Log in or create a free Rosenverse account to watch this video.
Log in Create free account100s of community videos are available to free members. Conference talks are generally available to Gold members.
Summary
If you’ve followed LinkedIn of late, it’s clear that UX researchers are frustrated. They feel their work is undervalued, their strategic contributions are marginalized, and their jobs have been made redundant. Multiple fingers have been pointed in multiple directions, and—as you’d expect from social media—the discussion has often ended up in a decidedly sour place. In light of The big design freakout and the UX research reckoning, there is an important conversation to be had about the changing roles of research, design, and product, and where we go from here. In light of this, Rosenfeld’s Advancing Research community is hosting a panel of respected, collaborative, and opinionated experts from the disciplines/functions at the core of this changing dynamic: Jamika Burge, Teresa Torres, Robert Fabricant, Noam Segal, and Peter Merholz—to stop litigating the past, and engage in a positive, constructive conversation about the future of UX research. Panelists: Jamika Burge, Robert Fabricant, Noam Segal, Teresa Torres Moderated by: Peter Merholz
Key Insights
-
•
Aligning user research outcomes with business goals is critical for demonstrating research value.
-
•
AI offers opportunities for continuous discovery but raises concerns over bias and ethical transparency.
-
•
Democratizing research involves enabling non-researchers to conduct basic studies, freeing skilled researchers for complex tasks.
-
•
A mature organizational environment is necessary to successfully democratize research without sacrificing quality.
-
•
Research quality can be evaluated using reliability and validity concepts adapted from academia.
-
•
Not all research activities require advanced skills; even product managers can be trained in targeted, simple research types.
-
•
Organizational change management is as important as research execution for advancing user-focused practices.
-
•
The UX research community debates moving past the term 'democratization' to focus on evolving roles amidst technological change.
-
•
Measuring UX research value is complex because impact permeates across teams and is less quantifiable than engineering outputs.
-
•
Despite evolving roles and tools, there will always be a need for specialized, skilled researchers for longitudinal and rigorous studies.
Notable Quotes
"How do we show the value of the work that enables us to really advocate for the humans whom we are serving?"
"Building for humans is a huge challenge because humans are multi-layered, weird, and wonderful irrational creatures."
"If we are truly going to create customer-centric organizations, every single person needs firsthand exposure to customers."
"Democratization has been happening for over 20 years and it’s only going to keep happening."
"User research itself is not a single function but many disciplines that require integrity and stewardship."
"We need to move past the point of who does what and into how our roles are changing with technology."
"We know what is not good research, but defining and communicating what good research looks like is more challenging."
"The ultimate measure of our research is its impact—did we build the right thing and did it have the expected effect?"
"Organizational change management requires as much care and effort as executing good research."
"There is always more work to be done than we will ever be able to do, so enabling others to participate is beneficial."
Or choose a question:
More Videos
"Enterprise operations is a ripe context for service design because it involves many people, processes, and tools across silos."
Ed MullenDesigning the Unseen: Enabling Institutions to Build Public Trust
November 16, 2022
"Am I the right person to conduct this type of research for this culture? That’s a question most companies don’t have researchers asking."
Sharon Banh Dave Hora Marieke McCloskey Alicia ZhongReimagining research: What does the field need to grow? [Advancing Research Community Workshop Series]
October 16, 2024
"I was not able to come up for them to be involved so I had to learn how to structure it in a way that we could share how this was important for the team."
Benjamin RealMaturity Models: A Core Tool for Creating a DesignOps Strategy
October 1, 2021
"Talent is evenly distributed, but opportunity is not."
Joseph Williams Nepani Birondo Matt Readman Allison NgoUnlocking impact and influence through inclusive hiring in research
December 16, 2021
"I made an explicit choice: we’re not making any offers until we’re interviewing women."
Dantley DavisLeadership & Diversity—A Fireside Chat with Dantley Davis
September 17, 2020
"The greatest sin of the designer is to say I have the answers and no one else is allowed to have them."
Louis RosenfeldDiscussion: What Operations can teach DesignOps
November 6, 2017
"Removing rigid educational requirements opens more opportunities for diverse talent."
Jackie Velasquez-RossTalent Acquisition and Our Responsibility
June 16, 2020
"Context design and context engineering mean figuring out and building what needs to go into that text file sent to the model."
Peter Van DijckBuilding impactful AI products for design and product leaders, Part 3: Understand AI architectures: RAG, Agents, Oh My!
July 30, 2025
"With the Indigo.Design plugin, you can profoundly change how the whole design system looks by just tweaking primary or secondary colors."
George Abraham Stefan IvanovDesign Systems To-Go: Introducing a Starter Design System, and Indigo.Design Overview (Part 1)
September 30, 2021
Latest Books All books
Dig deeper with the Rosenbot
How can AI tools like SharePoint Copilot or GPTs help prevent research duplication?
Where can UX researchers find reliable, up-to-date information and recommendations on research tool options?
What strategies help speed up the procurement and legal review of UX research platforms in organizations like LinkedIn?