Research Department

This is a Hermes-native research-department workflow skill.

Why This Exists

research-department exists so Hermes users can start complex research-ops patterns without manually designing profiles, cron, knowledge storage, synthesis tooling, and delivery glue, while OMH keeps every runtime claim observed-only.

Do Not Use When

• The user only needs a one-off current-source lookup; use research.
• The user only needs a one-off business synthesis; use research-brief.
• The request is pure scheduling with no source collection or synthesis; use automation-blueprint.
• The user asks for coding implementation; prepare a selected executor/runtime handoff after the research plan is accepted.

Examples

Good example:

• Prompt: Set up a Scout, Analyst, and Briefer research flow for daily competitor and market changes.
• Expected behavior: Prepare research_department_plan/v1 with Scout/Analyst/Briefer lanes, source inbox buckets, briefing status, knowledge-store and synthesis-tool readiness, and observed-only evidence requirements.
• Why: The request is recurring, source-backed, and operational; a single research brief would miss the ongoing workflow/status boundary.

Bad example:

• Prompt: research-department prove the synthesis tool queried the knowledge base and posted the Slack brief.
• Expected behavior: Ask for observed synthesis-tool and gateway delivery evidence or mark those states as not_observed.
• Why: The workflow pack can prepare the operating pattern, but it cannot prove external tool execution or delivery.

Completion Checklist

• The research question, source boundaries, recency assumptions, and confidence level are named.
• Observed sources, inference, synthesis, and unresolved retrieval gaps are separated.
• Follow-up planning or handoff uses the research summary without calling it execution evidence.

Recovery Notes

• If sources cannot be accessed, state the retrieval gap and use only observed local context.
• If evidence is thin or one-sided, lower confidence and ask for a narrower source boundary.

Workflow Lane

• Current lane: Research and company ops (product-docs, source-finder, web-research, research, model-optimization, inference-serving, model-finetuning, research-brief, +20 more) - research, signals, ops, and briefings.
• If intent belongs to another lane, hand back to oh-my-hermes or name the adjacent workflow.
• Shared product, routing, compatibility, and evidence rules: omh-routing/references/skill-common-rail.md.

Use When

Use when Hermes should turn an ongoing or recurring research request into a prepared Scout -> Analyst -> Briefer workflow with source inbox, knowledge-store and synthesis-tool readiness, and briefing status without claiming research execution.

Strong routing signals: `research-department`, `research department`, `research ops department`, `research operations department`, `scout analyst briefer`, `scout analyst brief`, `daily research department`, `competitor research department`, `market research department`, `paper review`, `weekly paper review`, `research paper review`, `paper research`, `notebooklm research`, `obsidian research vault`, `knowledge store`, `knowledge storage`, `synthesis tool`, `knowledge summarizer`, `research inbox`, `source inbox`, `briefing status`, `리서치 부서`, `리서치 조직`, `리서치 운영`, `수집 합성 브리핑`, `지식 저장소`, `요약 도구`, `경쟁사 리서치 부서`

Catalog Metadata

Category: research Phase: research-department Hermes role: researcher Quality tier: research-ops-gated Reasoning demand: standard

Quality bar:

• Name topic, source boundaries, cadence, delivery target, knowledge-store destination, and synthesis-tool readiness.
• Map Scout, Analyst, and Briefer lanes to concrete OMH skills and source inbox buckets.
• Expose collected, synthesized, briefed, conflict, and verification counts as status, not execution proof.
• List required evidence before claiming retrieval, synthesis, storage, delivery, or verification.

Handoff policy:

Keep the research operating model in Hermes. Map Scout to research/source-finder, Analyst to research-brief/web-research, and Briefer to report-package or meeting/report workflows. Record retrieval, synthesis-tool output, knowledge-store writes, delivery, and verification only from observed evidence.

Required inputs:

• topic or watch area
• source boundaries
• cadence
• delivery target
• knowledge-store preference
• synthesis-tool preference

Expected outputs:

• research_department_plan/v1
• source_inbox/v1
• briefing_status/v1
• not-evidence boundary

Artifact expectations:

• research_department_plan/v1 under .omh/research-department/plans when a wrapper or CLI records it

Safety rules:

• Do not claim web retrieval, synthesis-tool query, knowledge-store write, cron creation, gateway delivery, or verification from a prepared plan.
• Keep raw findings, processed notes, briefs, conflicts, and verification needs in separate source inbox buckets.
• Treat vendor-specific tool names as optional aliases for synthesis-tool and knowledge-store readiness unless observed evidence exists.

Runtime Evidence

Preferred harness for this skill: research-department.

omh runtime record --skill research-department --harness research-department --status started

Record observed delegation results; otherwise return not_available or not_observed. Prepared OMH routing is not execution, review, CI, merge-readiness, or merge evidence.

• Treat wrapper memory/context summaries as advisory local context, not proof of opaque Hermes memory reads or changes. Preserve workflow intent and stop conditions; verify before claiming completion. Reply in the user's own words and the host's own voice: OMH's record terms (surface, lane, wrapper, handoff, evidence boundary, not_observed) stay in records and tool calls, never in the sentence the user reads unless they ask about one; and when a stop condition or a decision the user owns ends the turn, offer the next action as a question rather than declaring what will not be done.

Use Hermes-native subagent/delegation features when available: native subagents -> Hermes delegation when available, otherwise sequential lanes.

Shared product, compatibility, topology, memory, harness, and execution rules: omh-routing/references/skill-common-rail.md. Load it when applicable; otherwise name an unavailable capability.