Why Are You Even Researching?

I met my mentor Alexandra through a program called Built By Girls which matches a mentor to a mentee based on similar career interests and provides them with the tools and network necessary to succeed in tech. She is currently a Senior UX Researcher in Frame.io who has contributed to Flexport, Uber, and Autodesk to name a few examples.

When I joined our first virtual meeting, I was met by a smiling face and a talkative young woman. I loved hearing about her journey as a UX Researcher, and I knew that my understanding of UX research would change when I met her.

I am still letting the wisdom I marinate in my mind I learned based on our most recent conversation. Here is what I found:

• What you’re investigating should align to a business priority
• Prioritize understanding the minds of people who don’t have the same mindset [as a designer]
• Focus on projects that use your design mindset and not projects anyone can recreate
• What gets you ahead in UX research is how you approach a problem, organize your findings, and communicate those findings to your team
• You do not want to research a problem in which data already exists. You can prevent this issue by communicating with the marketing team, data science team, human resources team, etc.

I wish I could have expressed my understanding through a virtual reaction in Google Meets for communicating her ideas so well. She provided practical examples of businesses doing this, such as why Uber created a feature for passengers to identify drivers through shining a specific color of light to the driver. Or why Airbnb created Explore nearby when the pandemic settled in. I cannot forget to include this amazing quote by her:

“Having a balance between [advancing in] the market and an actual human need creates great products” — Alexandra