UX Research in Agile, tree or forest?
I moved from a big tech where documentation, structure, process are well established, to the more ever-moving, real Agile style company as a UXR.
With my previous experiences consulting start ups that said they were “Agile” focusing on the tree instead of forest i.e. small code improvements, bug fixes, instead of basic yet life transforming feature for the users ignoring UXR or UX altogether, my biggest fear was my daily work becoming as tedious as piling bricks for the sake of it.
With the fear, I frantically Googled 2 things.
#1) “What is Agile” in the first place?
Wrike told me that…
- Individual interaction over formal processes — what if the individuals were problematic? 🤨
- Working software over comprehensive documentation — what if software is not working so well? or budget don’t allow? 🤨
- Responding to change over following a plan — without a plan, you loose focus! 😫
oh…Agile sounds terrible!! 😣
#2) “UXR in Agile”
Nielsen Norman Group article gave me those 3 main things ;
- Hard to integrate UXR into Agile but establish that user goal is represented and features/requirements will be informed by research 😭
2. Cycle is typically 6 wks, so ongoing plan/conduct/analyse will be continuously running. 🧐
3. Higher customer engagement but make sure that bigger picture of user goals are not lost and updated. 🧐
Translation : Daily shouting of UXR “everyone, focus, remember, we have residents to accommodate! build a house not a pile of bricks, they want windows!!”” — others “ignore them, they’re not part of our team”
The reality? Was not so bad.
But first I do wanna point out about Agile in general. If authentically done, as far as I know, it is CHAOTIC. Everything need to be discussed, aligned, therefore, many discussions. Ever changing priorities, ever changing people, ever changing tools we use, so many daily pings, no source of truth for any process…
Believe it or not, there is a positive side to it though!
They don’t care if your phrasing on the slides are articulate, or the images on the slides are not accurately placed. Or sucking up to your boss will get you somewhere rather than getting things done. We are constantly thinking as we run, so things get fixed so quickly. Not much BS or political moves, since simply there is no time for it. Pragmatic indeed, and the same for UXR. They allow rough quality for any outputs, so you can keep on updating. Also, tbh, the company having 1st party content helped for recruiting and faster turnaround.
As for UXR being respected in our Agile, the key seem to have been, to establish UXR as a fundamental built-in feature of Agile Product Development itself. Structurally, this meant placing UXRs as a part of the leadership (already implemented in most big corps, I know).
And, ohhhh did we speak out and challenged the leadership’s OKRs and discussion from users point of view, constantly!
I think that the key of UXR being respected and user’s perspective not being ignored, is for us to make the user reality as real and imaginable as possible. A drag queen, a protagonist who led the movement to make gay marriage in conservative country possible, said, “you don’t want to take action for someone you have no idea about, do you? But how about those 2 girls next door who are super nice? Do you wish they were happy? Come out and let them see you, let them know you have faces. This helped people vote for gay marriage” (sorry super paraphrasing)
To remind everyone’s work directly related to the bigger vision to the point that they can smell apple pie baked in the new house and children running (sorry for biased American soap drama images) every time they pile that 1 brick. I try to make sure when their mind start wondering off to something else, always remind them of those families that actually is waiting to be helped (not literally, metaphor). And, that their daily work is a part of something great, like smiles of the families.
I only have my boss to thank for UXR not being ignored even in such Agile environment. And of course, I can only imagine that this took painful, looong, years of discussion and proving UXR insights helped the product improve and grow, and we still have ever lasting responsibility to keep on reminding of the Apple pie and the smiles. But safe to say, despite my initial fear, I’m surprisingly happy being a UXR in Agile environment. At least, for now.
