Hello! I’m @netch from Mercari R4D’s Research Acceleration Team.
Mercari R4D runs the Mercari R4D PhD Support Program, which helps Mercari employees obtain doctorate degrees. Right now, we’re looking for employees to participate in the fifth round of this program, so we held an open-door session exclusively for our employees.
During this session, we explained the details of the program and also held a panel discussion with employees who have already obtained doctorate degrees while working to hear about their experiences. In this article, I’ll give an overview of the event. I hope it’ll be useful for anyone interested in getting a PhD as a working adult!
About the Mercari R4D PhD Support Program
The Mercari R4D PhD Support Program was introduced in 2022 to support employees in their research activities.
The program offers three main forms of support. First, Mercari covers the entire cost of tuition up to 2 million yen per year (including entrance fees, etc.) for three years. Second, the company affords participants the time they need for their research. Participating employees can choose to work five, four, three, or even zero days per week in order to balance their work and research. Salary is paid according to the amount of time they work on company tasks. Third, R4D provides various forms of support. R4D, Mercari’s research and development team, runs this program, so we can offer knowledge of and connections in academia, consultations regarding research topics and doctorate courses, help with procedures necessary to use confidential information such as Mercari transaction data in research, and more.
All employees of Mercari in Japan are eligible for this program. The doctorate course must be at a university in Japan, but the area of research doesn’t have to be related to the research R4D is working on—participants can carry out research in the humanities or social sciences, interdisciplinary research, or anything else.
The application process consists of a document screening followed by two interviews.
Employees accepted to this program are asked to provide a research status report every six months, as well as an annual report every year. R4D provides support as necessary for consultations regarding research, various procedures, patents, and more.
Related article: Held on Tuesday, February 11, 2025: JAIST Next Generation Recurrent Research/Education Symposium Presentation Report
Employees share their experience of getting a PhD as a working adult
When you hear stories about getting a PhD as a working adult, you probably wonder what it’s like to attend graduate school while working. Isn’t it tough to balance work and research? For this panel discussion, we invited @keiny and @fujimiyu, two employees who obtained doctorate degrees while working, to talk about their experiences.
What made you want to get a PhD as a working adult?
@keiny: My area of expertise is design methodology, but there aren’t any certifications out there that I could get to prove my expertise. So I was interested in getting a PhD to prove my expertise in the area instead. I also thought it would be an advantage because doctorate degrees are recognized overseas as well.
@fujimiyu: I wanted to get a PhD because you need to have one to pursue a career in research. When I worked at the National Institute for Japanese Language and Linguistics, I was surrounded by coworkers who had PhDs, so it felt like the natural next step.
What are the merits of having a PhD?
@keiny: Not only can you deepen your knowledge of a specific area, you also master the general research process of posing a question, deriving a new solution, and evaluating whether or not that solution is valid.
@fujimiyu: The first benefit is that it becomes easier to explain your career. People will associate you with your research topic and come to you for questions. The second is that you gain the satisfaction and confidence of having successfully taken your research this far. Even when I do research in other fields, I now have more insight into the process and what I can expect from the results.
What was it like going through your doctorate course?
@keiny: My research was basically designing something, then evaluating the results, which meant that it had a high level of uncertainty because the results wouldn’t always be what I expected. But I didn’t give up and kept working hard. There were times when I felt disheartened because my research wasn’t progressing well or I failed my peer reviews, but I tried my best to learn from my failures.
In order to maintain this attitude, it’s important that you yourself are intellectually curious about your research and find it interesting. To maintain my curiosity, I was careful not to let myself be influenced by trends or choose my research topics based only on what was likely to pass peer reviews.
@fujimiyu: Doing research while working was a battle against time. I had decided that I wanted to get my PhD in three years, so I made a detailed plan for when I would do surveys, when I would analyze the results, when I would write my research papers, and when I would present them. The dates of the conferences I would present at were already announced, so I proceeded with my research to meet those dates. In order to get a PhD, I needed to write at least three peer-reviewed papers, so I decided in advance which conferences I would submit the papers to.
Balancing my work and research time felt like I was putting together a puzzle while creating some of the pieces. But when I was writing papers, I wanted to focus on writing, so I blocked my calendar to prevent other people from making plans with me and ensure I would have enough time set aside to write. At the time, I was already balancing my work at a research institute with work as a part-time lecturer at a university. When it seemed like my research institute work was going to get busy, I did what I could to lighten the load in advance, and concentrated my work during periods when the university was not in session. It’s important to have support from those around you.
How did you balance your work with your research?
@keiny: With research, you’re thinking about the true nature of something and why we do it, but with work, you’re expected to find a realistic solution and execute it. Finding that balance was important. If you spend too much time thinking about the why in your work, or if you try too hard to apply realistic solutions to your research, then the line between them starts to blur, making both more difficult.
Also, in research, the focus tends to be on how much scientific contribution you’re making, but if you start feeling like your research topic is too minor to have any real-world applications, you may lose motivation to continue. I recommend thinking about how your research can contribute to your work, no matter how forced it may feel.
@fujimiyu: Many people around me were also working as part-time lecturers while doing their research. But even so, there were still times where I wished I could devote all of my time to my research. I know it’s not an option for everyone, but I think it might be easier to maintain your mental health if you can set aside a year or so to focus exclusively on research.
To be honest, I was so busy these three years that I barely remember anything. Even on the go, I was always doing something, like grading reports from my classes or reading papers for my research. There was also a period of time where I filled my schedule with work in order to cover my tuition and living expenses, which was stressful because I couldn’t make much progress on my research. That said, I didn’t think of being so busy as painful or difficult; I actually remember enjoying it. I made a deliberate point of setting aside time for stress relief; I formed a habit of going to ballroom dancing events every Wednesday night, and going out for dinner at an okonomiyaki restaurant after.
If you could go back to before you applied to the program and do it all again, how would you prepare?
@keiny: Compatibility with your academic advisor is very important. I would clearly express my interests and think about the direction of the research. I also recommend attending meetings of research societies and public hearings, as well as taking a peek at the community at academic presentations. In my case, I chose a doctorate course at a laboratory I already had connections to through collaborative research. I already knew my academic advisor and the content of the laboratory’s research.
Also, if you do your research alone, the scope of your work will be limited; finding research partners to work with from the early stages may help you broaden your network. But it’s not required to have research partners; what’s most important is your will to take on the challenge of getting a PhD.
@fujimiyu: I think the most important thing is frequently communicating with the person who would be your academic advisor before applying. I was a unique case in that my academic advisor was also my indirect manager at the research institute I was working at. But university professors will gladly answer questions about their research, even from people they don’t know, so you can just try reaching out and see what happens. If you find a professor whose work you’re interested in and contact them asking to sit in on their seminar, they may say yes. When applying from outside of the university in particular, having your name and face remembered will increase your chances of acceptance. Some labs will hire people for part-time survey or research positions; working part-time to get to know them before applying is another option.
Getting a PhD takes a long time, so if you don’t get along well with your academic advisor, you may find yourself quitting partway through. My advisor always said that research for a master’s course is owned by the student, but research for a doctorate course is a joint project between the student and the advisor. Also, securing the necessary research funds for your analysis is crucial, so I recommend applying for scholarships.
When moving on from a master’s course to a doctorate course, in most cases you’ll be expanding on the topic you researched in your master’s course; it’s rare to start a new research topic at this point. Making academic presentations and submitting papers on the research you did in your master’s course will help you create research results that you can show off when applying to a doctorate course.
Do you have any last words of advice for those looking to apply to doctorate courses?
@keiny: I think that reflecting on why you want to get a PhD and why you want to take on your particular research area now will help guide you to an advisor and research topic that’s right for you, and help you keep going even when things get tough.
@fujimiyu: You should secure the money and connections you’ll need early. For example, in order to get your advisor or other professors who will be stakeholders in your research to remember you, you can first create a connection by taking on a part-time job with them, and leave a good impression by finishing your work before the deadline. If you do that, you may even find yourself invited to join their research lab. If you don’t put in the effort to make connections, you might have a hard time with your research in the program.
Conclusion
The point about it being important to make connections with your academic advisor before starting a PhD program leaves a particularly strong impression. R4D, which runs Mercari’s PhD support program, is engaged in collaborative research with a number of different universities, so we may be able to help participants find advisors who resonate with the topics they want to research.
@keiny also mentioned that he obtained his PhD while at his previous job, but Mercari’s program with support such as covering the entire cost of tuition regardless of research topic is rare, so he hopes employees will leverage it. Our program has received attention from other organizations and has been covered in the media in a number of cases, but talking to two people who have experienced getting a PhD as working adults reaffirmed how exciting the program is.
I’m looking forward to seeing what research ideas come out of the fifth round of this program. Keep checking back here for more news!