Background & Purpose: In today's world of constant change, attention to the issue of competence in the field of management has been considered as a lever for organizations to transform their existing bureaucracies into efficient and flexible units. Today, in order to cultivate competent managers and leaders and increase the capacity of governance and productivity, every country needs managers and employees who can provide better services based on their competence in the general interests of society and improve their capabilities and competencies in line with the increasing growth of changes. Therefore, this research was conducted with the aim of designing a competency model for managers and experts in the field of research.
Methodology: The present study is developmental in terms of outcome, applied in terms of purpose, and qualitative in terms of method. The participants include academic experts and senior commanders of Imam Ali (AS) Officers' University. The sampling method was carried out using purposeful snowball sampling with 14 people, and the data collection tool was based on semi-structured interviews and using upstream documents. Data analysis was based on a qualitative method using Clark and Brown's (2006) three-stage coding and the theme analysis method.
Findings: The results of the study show that the two main dimensions of "general competencies" including two components of dialogue and negotiation (with the concepts of communication skills and information skills) and the component of personal skills (with the concepts of value and ethical approach, behavioral skills and management skills) and "specialized competencies" including two components of research-oriented thinking (with the concepts of interdisciplinary perspective, research thinking, research, career-based growth and specialized software skills) and the component of strategic thinking (with the concepts of strategic planning and future-oriented thinking) are the competencies required by research managers and form the basis of the research model.
Conclusion: For an organization to grow, its general and specialized competencies must be very clear to decision makers. Therefore, knowing the dimensions of competences of experts and research managers is considered a fundamental factor both for the development of the position of research and for their evaluation. Therefore, it is necessary to identify the competencies of experts and managers in the field of research in order to create a meritocracy system.