UX Research infrastructure
Year 2022-2023
Type Operations, Internal project
Role UX Researcher and Project lead
What is UX research infrastructure?
UX research infrastructure empowers the team to research efficiently and in an organized fashion so that all research is accessible, sharable and reusable. As a member of the design team, I led the setup of this framework. Together with 2 senior colleagues, we put together all supporting documents for research-hungry teams to plan, conduct, and report research.
In the span of several months, in parallel to other initiatives, we gathered and compiled best practices from the research world and our experience into an actionable framework. The final pipeline was heavily based on Lean UX for its pragmatism and iterative approach that suited our ways of working.
We wanted to the team to operate with a Lean methodology in mind so that high-priority research questions are put forward. As the infamous Lean UX canvas suggests, there are two questions that anyone involved in research should ask themselves:
What is the most important thing we need to learn first and what is the least amount of work to learn the important thing?
This became the motto of our research framework. Another brilliant framework we used was Jeanette Fuccella’s model which guides the team through matching a challenge with appropriate design and research workflow.
Goals
Streamline UX research across the board
Upskill the team
Democratize research
How does a UX pipeline look like?
Process and decision tree
An outline of a process with all supporting documentation was created and shared with the team. The team also had an access to a Method Decision Tree so it’s easier to choose the right research method depending on the type of question, budget and timeline.
User insights channels
We mapped all the insights channels available to us: support tickets, past interviews and tests, surveys in tools like Hotjar and others.
Research stack
First, we collected requirements for research tools and once they were selected we defined the use for each research product we had. The ecosystem consisted of several platforms that had to be linked to each other. We created concise documentation for all tools and platforms with guidelines for the team.
Research indexing and storing
It was important that qualitative research is indexed and processed in a way that any team member can access it and understand what was done, what personas participated and what insights were collected. To build a framework for continuous research research projects, interviews and insights should also be searchable – luckily tools like Dovetail do a great job with tagging user interviews.
In six months from now anyone should be able to find interviews and insights they are looking for.
Templates
We provided the team with off-shelf that our team members have access to off-shelf solutions for various research needs: research plan, unmoderated and moderated testing, interviews, and more.
Method specs and guides
Each method had a profile with details and best practices to facilitate the process.
Recruitment
Finally, since recruitment can often be time-consuming we compiled guidelines on recruitment so this step doesn’t slow down the whole process.
Please feel free to inquire for more information about this initiative.