The 4th HIRAKU-Vitae Workshop – Report

“Building and leading research collaborations”

Date: Thursday, February 7, 2019 10:00 – 17:00
Venue: Meeting Room 1&2, Student Plaza 4F, Hiroshima University (Higashi-Hiroshima Campus)
Participants: 29 in total (including 16HIRAKU Consortium Researchers, 2 Assistant Professors from Tohoku University, 2 URAs, 2 participants from industry)
Facilitator: Dr. Janet Metcalfe, Chair and Head, Vitae U.K.

This workshop aimed at tenure track academics and experienced researchers who want to improve their ability to build effective interdisciplinary and intersectoral collaborations.
It started with the self-introduction session. Since most of the participants did not know each other at first place, everyone was quite enthusiastic about knowing the others’ research.

After that, Vitae RDF (Researcher Development Framework) was explored to identify what kind of skills and competencies are required to drive collaborative research. Divided into four groups, they shared opinions each other. The facilitator highlighted an interesting finding that only two participants from the industry picked up “Risk Management”, while none of the rest thought it important for collaborative research. It seemed eye-opening experience to the participants from academia.

After luncheon session, everyone started to look into SDGs or the OECD Sustainable Development Goals. Surprisingly two-thirds of the participants knew none about SDGs, but everyone picked up one theme to tackle out of 17 objectives and divided into four different groups. While learning the key elements of collaborative research and TIPS to drive them, they have gradually integrated their discussion into the final proposal. Quite unique ideas were born from each group, which have triggered lost of questions and proactive feedback given to final presenters.

Some participants felt it quite difficult to integrate diversified opinions into one proposal, while we received quite lots of positive feedback, such as “It was useful to learn skills and knowledge required for collaboration and how to maximize it through RDF exercise.” “I’ve got good opportunity to interact with researchers from different fields. I’ve got inspired.” “I’ve found a partner I want to collaborate with,” etc.