UX Researcher (II)

Job Details:
Job Title: User Experience (UX) Researcher
Location: Mountain View, CA (Hybrid Tues to Thurs office, Mon & Fri remote)
Duration: 6+ Months
Type: Full-Time, Contract

Description:
As a User Experience (UX) Researcher, you conduct research projects of medium complexity to learn about users and their needs with little oversight. You use a variety of methods to collect and analyze data, and then share your findings with the team to improve products and services. You create high-quality communications about findings and recommendations, and have a deep understanding of user needs, pain points, motivations, values, goals, constraints, and opportunities. You have a close working relationship with your team and participate in cross-team collaborations with peers. You are always learning and growing in your field.

The Learning Frontiers UXRA will help lead and run our student engagement programs including our student panels, co-design sessions and empathy building events. The researcher will also synthesize and translate research findings to actionable insights to diverse audiences.

The Learning Frontiers team bridges cutting-edge AI research with evidence-based pedagogy to build the next generation of learning products. In close collaboration with research and AI partners, we identify and explore emerging frontiers in education from multimodal comprehension and adaptive practice to AI-assisted writing and oral assessments. Our goal is to prototype, test, and graduate high-efficacy pedagogical experiences into primary consumer surfaces to drive measurable, lasting learning impact at global scale.

Top 5-7 Skills:

1. Team Management

2. Ethical UX research

3. UX storytelling

4. Research processes

5. UX research methodology

6. Product development lifecycle

7. Human/user behavior

Requirements for the role:

• B.A./B.S. (completed) or M.A/M.S./Ph.D. (in progress or completed) in Human Factors, HCI, Psychology, Computer Science, Social Science, or other fields emphasizing human behavior

• Detail-oriented and ability to work fairly independently on a variety of tasks

• Excellent communication and project management skills

• Experience working and managing research vendors

• Experience with a range of qualitative research methods and analysis techniques

• Ability to carefully craft and communicate research findings through the appropriate means

• Experience in developing educational products

• 2+ years of relevant industry experience, including integrating user research into product design

• Leading, assisting in planning, conducting and analyzing user studies such as usability studies (both in-person and remote), focus groups, interviews etc.

• Managing and maintaining student engagement programs and advisory boards

• Design and facilitate empathy programs such as participatory co-design workshops and on-site focus groups

• Clearly communicate research agenda with cross-functional partners

• Evangelize and communicate research findings to diverse audiences through written reports and oral presentations

• Collaborate with UX Researchers and stakeholders on the team to define research projects and needs

• With minimal guidance, identify ideas to improve products and services through research-driven insights and recommendations

• Utilize user-centric thinking to unblock and inspire partners and collaboratively solve moderately scoped constraints in strategy, product or technology

• Contribute to developing a holistic research program by planning, designing, and engaging in strategic and tactical research

• Identify and adapt to evolving user needs by adapting research approaches

• Execute analysis for medium-sized research projects or programs

• Conduct moderately scoped research to identify user needs and business opportunities

• Plan and prioritize research across projects in alignment with larger project goals

• Collaborate with partners to identify opportunities to expand responsibilities

• Anticipate and remove roadblocks with the potential to impede progress

• Guide product direction through research by analyzing, consolidating, or synthesizing what is known about user, product, service, or business needs

• Demonstrate awareness of how multiple qualitative and quantitative research efforts come together to influence the team or project

• Help to identify, create, and effectively apply key insights and metrics in the evaluation of product or service impact

• Build consensus within one or more projects/teams and gain support for research-based, user-centric solutions

• Communicate research insights and recommendations to stakeholders and work to apply and integrate into product and planning

• Proficiency in: Team Management, Ethical UX research, UX storytelling, Research processes, UX research methodology, Product development lifecycle, Human/user behavior, Interactive technology, UX systems thinking

Education and Experience:

• B.A./B.S. (completed) or M.A/M.S./Ph.D. (in progress or completed) in Human Factors, HCI, Psychology, Computer Science, Social Science, or other fields emphasizing human behavior

• 2+ years of relevant industry experience, including integrating user research into product design

• Or equivalent combination of education, experience, and training

Mindlance is an Equal Opportunity Employer and does not discriminate in employment on the basis of Minority/Gender/Disability/Religion/LGBTQI/Age/Veterans.