I don’t need a UX researcher — Designers can do research.

“UX Researcher is an unnecessary role. Designers can do it.”: one CEO mentioned to me in a job interview.

It is a quite common scenario for UX designers doing research, especially in start-ups. Why pay two people when one person can do the same? However, the confirmation that UX designers can do UX Research abolishes the value of the UX Research role, and here I will explain why.

Note: each case is different. There are UX designers who became researchers and vice versa. In this article, I am analyzing UX research as a full time job dedication.

In the affirmation ‘UX designers can do UX research’ there is a misunderstanding of what are the responsibilities of each of the roles. Let’s clarify:

• UX Research is not UX Design. A ≠ B. And vice versa: UX Design is not UX Research.
• These two disciplines are related: there can be a part of research in the design. There can be a part of design in the research.

Affirming that UX designers can do UX Research is like saying that Everybody can be a psychologist. Whilst everybody can listen to you, empathise, and even support you in a correct way, not everybody can: analyse the symptoms, create hypotheses to work on and use the proper methodology to help you.

One of the added values of having a UX Researcher is having an employee who is fully dedicated to users’ feedback analysis. This implies analysis of previous UX Research projects, A/B tests, usability issues, etc. Does a UX designer role include this? — It shouldn’t. Because if a full time UX designer spends their working hours thinking about different methodologies, preparing the hypotheses and the follow-up research/s, when do they do the design work?

A value of having a UX Researcher is having an employee who is full time responsible for the users’ feedback analysis.

But be careful — this does not conclude that it’s a bad practice for designers to perform research. The research should not be owned only by the UX research department. There are benefits of designers and product managers participating in the research, such as; 1) The team better understands what people think about the Product and how they interact with it; 2) If designers do quick validations, UX research can focus more on strategic research (which personally I prefer). However, there is a need for a professional researcher to supervise these studies. So the hypotheses are well structured, the questions are asked correctly, and the insights are not findings. For instance, you would not going to trust a yoga teacher to cure your back pain, wouldn’t you? You might need a doctor to examine you first.

There is a need of constant communication with users which is UX Research’s responsibility

To improve a considerable area of the Product you might need constant communication with users, which means long term research (hello in-house UX Researchers 🙋🏻‍♀️). Quick validations are like short term cures (going back to the Psychology metaphor). They are good for testing and showing the directions to follow, however, not solving the main users’ pain point might lead to bigger problems and can end up costing the company more money.

Machines can’t communicate and understand the same way people do. This means that their designers have a special obligation to ensure that the behavior of machines is understandable to the people who interact with them. (NORMAN, D. in The Design of Everyday Things, op. cit., 67).

For example, to change Glovo’s rating system there were two UX research iterations and A/B tests. And, even after that, I would still analyze the new experience (3rd iteration).

Not solving the main users’ pain point might lead to bigger problems and can end up costing the company more money.

Having more researchers than necessary

Having more UX researchers than necessary can also be a problem. And, I assume, this is one of the causes of the CEO’s quote I mentioned in the beginning.

Having UX research studies that are done because there is a UX researcher and we need to give her/him a job, can provide research without value. And, not having a value from your department can lead to — “We don’t need a UX researcher”. In my job, I try to discuss with a Product manager why we need this project. Why are we asking this question? What do we want to achieve? Are there other priorities at the moment?

Concluding:

• Can designers speak with your users? — Yes.
• Can they analyze how people interact with the Product? — Of course.
• Can designers ask the questions in a correct way and acknowledge what type of questions they are asking? — Not necessary.
• Should designers constantly analyze users’ feedback? — It’s not their main responsibility.

If we agree with the confirmation that ‘My friend can be a psychologist’ dismisses the value of the Psychologist’s profession, we might agree that ‘UX designers can do UX Research’ abolishes the value of the UX Research job.