Renewed Vision and Strategy: Highlights from the DIRECT Leadership Retreat

On 6–7 July 2026, the leadership team of the DIgital REsearch CompeTencies (DIRECT) Framework project met at the Alan Turing Building in Manchester for an intensive two-day retreat. This event, made possible by support from the Software Sustainability Institute, provided a vital opportunity for in-person collaboration to advance our mission of supporting digital Research Technical Professionals (dRTPs).

Areas of Focus

During the retreat, our work was structured around several primary pillars designed to strengthen both the internal foundation and the external impact of the framework:

Improving project documentation for the community: a significant portion of the retreat was dedicated to ensuring the project is well documented, transparent and easy to join. Many of our internal documents have been finalised and made public in our GitHub space - including our Vision Statement and Roadmap that have guided our efforts and will continue to do so over the coming years. We also added new Contribution Guidelines, updated the project's Living History (yet to be finalised), and began work on a canonical intro slide deck and sticker designs.
Public-facing documents for institutions and funders: to make the framework more accessible to institutions and funders, we began drafting a "glossy" brochure. This high-level visual guide is intended to help stakeholders quickly understand how DIRECT can be used for workforce planning and professional development.
Defining roles and career pathways for dRTPs: we held extensive discussions on how to better describe dRTP role families within the framework, recognising a number of areas in which dRTPs operate. This work also involved sketching out specialties, career progression pathways and career profiles to ensure the framework accurately reflects the hybrid nature of modern digital research work. This proposal is now open for community feedback and comments, after which we will be embedding and implementing the agreed upon consensus in the framework.
Technical improvements: our technical sessions focused on evolving the DIRECT Webapp - key progress included updating the database schema to support new role definitions and career profiles, as well as a complete redesign of the homepage. We also worked on improving the structure for team and events pages to better showcase community activity.

Key Outcomes and Achievements

The retreat resulted in several immediate milestones that will propel the project forward:

Zenodo community: we established a dedicated Zenodo community to host our reports, slides and resources, ensuring they remain open and citable.
Sustainability & funding: a funding bid (with SHAREing Network+ flexible funds) was submitted during the retreat, and we spent time planning a significant CHARTERED funding proposal to support core development and community outreach through 2027.
Engagement: the team committed to presenting our progress at RSECon26 and began identifying high-impact academic journals for a major report on the framework.

Looking Ahead

The DIRECT project remains a community-led initiative. While we made great strides in Manchester, the framework continues to evolve through the contributions of dRTPs across the sector. Whether you are an individual looking to map your career or a manager seeking to support your team, we invite you to explore our resources and help us shape the future of digital research competencies.

For more information on the framework or to get involved, visit our GitHub organisation or the DIRECT Webapp.