{"id":2620,"date":"2020-10-29T13:03:39","date_gmt":"2020-10-29T12:03:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.stevebromley.com\/blog\/?p=2620"},"modified":"2020-10-29T13:03:41","modified_gmt":"2020-10-29T12:03:41","slug":"three-ways-to-make-people-care-about-user-research","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.stevebromley.com\/blog\/2020\/10\/29\/three-ways-to-make-people-care-about-user-research\/","title":{"rendered":"Three ways to make people care about user research"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
I couldn’t tell you if a tree falling in the forest makes a sound when no-one is around, but a research report certainly doesn\u2019t. It\u2019s very common to hear researchers complain that no-one is paying attention to their findings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This is a very bad situation for a new research team – what is the point of running studies if no-one is acting on the findings?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It\u2019s easy (and fun!) to complain about people ignoring research – but to make a real difference, effort is needed to make using evidence from research easy for our colleagues. In this blog post we look at three techniques to get people to take notice of research findings, and increase the impact of our research studies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Run studies people care about<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
User research uncovers information that makes decision making easier. It\u2019s surprising if no-one is paying attention to that information. Are your studies actually answering questions related to the team\u2019s priorities?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It\u2019s designers and product managers, who typically make product decisions, not researchers. Because of this, it should be designers and product managers who are informing research objectives. They know what decisions are coming up that they have to make, and they can make an informed decision.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When researchers plan and run studies unilaterally, they can go off and run studies that they find interesting, but which might not be relevant for upcoming product decisions. This isn\u2019t to say that researchers can\u2019t have good ideas for studies – by providing an unbiased outsider\u2019s view they can identify some of the core assumptions being made by product and design, and run studies to explore them. However a researcher should also check there is the opportunity to take action based on the findings, and gather some support for exploring these assumptions, before committing time to running these studies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The solution is to work closely with our product and design friends, always set objectives collaboratively, and ask teams \u201cwhat are you going to do with this information\u201d before starting studies. A kick-off meeting, using the kick-off template can help put some structure to those conversations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Move beyond research reports<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
It\u2019s a well known user research trope that user research reports get presented and then filed away in a drawer to be forgotten evermore. This is a shame, as forgotten findings have no impact on product decisions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This happens because research reports are an easy way for the researcher to \u2018store\u2019 knowledge. But they are not always an easy way to consume knowledge, and many findings, and potential opportunities will be missed when research findings are delivered in one big report.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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