research-strategy-brief

Creating a Research Strategy Brief

What This Does

Integrate policy trends, research capability analysis, funding opportunity information, internal resources, and potential competitors/collaborators to create a short research strategy memo for departments, research groups, and centers. Rather than mere information gathering, it should go as far as clarifying "which opportunities, who, and what should be prepared."

• Target Users: URA, research strategy staff, department executive leadership, center directors, PI groups
• Problems to Solve: Policy information, funding opportunity information, and research capability analysis exist separately and are not converted into concrete actions
• Expected Outcomes: Make it easier to discuss priority areas, candidate PIs, team formation, preparation for the next funding call, and internal measures

Required Inputs

• Scope: Departments, research groups, centers, themes, periods
• Policy and Funding Opportunity Information: Government policy, FA funding calls, council materials, internal priority measures
• Research Capability Information: Papers, citations, KAKEN, researchmap, awards, external funding, joint research
• Internal Resources: Researchers, equipment, URA, administrative staff, industry-academia collaboration, international collaboration, existing projects
• Purpose: Department meetings, strategy meetings, funding preparation, base formation, budget requests, etc.
• Constraints(Optional): Deadlines, candidates, priority fields, disclosure availability

What It Produces

1. Research Strategy Brief: Background, opportunities, strengths, gaps, recommended actions
2. Opportunity Map: Correspondence table of policy, funding calls, research capability, and internal resources
3. Candidate Themes and Candidate Team Proposals: PI, roles, partner institutions, preparation ToDos
4. Decision Memo: Matters to be decided by departments and research groups
5. Next Action Table: Person in charge, deadline, contact point, required materials

Procedure

1. Define the purpose of the brief

用途:
- 読者:
- 決めたいこと:
- 使う会議:
- 期限:
- 公開範囲:

Change the level of detail depending on whether the readers are department executive leadership or candidate PIs.

2. Separate information sources

Information	Examples	Notes
Policy	MEXT, CSTI, councils, FA strategy	Check the latest official materials
Funding Calls	JST, JSPS, AMED, NEDO, private grants	Deadlines, eligibility, recommendation quotas
Research Capability	Papers, KAKEN, OpenAlex, researchmap	Clearly state the limitations of indicators
Internal Resources	Equipment, researchers, existing bases, support systems	Be careful with the handling of non-public information
External Collaboration	Companies, local governments, overseas institutions	Contracts, intellectual property, international confirmation

3. Create an opportunity map

| 機会/政策 | 関連公募 | 学内の強み | 足りない要素 | 候補者/部署 | 次アクション |
|-----------|----------|------------|--------------|-------------|--------------|

4. Write the strategy brief

# 研究戦略ブリーフ

## 要旨

## 背景

## いま見えている機会

## 学内の強み

## ギャップ・リスク

## 推奨アクション

## 次に決めること

Recommended actions are divided into information provision, team formation, interviews, preparation for public calls, internal university measures, and external collaboration.

5. Turn into next actions

| アクション | 目的 | 担当 | 期限 | 確認先 | 成果物 |
|------------|------|------|------|--------|--------|

Judgment criteria

Judgment item	Points to check	Response
Evidence	Is there a source in policy, public calls, or indicators?	Record URL and confirmation date
Feasibility	Are there candidates, deadlines, and a support system?	Turn into ToDos
Limitations of indicators	Are there field differences, DB differences, or same-name individuals?	State the limitations
Institutional strategy	Is it consistent with internal university policy?	Confirm with relevant departments
Disclosure scope	Does it contain non-public information?	Specify the sharing scope

Common mistakes and countermeasures

Mistake	Countermeasure
Ending with a summary of policy information	Break it down to candidate themes, teams, and ToDos
Treating indicators like a ranking	Write field differences and limitations
Not working backward from the public call deadline	internal-deadline-tracker hand over to
The memo becomes one whose readers are unclear	Put the readers and meeting purpose first

Quality standards

• Policy, public calls, research strength, and internal university resources are made into a single set of decision-making materials
• Recommended actions have owners, deadlines, and deliverables
• Indicators and inferences are distinguished
• policy-monitor, research-metrics, funding-search can integrate the outputs of

Available Tools

• Read: Reading policy documents, public call guidelines, research strength data, and internal university materials
• Write: Creating strategy briefs, opportunity maps, candidate team tables, and ToDo tables
• WebSearch / WebFetch: Confirming government, FA, university, and researcher information
• Bash: Formatting tables, CSV, aggregation, and source lists