Unsticking Research for Better Information Flow
Summary
Creating and sharing knowledge to make better decisions and solve problems is the core of a research function. An “insight” helps organize disparate information – it makes things clear.
Key Insights
-
•
Deliberate documentation with decision focus and tagging is key to making research insights retrievable and actionable across teams.
-
•
Limiting key insights to five per report prevents dilution and conflicting stakeholder interpretations.
-
•
AI tools like SharePoint Copilot and custom GPTs can effectively interrogate research repositories to detect duplication and support decision-making.
-
•
Tagging documents with metadata such as decision informed, core problem, and expiry date helps both humans and AI find relevant insights quickly.
-
•
Curated communication—using output-only channels for high-frequency updates and targeted in-depth emails—prevents stakeholders from becoming overwhelmed.
-
•
Research insights have varying shelf lives; pricing studies may expire in 12-18 months while usability heuristics last longer.
-
•
Keeping research reports focused on actionable decisions ties the insight work directly to business impact and ROI.
-
•
An insight is a finding plus an opinion, emphasizing the so-what that ties data to business and user meaning.
-
•
Scaling insight sharing requires evolving processes suited to company size, culture, and tools availability.
-
•
Building relationships with customer-facing teams strengthens research influence and amplifies insights usage.
Notable Quotes
"What good are the insights if we can’t get them where they need to go, when they need to go there, and make sure they get used?"
"We end up with this junk drawer phenomenon with spaghetti-fication of different insights being passed around with no clarity."
"Deliberate documentation can be the decider between something being useful in the future or not."
"An insight is a finding plus an opinion — it’s the so what of it all."
"No more than five key insights — any more and teams start going off in different directions."
"We are not just doing research to find stuff out; we need to show a return on investment on everything."
"Don’t try to tag all historical work at once — tag as you go to avoid re-platforming nightmares."
"Curated communication means linking, not explaining — think of your messages as a doorway, not the destination."
"If you’re a team of one, focus on getting one stakeholder at a time to sponsor your work."
"If you’re in a big company, think smaller to work bigger — narrow your focus rather than get distracted by every shiny tool."
Or choose a question:
More Videos
"The biggest myth of all is you can't teach creativity."
Dr. Karl JeffriesThe Science of Creativity for DesignOps
January 8, 2024
"When we showed the Iceland Ministry of Foreign Affairs their portfolio, the Foreign Minister said, we have to pivot our innovation investments to early-stage catalytic innovations."
Milan Guenther Benjamin KumpfThe $212 billion ‘so what?’: unlocking impact in development cooperation
November 20, 2025
"Building incentives and celebrating deferred impact rewards researchers and drives behavior towards reusable knowledge creation."
Ben Davies Matt Duignan Andrew Michael Dr. Emily DiLeoExpert Panel: The Principles of Research Repository Design
March 11, 2022
"The Austin studio’s walls can be put up and taken down by a 90-pound person on a Home Depot shopping cart."
Phil GilbertA Consistent Culture of Design
May 14, 2015
"Building more ethical, responsible, and humanistic forms of technologies requires diverse and interdisciplinary conversations."
Prayag Narula Rida QadriHCI 2.0: Humanity Deserves the Attention that UX Research has to Offer
March 28, 2023
"Sometimes research becomes the defacto 'talk to a customer' group, which can distance others from direct customer contact."
Ned Dwyer Emily Stewart James WallisThe Intersection of Design and ResearchOps
September 24, 2024
"An accessible product is not only the right thing to do, it’s also good for business."
Erin WeigelReal-world lessons to improve your conversion rates
June 26, 2024
"Disability is less about a person and more about a person’s interaction with the environment and processes."
Samuel ProulxFrom Standards to Innovation: Why Inclusive Design Wins
November 19, 2025
"Mastery is a core human motivator; people want to understand and feel competent in what they do."
Cheryl PlatzEmbrace Your Fun Factor: Game Development Best Practices for Product Design
January 9, 2026
