Bridging the gap between research and design
Research & design are ideally (but rarely) entwined throughout the design process. Until there is a way to become a perfect designer-researcher cyborg, we will work on diverse teams of people who have cultivated deep domain knowledge within their chosen fields. But research smarts do not necessarily translate to design-mindedness, and design chops do not necessarily translate to an understanding of the research process. Researchers and designers live on opposing sides of a canyon filled with potential miscommunication, lost findings, knowledge gaps, and even profound frustration because your colleague just “doesn’t get it.”
The Problem
I’ve worked with researchers who struggle to frame their findings actionably. I’ve worked with designers who ignore research insights, or almost worse, refuse to move forward with design until every pixel of a prototype has been evaluated by users.
These misunderstandings can cause teams to insulate themselves from each other, with research retreating to its corner of protocols, analysis and reports and design huddling around wireframes, visual designs and clickable prototypes, each peeking out only so much as necessary to communicate the bare minimum to each other.
In this model, research doesn’t have a say in design, and design doesn’t have a say in research. This mode of working may be easier from a scheduling and resource management perspective, but it comes with significant costs: additional sprints to factor research findings into design, questionable design decisions that eventually need to be reworked, unclear design objectives, research initiatives to nowhere, and frustrated colleagues ready to throw in the towel and just give up instead of rallying around a problem to find a creative solution.
Building and maintaining a bridge between research and design can be challenging but it is definitely rewarding. After all, research and design are team sports. It takes trust, it takes work, but mostly it takes people who are willing to listen to each other and adjust their approaches to collaboration accordingly.
Build the Right Bridge
When it comes time to tackle the widened gulf between design and research that your team may have found themselves swimming in, it’s important to understand the root of the problem that your team is facing. A bridge between research and design for a team that doesn’t understand the value of research or how to collaborate with design is very different from a bridge to connect designers afraid to move forward without research or researchers too used to being the directors of every design decision.
Does your team need additional training, both for researchers and designers?
Does your team need to build confidence in each other’s abilities?
Does your team need more structured time for collaboration?
Does your team need more open lines of communication?
Does your team just need to get to know each other?
Diagnosing the problem will help you define the solution. There is no one-size-fits all method of bringing design and research together into one team, but considering personalities, backgrounds, experiences, expectations, styles of working, and modes of communication are all important when coming up with a game plan. Sometimes design and research just click. Sometimes working together may need to be a little more forced until the wheels start turning. Either way, it’s vital that everyone on the team knows how to…
Speak the Same Language
Embedding researchers in design and designers in research comes with plenty of challenges around communication. Researchers may come from traditional academic backgrounds, like psychology or anthropology, where they’re more comfortable communicating in Word Documents. Designers usually speak in Figma files. Additionally, colleagues may have picked up bad habits throughout their careers. They could be quite content working on non-collaborative teams, despite the shortfalls of this mode of working. It could be difficult for them to imagine a new way of researching or designing.
For researchers, providing designers with “insights” is rarely enough, especially when working on multidisciplinary teams with product managers and engineers. Researchers need to take their insights and turn them into boundary objects that can provide direction to teams without being overly prescriptive to solutions. I find that framing my insights as user needs to meet, pain points to solve, or opportunities for exploration organized within thematic or process frameworks can effectively get everyone on the same page. Those “frames” of insights can then easily be spun into collaborative workshops or tactical design requirements.
For designers, researchers need help understanding what you need to learn. In an ideal world, we’re in every meeting, every design critique, every client check-in, but that’s usually a logistical impossibility. Researchers think in questions, not ideas. As a researcher, I often set up meetings where the team collaborates on research questions to answer in a study. In the spirit of building a bridge both ways, designers can think about questions they need answers to throughout the design process. It’s great when those questions are even contextualized within designs themselves. Knowing what designers want to know — without needing to painstakingly pull it out of them — speeds up the research process and brings us closer to those insights!
Trust the Process
At the risk of sounding too obviously from Philadelphia, you have to trust the process. If you’re a researcher new to the design process, or a designer new to working with researchers, there will definitely be a phase of discomfort. Like any relationship, communication is key, and it may be awkward to hear or say “hey, these findings aren’t actionable enough” or “can you please give me more direction on what you’re trying to learn from this research?” The most effective teams are those that can navigate miscommunication or disagreements without ego or personal insecurity. If you find yourself retreating from colleagues who have different backgrounds than your own, ask yourself why.
Maybe it’s time to take someone out for a cup of coffee.
