Summary
Come listen to real stories of how User Research has worked closely with Product Design and Product Management at Compass. Moderated by Anna Avrekh, Director of User Research, this Q&A session will cover how teams work closely with user research, how they have taken action off of user research, and the keys to successful relationships. Feel the love!
Key Insights
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Compass embeds researchers deeply into product teams, enabling ongoing collaboration across the product lifecycle.
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User research frequently unveils diverse, sometimes contradictory needs among users from different markets.
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Research can fundamentally change product strategy, such as merging similar products based on user terminology and use.
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Assuming competitor products are best-in-class without user research risks misguided product development.
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Limited research capacity at Compass requires prioritizing major user questions over minor design details.
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Timing user research effectively is challenging in fast-paced, multi-prioritized environments.
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Cross-training product teams in basic research principles helps scale insight gathering and avoids misuse of research.
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Research differs from user feedback; research requires methodological rigor to avoid bias and leading questions.
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Leading a user research session gives product teams empathy for researchers’ complex, high-pressure work.
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Continuously involving researchers throughout development, review, and post-launch phases improves outcomes.
Notable Quotes
"I’m always shocked when my design is just the perfect solution from the get-go."
"The biggest fundamental change for us was realizing agents didn’t distinguish between two products we thought were separate."
"User research at Compass consistently surprises me with the complete diversity of the agent population."
"We only have one researcher, so we have to focus on testing big goals, not minutiae like font sizes."
"Sometimes you have to do without research if the timeline is so short that research won’t come in time."
"People conflate research and feedback, but research is a rigorous method to avoid confirmation bias."
"It’s really hard to lead research sessions; you have to stop yourself from leading users to answers."
"Having our researcher in meetings throughout the product lifecycle is super helpful to maintain nuance."
"User research is like live TV; the researcher is on the spot and under high pressure."
"You don’t know how hard research is until you’re actually running the session yourself."
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