From learning the lingo to ways of working: an academic’s experience of transitioning into UX

Five months ago, I started work as a senior user researcher at Kainos. I arrived here from academia, via a short stint in the commercial sector.

My blog post is the first in a series of reflections from academics who have moved into consultancy.

I currently work on a large-scale public sector project. As a newcomer to consultancy and the public sector, getting used to new job roles, ways of working and terminology has been an exciting challenge.

In this post, I share five tips for managing the transition from academia to a digital consultancy like Kainos.

1. Do your research about other disciplines

This is an obvious one for researchers. When I started at Kainos, there were two roles I did not know. The first was the role of content designer. I had heard of UX writers and had worked with copywriters, but how did these roles compare? I found out that the history of content design is linked to that of Government Digital Services (GDS), and so GOV.UK was a good place to start. Its Introduction to Content Design actively distinguishes between the marketing-focused ‘creation of copy’ and the more user-centred approach to ‘designing content’.

The second role new to me was business analyst, or BA. Was this the equivalent of the commercial product manager? I found useful articles on this and related user experience (UX) roles via the Nielsen Norman Group, including one on how UX professionals collaborate on deliverables. Understanding these contexts helped me to meaningfully engage with my new colleagues.

2. Speak up and ask questions

One of the first things I did after joining a Kainos project was to set up meetings with both content designers and BAs. I asked them questions, watched how they operated, then worked with them to cross-check my understanding.

At Kainos, there is a culture of mutual respect and support. Being inquisitive is not a sign of weakness but of engagement. Being the person who asks questions also allows others to speak up when there is something they do not know or understand. Often this reveals important shared knowledge gaps, or ways to develop our thinking.

3. Transfer those academic skills to shape your own role

For some time in the commercial sector, I tried to fit in and not draw attention to my previous academic training. In fact, a well-meaning colleague once told me to ‘ditch the academic back story’ because academic experience was shorthand for lack of experience in industry.

When I joined Kainos, I realised this advice to ignore my academic background was not helpful. It took emphasis away from some important transferable skills that were relevant to my role. For example, as an academic, I worked with other disciplines to advance knowledge and innovation. I also communicated complex ideas to different audiences.

Kainos values the different paths we have all taken to get here, including academia. Once I let go of ‘fitting in’, I was free to explore doing things differently. For example, it turned out that making my own role as a user researcher clearer to other disciplines was one way of making a difference.

4. Advocate for improved ways of working

When I joined Kainos, I needed to understand existing ways of working. But I also realised that ways of working were not static.

This realisation led me to do several things to improve ways of working, including:

• sharing my research plans
• inviting comments on discussion guides
• encouraging technical architects and team leads to observe research sessions and contribute to analysis workshops

All these things meant that I made my own processes as a user researcher more visible and valuable, and involved the wider user-centred design team (including the BA) and other disciplines in more steps of my research.

It also improved communication and helped dismantle some of the language barriers we build through discipline-specific ways of talking.

5. Learn the lingo

It is of course vital to learn some important terminology to avoid breakdowns in communication. For example, one term I had to get to grips with at Kainos was ‘user stories’, not because it was new to me, but because I had known it quite differently as part of storytelling, of shedding light on user needs. In contrast, my business analyst colleagues write user stories to communicate user requirements, which developers then build and deliver. It helps to understand colleagues’ use of language to be able to support their research needs.

And here comes the caveat. There are other bits of terminology that I feel make life unnecessarily hard for newcomers. This is because tricky words and insider terminology can exclude people who do not understand them. There is a reason the GDS style guide includes a list of ‘words to avoid’ (see ‘W’) in digital services. Both as a newcomer and a user researcher, I feel it is my responsibility to challenge terminology where it actively excludes.

Final reflections

Writing this blog post has reminded me of a powerful (albeit contested) linguistic concept called ‘linguistic relativity’. It suggests that language shapes our experience of the world and that we perceive the world differently based on the words or categories we use to describe it. I think I do know the world of UX differently now that I have engaged with, and worked with, its terminology.

Maybe this is why one of my greatest reflections on transitioning from academia to UX is that I love the wordy craft of content design. I enjoy working with colleagues in this area to make our services and designs simple, intuitive, accessible, and inclusive; to shape user experience in positive ways.

Many thanks to Amy Noss, Adam Dunn, Lizzie Coates and Mark Kingshott for helping me shape this blog post.

Photo by Alexandra on Unsplash (Artwork: Tim Etchells)