UX Research Manager

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Job description

We are seeking a UX Research Program Manager to join our UX Research team. You will partner directly with UX Leadership and researchers to establish research best practices, streamline and scale research programs and tooling, and own the administrative complexities for the team so that researchers and designers can focus on solving client and user problems.

You’ll bring exceptional project management skills to the team, along with a deep understanding and passion for user research and its methodologies. You’ll help us ensure the team’s success in conducting research activities that drive better user experiences. You will manage critical functions of the UX Research team, including prioritizing requests, planning projects, defining goals and milestones, onboarding and managing vendors, tracking and managing research invoicing and budgets, facilitating recruitment efforts, and tracking and reporting on research impact. You'll also develop processes and workflows that allow the team to effectively scale as it grows.

Responsibilities:

Planning

Understand the UX research team and its priorities, and how its work fits into the wider UX and Design landscape.

Collaborate across UX teams to scale and execute program and project plans end-to-end, thinking about how to optimize resourcing, time, and funding investment.

Proactively identify risks, and mitigation plans for those risks, before they become issues; adapt our strategy as needed to minimize project impact.

Programs

Manage the operations of research programs that will promote the user voice across various business lines and products in a consistency, efficient, and streamlined manner.

Improving process for and maintaining ongoing coordination of our Rolling Usability Labs, a weekly touchpoint to get feedback from customers.

Own the process for which users get access to in-product feedback and other research tools. Manage the day-to-day oversight of in-product feedback programs inclusive of line of site into all current implementations, next steps, and partnering with the product teams to ensure program stays on track.

Oversee development and maintenance of best practice templates, screeners, access, and training to ensure consistency in research across teams who utilize this tool.

Research Repository: Develop and maintain best practices related to the development of a research repository, including the process to store, tag, share, and communicate research and insights across the Design organization.

Calculating Research Impact

Tracking product and design improvements from UX Research efforts (converting this to ROI).

Producing regular reporting and data summaries for leadership to communicate the work of the UX Research Team for various views such as volume, impact, methods used, gaps, hurdles, etc., ensuring all areas of the organization are represented.

Vendor Management

Managing vendor partnerships to ensure smooth onboarding and usage for UX Research Team. This includes collecting regular feedback from UX Research Team to evaluate effectiveness of each partnership.

Own contracts and administrative governance for UX Research tools; including budgeting, contract renewals (in partnership with procurement team), and usage documentation or trainings for the team.

Culture

Leading research team culture initiatives to ensure team cohesion.

Communication

Own recurring stakeholder updates; serving as bridge between UX Research and cross-functional teams and leaders.

Constant advocate for sharing, socializing, and evangelizing the value of user research throughout the organization.

Scale research operations by defining and formalizing repeatable processes and best practices.

Research Best Practices and Process

User recruitment screening for moderated and unmoderated research

Templates for generative and evaluative research methods

Research measurement best practices

User panel and tool management and streamlines access

Creating and managing internal resource materials to streamline the team’s ways of working (e.g., vendor guides, templates, research briefs).

Oversee research participant recruitment efforts, including outreach to vendors and construction of a directory of participants.

Own the roll out and partner toolkit definition to scale our self-service research program beyond the UX Research Team when appropriate.

5+ years of relevant experience in UX research operations (1)

2+ years of experience leading end to end project delivery for large, cross-functional project teams.

Experience working with UX Research teams across multiple research methods and activities, spanning both qualitative and quantitative disciplines (4)

Experience with UX research workstreams including user recruitment and scheduling, panel management, vendor management, policy and legal governance, backlog/pipeline prioritization, impact tracking, knowledge management systems/portals (1)

Experience developing and maintaining team resources and communications, including templates, playbooks, and training calendars.

Passion for planning, tracking, organizing logistics, process, details, and documentation. (2)

Advanced project management and execution skills

Excellent communicator

Ability to execute in a large, matrixed organization

Qualifications:

Experience managing research operations such as recruiting, scheduling, and vendor management

Experience with processes related to socialization and evangelism of research and research best practices, highlighting impact

Extremely detail-oriented with a focus on process definition

Proactive self-starter with great follow-up skills

Basic knowledge of research methods; Familiarity with UX research a plus

Knowledge of user experience measurement and setting KPIs

Experience escalating issues, making trade-off decisions, balancing constraints, and communicating risk

Understanding of UX design, and common design processes

Experience working in a collaborative multi-disciplinary team and working directly with designers, product managers, and engineers

Experience with forecasting and budgeting

Experience with research and design in Agile/Scrum

Well versed in Qualtrics, User Zoom, Enjoy HQ, online communities such as C-Space, and other common research platforms

Jira expertise preferred

Bachelor’s/University degree