As a researcher interested in how organizations thrive, I have been studying the Langer Lab as an exemplar for nearly six years. I have learned that the keys to success depend on recognizing that entrepreneurial science requires extensive collaborations on both the scientific side and the business side. Scientists that succeed are good collaborators; if you are a junior researcher, this primarily entails working hard, following up, being willing to take initiative and looking for opportunities to be a project champion. If you are a lab director, this means allowing others to share the credit and take direct ownership of the project, which is the necessary flip side to identifying a project champion. A project champion cannot do the job if someone above her or him is micromanaging the process or taking all the credit.

The Langer Lab is very flexible, especially with resources. This can mean working with what you have on hand rather than getting stymied by lack of resources. This is especially true with human talent. Back when the lab was just beginning, Langer conducted research primarily with the assistance of Massachusetts Institute of Technology undergraduates. The work needed to be done, and he used whatever talent he had (today, dozens of undergraduates still work alongside graduate students and postdocs in the lab).

The lab keeps an open mind about what might be a potential platform technology. Good ideas can come from anywhere and frequently arise through combined knowledge from two previously disparate lines of research. Just as it was uncharacteristic for a surgery lab in the 1970s to hire Langer, today his lab includes researchers not typically found in chemical engineering departments. He hires promising scientists even if the relevance of their expertise to current projects is not immediately apparent. This creates conditions in which ideas are shared and helps lead to multidisciplinary innovations.