From Passion to Execution: A Story of Evolving Research Maturity at LinkedIn
Summary
Key Insights
-
•
Inefficient project tracking using Google Sheets was replaced by a custom Airtable base with automated unique project numbers, improving scalability and reducing duplicate entries.
-
•
Leadership resisted using standard service management tools like Jira for research project tracking, fearing it implied UX research was a service team taking orders.
-
•
Participant recruitment leverages LinkedIn’s data warehouse for opted-in users, enabling quarterly bulk recruits that account for 80% of recruiting needs.
-
•
Participant incentives were decentralized and error-prone until onboarding Ethnio enabled global culture-specific rewards, automated delivery, and compliance tracking.
-
•
Implementing a status reporting workflow integrated into tools researchers already used (Teams, Figma) drastically improved status accuracy and reduced manual effort.
-
•
Rapid Lab, a biweekly evaluative research program across three lines of business, tests six designs every two weeks, made possible by foundational operational improvements.
-
•
Connecting research assumptions, participant feedback, insights, and business impact in Airtable enables leadership to track research impact and identify process issues.
-
•
A research librarian role was critical to maintain a consistent taxonomy in the insights repository, preventing chaos from multiple inconsistent tagging styles.
-
•
Consolidating planning workflows across multiple design functions into a single Airtable interface addressed visibility, prioritization, and capacity planning challenges.
-
•
Scaling research ops requires strategic partnerships, custom tooling, centralization with flexibility, automation to reduce human error, and ongoing iteration as the organization grows.
Notable Quotes
"Broken processes aren't scalable."
"The biggest pain point in my life was tracking research projects through a disjointed flow of Airtable, Google Docs, and hand-curated emails."
"The only way to get a project number was through Airtable, which allowed us to further evolve the process."
"Researchers used to issue incentives manually, running on an honor system that was error-prone and inconsistent."
"Ethnio allowed us to track participants' total compensation and set annual caps, reducing fraud risk and improving compliance."
"We simply told leadership we don’t even know what we don’t know or what we do know, leading to a research insights repository."
"The research librarian equals consistent taxonomy; without that, you can’t build accessible and searchable knowledge."
"In a large organization, processes must become more centralized and rigid to scale, though flexibility and team needs still matter."
"Start somewhere simple, start early, include the right voices, and build foundational components you’ll reuse over and over."
"Go find a partner in Ops who has a passion for operations and pain points of inefficiency, then build something great together."
Or choose a question:
More Videos
"Are you creative? Such a loaded question, isn't it?"
Dr. Karl JeffriesThe Science of Creativity for DesignOps
January 8, 2024
"Creating internal champions in client organizations helps improve adoption and reduces churn."
Amy MarquezINVEST: Discussion
June 15, 2018
"Visualizing data in a way executives can interpret is key to shifting from I think to I know."
Steve Portigal Chris Chapo Kelly Goto Christian RohrerDiscussion
May 13, 2015
"It took a lot of relationship building and conversations to break down the perception that designers' time was owned by particular teams."
Alicia MootyDesign Staffing Models
September 30, 2021
"I am not throwing away your UX."
Ana Maria Montero Barrantes Aditi Dhar Michelle Kaplan Nate Osborne Matt LaurenceThe Authentic UX Talent Show
January 8, 2024
"Simply asking stakeholders what success looks like for them in a project is a powerful way to start meaningful conversations."
Lada Gorlenko Sharbani Dhar Sébastien Malo Rob Mitzel Ivana Ng Michal Anne RogondinoTheme 1: Discussion
January 8, 2024
"Choosing a research repository is a big battle in your organization; the right decisions can really help you succeed."
Sofia QuinteroThe Product Philosophy Behind EnjoyHQ
March 10, 2021
"People don’t actually hate innovation; they like their jobs and feel threatened by change."
Laura KleinUnique challenges of innovation in enterprises
April 23, 2020
"Embedded squads build domain expertise but risk losing knowledge if someone leaves, while centralized teams help reduce duplicated effort."
Andrew MichaelBuilding a Product Insights Team
March 10, 2022
