And does imbuing, at the Researchers, work the same way?
Pretty much any time you want to limit a reaction to a specific dwarf, setting the Profile at that workshop to that dwarf is the method to use. Other handy uses are having a specific dwarf pull a lever (nice for getting rid of annoying nobles or tricking a dwarf to a very specific area to get locked in), making sure forges are used only by your best smiths (check out the min/max skill required settings too), and keeping certain dwarves OUT of a workshop because several MWDF reactions are dangerous. For instance, I have 30+ dwarves with Masonry enabled to get constructions up fast, but I don't want them churning out crap from my Mason's shop, so I use Profile to limit the shop to my very best masons only.
So that means he can't be already be military when running the reaction, right? He needs to be a civilian?
He can be in a squad, but it needs to be inactive so he'll do civilian-ish jobs (such as that one). The way I handle upgrading my military in MWDF is I create a permanent "On Leave" squad* that is set to Inactive in the Alerts screen. I then swap the dwarf I want to upgrade out of the active squad he is in, and into the inactive squad, then upgrade him. Once he passes Barracks training I swap him back into the Active squad. It makes it easy to keep track of him in a large population and his buddies in the Active squad don't disrupt their training.
* also handy for temporarily sidelining female soldiers with babies, until the babies are grown; or badly injured soldiers that are recovering. The temporary squad makes it easy to keep track of sidelined soldiers and is useful as an emergency squad to deploy as well