work very independently in most respects, but they do
have certain obligations that flow from sharing the lab space. You
can make use of these to encourage compliance with the ELN. If you
do, then most of the science will get recorded in passing.
I think that this was exactly one of the problems. The ELNs we tested
had no option for booking instruments, no way to find files from
instruments let alone read them (it would support only TIF, JPEG, Doc,
XLS, PDF), and would not do stock keeping: all these are thought to be
out of the ELN scope. And that makes an ELN inherently less useful.
Lack of instrument support is another issue: a machine that would
allow us to import real chromatograms to ELN would be cool - alas, the
solution that was suggested to us is to save as PDF or XLS and
reload ...! (it took 3 weeks to come back with this great plan!)
For the rest I have nothing much to say, I basically agree.
A.
I suggest also ensuring that it includes electronic tools that
actually help. Two examples from PiMS are primer design, and
automatically uploading and interpreting results from the Caliper GX
instrument.
It must allow round trips with spreadsheets, i.e. dump ELN data as a
spreadsheet, edit it, upload it again. Despite their substantial
disadvantages, some scientists will not give them up. It should also
allow crossreferencing with paper note books. Some will continue to
use a lab notebook. When they discover that the ELN serves as a
searchable index to it, they will warm to the ELN.
I suggest aiming for "no paper" at your lab progress meetings within
say 12 months. When you reach that point, everything important is in
the ELN. Before then, the ELN is not giving real value.
You will need someone who is keen on the introduction of the ELN, to
customise it, provide first line user support, and act as a single
point of contact with the supplier. This might be a scientist or an
IT person. I have also seen this done well by a technician, Delphine
Chesnel when she was at the EMBL Hamburg. If you can't find such a
"champion", then introduction will not be successful.
Some of the problem here is an "own goal" by the community:
scientists are trained to use paper during their degrees, so ELNs
are a controversial change of practice. One person who, unusually,
began with an ELN told me how inconvenient it is now she works in a
paper-based lab.
PepTalk 2012 had a workshop on this topic. The recording and notes
are here:
http://www.structuralbiology.eu/support/forums/networks/pims/why-dont-scientists-use-limselns
regards,
Chris
____________________________________________
Chris Morris
chris.mor...@stfc.ac.uk
Tel: +44 (0)1925 603689 Fax: +44 (0)1925 603634
Mobile: 07921-717915
Skype: chrishgmorris
http://pims.structuralbiology.eu/
http://www.citeulike.org/blog/chrishmorris
Daresbury Lab, Daresbury, Warrington, UK, WA4 4AD
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Anastassis (Tassos) Perrakis, Principal Investigator / Staff Member
Department of Biochemistry (B8)
Netherlands Cancer Institute,
Dept. B8, 1066 CX Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Tel: +31 20 512 1951 Fax: +31 20 512 1954 Mobile / SMS: +31 6 28 597791
