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Planning for an Open Research future: A practical resource and evidence-based guidance
Stewart, Suzanne L. K.
Stewart, Suzanne L. K.
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2026-05-12
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Concerns about the reproducibility and integrity of research have inspired ongoing advocacy for the adoption of Open Research practices. These practices aim to embed transparency, openness, and accessibility across the research lifecycle, from planning to reporting, in order to strengthen research quality and credibility. Despite much investment and policy support, the extent and consistency of adoption have been uneven across disciplines, study types, and methodological approaches. A significant factor in this discrepancy is the limited availability of practical and technical tools and guidance that support the implementation of a broad range of practices at a granular level throughout the research workflow. While the rationale for Open Research has been widely championed, detailed approaches to adoption have received comparatively less attention.
This project, Planning for an Open Research Future: A Practical Resource and Evidence-Based Guidance, was developed to address this implementation gap. The project achieved three objectives: to identify the critical elements researchers need to consider when planning for transparency and openness, to provide evidence-based guidance for funders and other stakeholders (i.e., research-enabling organisations such as universities, publishers, scholarly societies, and infrastructure providers) on supporting the adoption of diverse open practices, and to develop a Transparency and Openness Management Plan (TOMP) template (Stewart, 2026) as a resource for researchers and stakeholders. To achieve these objectives, the project used a two-round, expert consultation approach, in which individuals with recognised expertise in Open Research from a range of disciplines provided structured feedback on key issues and the developing resource. This iterative process ensured that the TOMP was grounded in researchers’ experiences and addressed expert-identified needs.
The project produced two complementary versions of the TOMP, with both supporting the implementation of a range of Open Research practices across the research lifecycle. The narrative version facilitates detailed planning, documentation, and justification, supporting rigorous and reflective implementation. The checklist version provides the same structured, comprehensive approach to planning and tracking open practices in a streamlined format for projects where extensive explanation is non-essential. Both versions are modular and adaptable to suit a range of disciplines, methods, and study types. They are designed to prompt researchers to address the impact of cross-cutting issues, such as ethics, governance, collaboration, and resource needs, on Open Research plans. Accompanying practical guidance supports researchers in comprehensive and purposeful implementation, with signposts to relevant external guides, information, and support. The TOMP has been created as shared infrastructure for the research community. Both versions and their guidance are openly licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) licence, allowing them to be reused, adapted, and further developed by researchers, funders, and other stakeholders.
In addition to the TOMP, the project also generated actionable insights for stakeholders on the barriers, facilitators, and researcher needs associated with tools, resources, and guidance for implementing Open Research practices. These insights indicate that researchers value practical and technical tools that systematically guide rigorous and effective adoption. Such tools and resources should be designed to support flexibility and adaptability in use and account for methodological and disciplinary variation. Effective implementation is also enabled when tools support researchers to address cross-cutting factors, such as funding and other resources, ethics, and policy alignment. However, tools may be rendered ineffective if they create needless administrative and time burdens; use technical and inaccessible language; or operate in isolation from existing processes, systems, and resources.
For stakeholders, including funders and other research-enabling organisations such as universities, publishers, and infrastructure providers, the implications are clear: their Open Research initiatives, tools, and resources should integrate with broader support frameworks; seamlessly align with existing policies, procedures, and systems; take a flexible, modular, adaptable, and efficient approach in their design and requirements; and be accessible in structure, tone, and language. When designed this way, mechanisms to support Open Research adoption can empower researchers to implement practices effectively and appropriately for their contexts while also strengthening stakeholders’ capacity to enhance the transparency, openness, and reproducibility of research they support. The TOMP and its accompanying guidance provide an immediately usable and adaptable resource, but also serve as a model for resource development that stakeholders can utilise to foster more effective, sustainable, and systemic uptake of Open Research.
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Stewart, S. L. K. (2026). Planning for an Open Research future: A practical resource and evidence-based guidance. Oxford, United Kingdom: Innovation and Research Caucus.
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Innovation and Research Caucus
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052
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Planning for an Open Research Future: A Practical Resource and Evidence-Based Guidance | Funder: Innovation and Research Caucus