Introduction
UX Research and Design Research is a very interdisciplinary field; it borrows concepts from across the social sciences (e.g., anthropology, psychology, statistics), design, human factors, and many, many more (link).
While UX Research (in one form or another) has been around for decades, it has seen a more dramatic growth and maturation in the last decade. The approaches within UX Research are now being applied well beyond the tech industry and have made an impact in all kinds of companies and nonprofits, including banking and health care.
While the concept has been fairly well-established, the specifics and definition of the role vary considerably from company to company. There can be a big difference in a company’s UX maturity and research culture; and, at larger organizations, even from team to team. There are even differences regionally. While getting your foot in the door is important, make sure you are trying to find the right fit for you as well.
Our hope is that a guide like this can make the process of getting a job as a UX Researcher a bit more transparent and demystify the process, resulting in a richer and hopefully more inclusive research community. There are doubtless systemic challenges to the current landscape (too few companies want to invest in developing new researchers and internships are hard to come by), but hopefully these articles help a little in lowering the barrier to entry.
Please let us know if you have any feedback or would like to contribute!
We have organized this guide into the following sections:
