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Design Research Strategy & Strategic Design Research
Summary
When scaling and democratizing research practices, how can you help ensure higher levels of value are delivered? In this interactive session, we discuss different items we can leverage to ensure design research is providing value to an organization by driving strategic decisions. Areas we cover include: Utilizing research repositories as strategic assets; Leveraging quant + quo data to track success; and Ensuring research can focus on the highest value work.
Key Insights
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Research repositories should be designed like design systems—organized, accessible, and enabling holistic storytelling rather than just storing final reports.
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Atomic insights or research nuggets capture rich, verbatim customer feedback that enhances empathy and informs design decisions more effectively.
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Democratizing research to teams increases insight ownership but risks duplication and inconsistent results if not strategically managed.
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Effective research strategy involves deciding what not to do to maintain organizational focus, echoing Michael Porter's definition of strategy.
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Most organizations struggle to fully integrate user-centered research into decision-making despite having talent and data available, causing researcher frustration and turnover.
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Combining deep usability study insights with broader, real-time listening posts enables a richer understanding of user pain points across contexts.
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Qualitative UX research faces challenges in measurement and aligning results with business metrics, requiring new approaches beyond standard quantitative data.
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Video and multimedia summaries of research insights can personalize findings and improve engagement across teams.
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Building trust and relationships across departments (UX, strategy, marketing) maximizes the value of research data collected through various channels.
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Investing time upfront in organizing and tagging research insights can save teams significant time searching and accelerate impactful outcomes.
Notable Quotes
"Strategy is telling organizations what not to do, not just generating new ideas."
"Research repositories often get a bad rap because people just dump final reports without thinking about how they'll be used."
"Atomic insights are nuggets that tag what customers actually said, including their sentiments and sometimes swearing."
"On average we spend 20% of our time just looking for things, which is not the best use of resources."
"Democratizing research can lead to duplication and even conflicting results if we’re not careful."
"I want to look at the discussion guides or listen to recordings to really get the emotional context."
"Organizations are slow to adopt the practice of making every decision from the voice of the customer, despite having talented people and data."
"Combining deep usability studies with site intercepts gives you both step-by-step insights and a moment-in-time view of user pain."
"Using video clips of insights creates a more personal connection and helps teams engage with the data."
"Building relationships with other departments helps us leverage information collected for different purposes in a structured way."
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