Summary
I very quickly noticed how my entire professional journey had molded me into a UX Researcher that had a broader reach with teams, people, customers/users, and industry knowledge. In the Enterprise space I was/am able to successfully leverage so many of my other skills obtained in my other positions to make me a dynamic well-rounded researcher outside of just knowing principles, cognitive behaviors, data synthesis, and writing reports. It was the culmination of all of me, owning and leveraging ALL of my experiences that allowed me to connect the UX dots to my previous 15 years of experience. Eventually, I was doing onsite interviews with various Silicon Valley companies and then landed at LinkedIn. I am a ResearchH.E.R – Highly Enterprise Ready.
Key Insights
-
•
Career paths in UX can be nonlinear and enriched by diverse professional experiences across different fields.
-
•
Economic hardships and layoffs can lead to pivotal career transformations when approached with hope and resilience.
-
•
Running towards a career goal rather than just away from dissatisfaction or setbacks is crucial for intentional growth.
-
•
Internal hires with deep domain knowledge bring invaluable context and relationships to UX teams, often overlooked.
-
•
Combining skills from project management, sales, and customer success creates a powerful foundation for user research.
-
•
Formal credentials like degrees or PhDs are not always prerequisites to successfully transition into UX careers.
-
•
User journey mapping can bridge gaps between customer success and UX, fostering better organizational understanding.
-
•
People with enterprise experience bring unique advantages in navigating executive conversations and stakeholder relationships.
-
•
Organizations often miss opportunities to promote internal talent into UX roles, which could strengthen their teams and reduce onboarding time.
-
•
Personal storytelling and vulnerability in sharing career journeys can inspire others to embrace nontraditional paths in UX.
Notable Quotes
"Let me just take you along this journey, where it began."
"Don’t just run away from something. Make sure you are running towards something."
"If you make a pretty page, that’s great. But if the users can’t actually use the page or they’re frustrated, you just have a pretty page."
"I was kind of wandering around aimlessly trying to find the next job."
"I was going to use everything that I had experienced, all the skills, all the successes, and become my own superpower."
"You’re not one of them. And that is your strength, Renee. That is your power."
"I was able to connect the dots a lot for the UX team because I had those relationships from customer success."
"Only one internal hire on the UX team was a huge misopportunity for us."
"Having those tough conversations with C-Suite execs, delivering findings with unwavering voice because you know the customer."
"I want people to question why I’m not in the room if I’m not there."
Or choose a question:
More Videos
"If it’s not sold at Amazon or Costco, it’s probably not in my house — not because I love those companies but because of their consistency."
Sam ProulxOnline Shopping: Designing an Accessible Experience
November 29, 2023
"Not all climate jobs have digital outputs, so don’t waste your time chasing digital roles in fields like green concrete."
Max Gadney Andrea Petrucci Joshua Stehr Hannah WickesAssessing UX jobs for impact in climate
August 14, 2024
"People crave real connection, but not forced fun or extra Zooms—so we embed play into existing meetings."
Shipra Kayan Tess DixonHow Tess Dixon Facilitates Team Engagement and Collaboration at Condé Nast Using Miro
October 1, 2021
"Sharing research should take more time than actually conducting it because socializing insights drives impact."
Bob Baxley Sara Asche Anderson Sharon Bautista Frank Duran Jamie Kaspszak Abbey Smalley Sylas SouzaTheme 4: Discussion
January 8, 2024
"When you’re passionate about a topic, you hear the song loudly in your head; the listener just hears clapping."
Janaki KumarInnovate with Purpose
June 14, 2018
"You don’t have to be a designer to participate; over 90% of our community are not design professionals."
Lona MooreScaling Design Beyond Designers
June 11, 2021
"You’re never going to convince business people with product language, but you can with financial language they care about."
Giff ConstableFinancial fluency for product leaders: AMA with Giff Constable
April 11, 2024
"Emergence means that something new arises through simple interactions; we design interactions so systems find their own desirable solutions."
Meghan Hellstern Joanne DongThe Next 100 Years of Civic Design: How Might We Better Rise to Meet the Challenges of Today and Tomorrow?
December 10, 2021
"An everything chat bot is almost certainly not how you’re going to build it; realistically you’re building three apps in a trench coat."
Sarah BarrettAI in Real Life: Using LLMs to Turbocharge Microsoft Learn
February 13, 2025
Latest Books All books
Dig deeper with the Rosenbot
What role does accountability cadence play in sustaining discipline within design ops initiatives?
What does it mean for design ops to shift from managing existing processes to architecting infrastructure and cultural change at scale?
How should a design ops team define and use lead measures and scorecards to track progress effectively?