5 Ways to Make Research Strategies Work

By: Professor Datuk Dr. A Rahman A Jamal

  1. Bring the best brains to the table. Research is almost always about teamwork and the same applies when mapping out research strategies for an institution. This need not be formalized into a committee but could just be an intellectual discourse by a diverse group of people who know about the common goal of research excellence. As Steve Jobs once said, ‘We don’t have committees at Apple, but what we have are many team meetings and discussions where everyone can bring ideas to the table’. Let us not become too much of a committee-centric group of people. I personally would prefer an informal discussion over coffee where there are no long opening preambles and speeches. If the problem is about the declining in terms of the number of publications, let us start asking everyone (the best brains) in the room for their thoughts on reasons for the decline. Let us map out the reasons and think of clear and workable strategies to overcome the problems.
  1. Have a clear plan of action and mobilise the best team to execute. This is nothing new but I am just repeating what we all already know. Everyone knows that strategies fail because of poor execution or implementation. The myth that someone from the very top must lead has long been busted. I don’t think so too. To me the best executioners are those who have successful track records and those who have the experience leading teams, solving problems or undertaking projects. Seniority counts but not necessarily all the time. For example, if we want to increase the percentage of Q1/Q2 papers to reach 20% of all our publications, then the team leader must be someone who has plenty of Q1/Q2 papers in his/her bag. Nothing beats hands-on experience when it comes to research. I know, I know….he/she must also have some leadership skills too.
  1. Don’t just communicate but educate. Sending circulars and having meetings with masses of people to inform them about the strategies may just work but the people may still not understand about the essence of each of the strategies. Show them the way. The key thing is not to send the wrong signal. Leaders should ask for honest feedback early and not be defensive if there are those who show opposing ideas and opinions. Many of us do not believe in bulldozing things unless one is very sure that the strategy will work. People now often quote our former Prime Minister, Tun Dr. Mahathir, on his vision and policies on implementing key mega projects like the Petronas Twin Towers and the Penang Bridge despite strong opposition then. But he had the confidence that it will work. If you don’t have that kind of confidence, get back to the drawing board with your best team. Educate and convince the opinion leaders and the research leaders first as these are the people who will ensure that the strategies trickle down to the masses.
  1. ‘Someone’ must get the resources. I believe that strategies should be planned based on available resources and also on those resources that are likely to be obtained successfully in the near future. If the strategy is to build a world class research institute, then the appropriate resources must be put into place. You might laugh here but UMBI and the other research institutes in ¼¯ÃÀÂ鶹 were given a mere RM25,000 funding for operational expenses in the year of formation. I would like to mention here the case of the Cancer Science Institute (CSI) in Singapore which is now one of the premier research institutes in the National University of Singapore. CSI was set up in 2008 and is one of the 5 centres of excellence in Singapore. CSI received SGD175 million in funding every year. They have now 21 top class principal investigators and more than 100 post-docs. In 2014 alone, they produced 230 publications (ISI, Scopus and PubMed). If we want to attract the best, we have to pay good salaries. If we want our people to produce the best, we must provide adequate funding. Let us also go all out to retain our top professors, top researchers and have a clear mechanism to get rid of the non-performers.
  1. Don’t take short cuts but implement sustainable solutions. There are quick wins in research but these are mainly to make up the numbers, if publications are what we are referring to. Taking out supplementary issues is a quick win, but papers are usually of low quality and very few will be cited. People will soon make a mockery of us. Publishing in indexed journals is a strategy but it must be made clear that ‘purchasing’ a supplementary journal issue to publish low quality papers is certainly not a wise plan of action. If this is a strategy, then we might as well spend money buying supplementary issues and publishing by the thousands. Asking certain people to write papers for us is also a quick win but a sustainable solution will be to encourage and train our young lecturers to write. In the medical field, case reports are quick wins but we cannot have lecturers who are promoted to professors with just case reports. Many journals do not accept case reports anymore. We need real research projects to be sustainable. We need the real researchers to show the way.