CHOOSING THE RIGHT RESEARCH CAREER PATH FOR YOU

Being a researcher: From academia to industry

Understanding what we can learn from each research role

Before going to university, I worked for a digital marketing agency. As soon as I mentioned going to the university to my manager, he replied something like (let me know if you are familiar with this): “But why would you do this to yourself? If you want to learn UX, take a course and don’t waste your time at the university. The university is not relevant anymore” (not the exact quote. Yeah, I know, bad researcher 😉 ).

6 years have passed, and I’ve already published my first paper during my Bachelor degree, began working at Red Hat as a UX researcher intern (and now full-time), and started my Sociology thesis as part of my Master degree. It’s time for me to reflect on my experience and review the differences between academia and industry — from a UX research career perspective.

Let’s begin by asking, “why should you read this article?”

My motivation for writing this article was twofold:

1. To help students considering becoming a researcher decide which path to choose (Academia VS Industry).
2. To help people understand the differences between academic research and UX research so they can recognize the advantages and disadvantages of each role and how they can learn from them (or even better — collaborate together).

In this blog post, we will cover the difference between academic research and UX research in the industry. I am going to take you through my journey, what I’ve learned, and what I took from my time as a researcher in the miLab and at Red Hat.

Common Ground

The role of a researcher is ultimately to observe the world around us and create and organize knowledge based on these observations. As a researcher, you can observe people, ideas, behaviors, and even written knowledge and posts. The researcher’s work is to document these observations in a systematic way, which enables the researcher to provide insights from those observations. Both academia and industry play this role, aiming to study motivations, behavioral patterns, and effects.

To accomplish these goals and organize information in a non-biased way, researchers around the world created a set of systematic methodologies aiming to uncover mechanisms, organize and analyze information, while trying to reduce the bias one can have. Eventually, the main goal is for people to consume and use that knowledge.

So, what’s the difference? For me, it’s all about these main subjects: freedom, speed, influence, sample size, and salaries.

By using different research and analysis methods, the researcher allows himself to find patterns in the data collected, and reduce bias. — Photo by Daria Nepriakhina 🇺🇦 on Unsplash

Freedom

Let’s start by understanding the role of a researcher in each field. As a researcher at the university, you can do almost whatever you want. The freedom you get to explore the topics that interest you is amazing. I can only dream about it as a UX researcher. If you have a question in your head, and you want to explore it, go and do it!

Unfortunately, the industry doesn’t work like that, and it’s not necessarily a bad thing. In the industry, you would usually work on a specific product, in a specific field, with specific users. Eventually, most of your studies will answer the same question: “what should the company do to increase its revenue?”.

However, the freedom in an academic setting also comes with a price. You have to work in a competitive environment, and publish your work in conferences and journals where they will be reviewed by different researchers. You need to defend your work all the time, and make sure you’ve done outstanding work. That being said, it’s eventually what makes this knowledge worthwhile. And to be honest, getting your paper published and cited by others is an amazing feeling.

On the other hand, even in Red Hat, where we have a well-established research team, we still need to educate the company on how supporting research activities in different phases of the product will help the company provide value to their customers, and yes, eventually increase their income. However, from my experience, presenting research findings to the teams that I’m working with encourages them to support and ask for more research activities to make better-informed decisions. That being said, it’s not always the case.

Speed

When it comes to speed of work, the industry is much faster, from conducting and analyzing studies to presenting them. When you decide on a research project in academia, you can’t jump and start it. You must work in strict phases, where you start by reading and studying what other researchers explored before you about your research field. Then, you can start writing your proposal for your Institutional Review Board (IRB). This proposal defines what you’re going to study in the project and how. Part of the reason for having an IRB is to make sure you’re not going to harm any of your participants in any way.

After conducting the research, you need to submit it to a conference or a journal. It’s an ongoing process, especially in journals, where the journal committee reviews your paper and asks you to improve your paper based on the comments they provided until your paper is finally accepted.

Now, let’s define industry research phases. Eventually, we provide research work to support product decisions and the product team. It’s starting with creating a research roadmap that correlates with the product roadmap. Then, discuss with relevant stakeholders (those who have an interest in the product and the study) about the study goals — what we want to learn, and what are they interested in? Then, the researcher writes the plan, the script, and the timeline for the project — approving it with the stakeholders, and you’re good to go. Trust me, it’s faster than working with the IRB. The fast pace allows researchers to work on a couple of projects, each in different phases (planning, conducting, analyzing, sharing, etc.), which allows for variety that helps you move forward, and spread your influence over multiple areas.

But if we’re being honest, and reviewing the reason for conducting studies — it is the impact the study will have on the field/the product. And this is the real story, how fast your insights are shared with the world. As I’ve mentioned, in academia it can take years before your work sees the light of day, which depends on a couple of factors, such as submitting your work to a conference or journal. However, in the industry, the stakeholders in the company are the ones that matter and are the ones who are going to take your insight and deliver them in the product.

The fast pace allows researchers to work on multipe projects, which allows for variety that helps you move forward, and spread your influence over multiple areas. — Photo by Maarten van den Heuvel on Unsplash

Influence

Influence is another factor for this discussion. To be honest, this is a hard one, and it depends on how you perceive impact. One can argue that academia doesn’t possess the impact and power it once had, and today, researchers have impact only if they work on products that influence their users’ lives through great products. Personally, I don’t see it that way. Each provides impact in diverse ways and supplies different types of information.

One of the things that I love the most about writing academic papers is the Discussion chapter, where you explore your findings in regards to previous knowledge published about the investigated research topic and field. It requires the author to think about the consequences of the results and the insights the researcher provides, and how this new knowledge is built on previous work in the field and supplies a different point of view for the discussion in this field. This discussion is meaningful and encourages the author to think outside the specific research bubble.

So what does influence in the industry look like? It’s straightforward, you’re working on products that solve problems for people. Before I joined Red Hat, I was interviewed for a product manager position. I remember talking with the talent acquisition team and telling her about the impact that I see the product has. I remember she told me, “Eventually, it’s a business, not a charity” (again, not an exact quote, bad researcher). And while I agree with that statement, I still see the impact the company has when you look at the greater consequences of the product. Yes, when I work at Red Hat, helping build products for developers, I don’t cry when I hear developers’ problems. But the impact is not solving the problems for developers, it is how the tools we’re creating for developers empower them to make better products that drive the world forward. It‘s how our customers building on our product and creating innovative technologies that solving problems, like secure your house, or helping companies provide new accessibility features.

Eventually, when it comes to impact, every researcher creates impact and knowledge that can help drive the world forward, invent new technologies, new insights, and solve problems. It doesn’t matter where you take your skills if you use them for good. If I want industry researchers to think about one thing is — how can we use the big budgets we have to create studies that have a big sample size for each study? Yes, I’m aware recruiting is a pain point (depending on the company, and users). Still, I wish researchers from companies who have the budget and the access to participants, will perform studies with much bigger sample sizes.

Salaries

So, let’s discuss the elephant in the room, which may influence your final decision, what are the salaries for each? Usually, the salaries in the high-tech industries are much higher than in the university (based on a simple comparison on indeed.com). It depends on a lot of factors like years of experience, country, company size, what other activities you do at the university (teaching for example), etc.

However, one special point to consider is“where should I begin?”

In my opinion, the answer is clear: start in academia. There are three main reasons behind this answer:

1. Academia is the best place to learn how to do proper research, without taking shortcuts, with people who help you review your work, and would make sure you did the best research work possible.
2. Finding a UX research position can be difficult, especially if you’re out of the United States. It’s a new role in the industry, and most of the open positions are currently located in the States. However, becoming a research assistant in a lab at the university requires you to be a good student, and find a research lab that INTERESTS you (yes, I simplified the process, but it can be that easy!).
3. The last reason that I want to point out is something that my professor told me. Academia is the place to make mistakes, and to learn from them. It’s a safe space to learn and become a better researcher. While in the industry each mistake can cost a lot of money, usually in academia this is not the case, since you’re not helping the university take a new business direction, and usually, you have the time to fix and learn from your mistakes.

Comparing Academic Researchers vs UX Researchers based on the points discussed above. As you can see, it’s really a tie, and it depends a lot on where you see yourself in the future, and what is important to you.

So, What’s Next?

It is our role to drive ethical discussions around our products, and how it affects our users or other groups.

I’ve already mentioned how much I love the Discussion chapter at the end of academic papers. So, it’s my time to do exactly that. What can we learn from all of the points raised in this blog?

For industry researchers, I want to raise a couple of points to think of. How can we drive innovation by studying subjects that are not product-specific? For example, in the field of AI assistants, researchers can study the impact that assistants have on children’s imagination. By studying a subject like this, we can understand the consequences of the products we deliver, and suggest creative solutions which will also put the company in a good light, and can be used as a selling point later. In my opinion (influenced by my professors), it is our role to drive ethical discussions around our products, and how it affects our users or other groups.

Another point to be taken is the way academia builds on earlier work. It can be by building on the knowledge you can find in Google Scholar, the work of other researchers in your team, or even blog posts that were written by professionals. Making sure to connect your study to other studies or knowledge in the field will help you make better recommendations that consider multiple points of view. I think it’s part of what makes our work so unique, we don’t assume that the knowledge we create is absolute. We’re moving forward to learn the next thing, and to learn how this new knowledge interacts in the field.

And for academia (which by now you probably know I’m a fan of), I encourage my fellow researchers to drive and look for work with the industry more often. It can connect our studies to new and exciting resources, and test and discuss theories in various use cases. Also, I encourage you to attend conferences that are organized by the industry, to be involved there, and to present your studies to new audiences. It may result in better collaboration between industry and academia and would help bring the ethical discussion around the consequences of technology to the field.

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