{"id":8583,"date":"2011-11-23T17:07:40","date_gmt":"2011-11-23T22:07:40","guid":{"rendered":"\/news_blogs\/john\/?p=8583"},"modified":"2023-12-20T16:47:02","modified_gmt":"2023-12-20T21:47:02","slug":"the-strategy-of-intentional-accidents","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cccc.org\/news_blogs\/john\/2011\/11\/23\/the-strategy-of-intentional-accidents\/","title":{"rendered":"The Strategy of Intentional Accidents"},"content":{"rendered":"
This entry is part 34 of 37 in the series Sabbatical<\/a><\/div><\/div><\/div>\n

Everyone knows about penicillin\u2019s accidental<\/em> discovery, but it wasn’t that accidental, and knowing the real story behind the ‘accident’ will add a great tool to your strategic planning toolbox. The truth is that Alexander Fleming was not an absent-minded, messy researcher but a brilliant strategist with habitual practices that made discoveries more likely. By adopting his practices, you will likewise make it more likely that good things will happen to your ministry!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What Really Happened in\u00a0Fleming’s Lab<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"St.<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Fleming’s lab fills the tower bay. It is the middle level of the three vertical windows.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Paddington<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Wikipedia<\/a> and other sites describe Fleming and his lab as untidy<\/em>, messy<\/em>, or cluttered<\/em>, but if you visit the lab, which is set up exactly<\/em> as it was in 1928, you will find out that what appears messy and cluttered is just another aspect of his experimental work. (Sorry, no pictures are allowed inside the lab.) The museum guide told me that when Fleming was done with an experiment (the experiment he intended to do), he always<\/em><\/strong> left samples of his experiment out for at least several days as an experiment to find something unintended that he obviously wasn’t<\/em> looking for.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another practice was to combine things just to see what happens. In 1921 he had a cold, and put some of his nasal mucous in a petri dish and saw that it dissolved the bacteria in the dish. He discovered a natural human antiseptic, lysozyme, which would have guaranteed his place in history even if he had never discovered penicillin!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Practices such as these made it possible for Fleming to be surprised by the unexpected. He was very intentional about creating opportunities for discoveries to be made. If this made his lab untidy or cluttered, so be it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Furthermore, it wasn’t an accident that he just happened<\/em> to notice something unusual in a sample. He always inspected the samples very carefully, and this time he noticed a clear spot on the slide where the bacteria that he was experimenting on should have been. The organism had been killed by something on this one part of the slide, and the killer agent turned out to be a mould that he first called mould juice<\/em> and (wisely) later called penicillin<\/em>!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The real story is that the discovery of penicillin was not\u00a0so accidental. Fleming deliberately<\/em> left the cultures out to allow time for something unexpected to happen. He deliberately<\/em> inspected the samples to see what, if anything, had developed.\u00a0He deliberately<\/em> followed up an unexpected observation to find an explanation for it. And he deliberately<\/em> invested time to think\u00a0about the implications of what he had discovered. Anyone who does what Fleming did is likely to discover something sooner or later.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In summary, Fleming’s method was:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \n
  1. Create opportunity to be surprised.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  2. Be on the lookout for surprising things.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  3. Be curious about the surprises you find.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  4. Look for ways to take advantage of the surprises.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    My Discovery Using Fleming’s Methods<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

    Although I did not realize I was using Fleming’s methods at the time, I discovered the idea for this post following the same principles as Fleming. It was no accident that I stumbled upon the lab that led to the story that inspired this post. Here’s an example of Fleming’s method at work:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Create Opportunity to Be Surprised<\/h3>\n\n\n\n