A Decade in UXR: What Have I Learned?
The Beginner’s Mind: Our Greatest Advantage
When I first stepped into UX research, I thought expertise meant having all the answers. I started working as a UX/UI designer in 2012, and at that time, the separation into UXR, Visual, Design Systems, and Experience Design wasn’t so prominent — I got to do everything.
Over a decade, I’ve learned that the real challenge in UX research isn’t just gathering data; it’s uncovering what users truly need, even when they can’t articulate it themselves. And the biggest obstacle to doing that?
“The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge”
Daniel Boorstin
We all carry bias — this is just how we are, imperfect, shaped by our unique life experiences, cultural identities, and upbringing. The most dangerous researchers aren’t those who lack experience; they’re the veterans who’ve forgotten how to see with fresh eyes. That’s why embracing a beginner’s mindset, also known as shoshin in Zen Buddhism, is our greatest strength.
Elizabeth Churchill, a leader in human-computer interaction, warns that “experts see the world through thick filters.” Jane Fulton Suri of IDEO similarly advocates for approaching each research challenge with deliberate naivety — not as a limitation, but as our most valuable tool.
Seek Out the Edge Cases and Trend Setters
In my view, the most revealing insights rarely come from the middle of the bell curve. They emerge from conversations with those living at the edges — the early adopters, the creators, the passionate critics, the hackers.
I’ve learned to identify these “trend setters” and engage them with genuinely open-ended questions. Not “Would you use this feature?” but “Walk me through how you currently think about and solve this problem.” The difference is profound — one merely validates our assumptions; the other reveals the unexpected territory where high innovation potential.
“I had to build my own solution because nothing out there does what I need”
At Airbnb, Genevieve Bell and her research team pioneered immersive ethnographic studies, discovering their most transformative insights not from surveys but from spending time with hosts in their homes. They weren’t hunting for specific answers; they were mapping unknown territories.
The Qual-Quant Dance: Mastering Mixed Methods
Research methods aren’t created equal, but they are equally necessary. The sequence to me matters profoundly:
Qualitative research first — observe what people say, think, feel, and do. These immersive sessions reveal the questions we didn’t know to ask and the problems we didn’t realize existed. This is where patterns emerge and hypotheses form.
Only then should quantitative validation follow. With 40+ participants (respecting the statistical law of large numbers), we can verify which patterns hold true at scale and which were merely interesting anomalies.
The power of mixed methods lies in strategic deployment across the research lifecycle. Here are a few methods that I particularly like, that I got to use during my time at Accenture Song and in collaboration with Fjord team:
- Service blueprint details holistic service processes and touchpoints that go beyond digital.
- Ethnographic research provides contextual inquiry through immersive observation of users in their natural environments.
- Journey mapping visualizes the entire user experience or it’s fragmented touch points.
- Affinity mapping clusters qualitative data into bigger patterns and themes, bridging the gap between individual stories and broader insights
- A/B and multivariate testing quantifies the impact of specific design decisions with statistical rigor.
When project budget allows, I strongly advocate for multi-week research initiatives that blend complementary methodologies. This isn’t just about gathering more data — it’s about revealing the hidden connections between what users say, what they do, and why they do it.
The Accenture/Fjord human-centered design process embodies this sequence perfectly — deep empathy precedes measurable validation. Rushing to quantitative research prematurely is like using a map before exploring the territory.
The Magic Number Five and Frequent Testing
Perhaps the most counterintuitive lesson I’ve learned is that you’ll discover approximately 80% of your usability issues with just five participants. Jakob Nielsen’s research validated this phenomenon, showing that testing with more users yields diminishing returns.
This revelation transforms how we approach research. Rather than conducting massive studies infrequently, we can test with small groups continually throughout development. This philosophy is essential to creating intuitive products — test early, test often, iterate rapidly.
The power of five means we can maintain velocity while still capturing critical insights. It’s not about perfect data; it’s about continuous learning.
Vision vs. Validation: Corporate Testing Philosophies
This tension between extensive testing and visionary intuition plays out fascinatingly across the tech landscape:
- Visionary-led companies like Apple and Airbnb have historically prioritized intuition over user testing. Patricia Moore, one of the pioneers of inclusive design, created groundbreaking solutions by immersing herself in the experiences of aging individuals, shaping an entirely new approach to human-centered design.
- Data-driven companies like Netflix and Amazon embed experimentation into their DNA. Anne Wojcicki’s 23andMe pioneered direct-to-consumer genetic testing, continuously refining their UX through rigorous user research and iterative testing.
Personally, I feel more affinity with visionary companies like Apple and Airbnb.
Broadly both approaches have yielded spectacular successes and occasional failures. The lesson isn’t that one philosophy trumps the other, but that organizations must consciously choose their research stance based on their culture, leadership, and market position.
Mindsets Over Demographics As You Scale
As products scale globally, demographic segmentation becomes increasingly problematic. I’ve watched countless teams obsess over age brackets and income levels while missing the psychological patterns that truly predict behavior.
“Organizations will demand a more qualitative understanding of what people’s data really tells us within the context of their lives. We’ll move on from using traditional market segmentation to defining mindsets that indicate individuals’ behaviors and attitudes to design personalized products and services.”
Fjord Trends, 2019
The most sophisticated research organizations — including those at Airbnb and IDEO — now organize around mindsets and mental models rather than traditional demographics. Here’s why this shift matters:
Demographics are surface-level attributes that correlate with behavior but rarely explain it. Mindsets reveal the underlying value systems, motivations, and worldviews that drive decisions:
- Income level may suggest purchasing power but tells us little about prioritization principles
- Gender might correlate with certain preferences but fails to explain the psychological drivers behind those patterns
- Generational cohorts share historical experiences but diverge dramatically in how they process and respond to those experiences
Value systems transcend these traditional categories. A sustainability-focused minimalist, a status-seeking maximalist, and a utility-driven pragmatist will interact with your product in fundamentally different ways regardless of demographic alignment.
These psychographic patterns transcend cultural and demographic boundaries, offering more durable insights as products scale globally. They reveal the “why” behind behavior, not just the “who.”
The Overlooked Partners: Research Begins at Home
A final insight that took me years to fully appreciate: when working with clients as an agency partner or consultant, interviewing your clients and interested parties is just as crucial as interviewing users.
These internal partners — whether executives, product managers, or subject matter experts — hold essential context that shapes how research findings will be received and implemented. Through thoughtful interviews, you gain:
- Insight into past research efforts and why certain initiatives succeeded or failed
- Intuition of unstated assumptions driving the project
- Clarity on what “success” truly means for different parties involved
I’ve seen brilliant research insights go nowhere because they didn’t address real business partner needs. Conversely, modest insights have driven tremendous impact when perfectly aligned with client priorities and framed in language that resonated with decision-makers.
The most effective researchers don’t just understand users — they understand the ecosystem where their recommendations must thrive. By interviewing clients with the same rigor and empathy you bring to user research, you chart a clearer path to project success and build the trust needed for your insights to drive meaningful change.
Designing for Humanity: The Inclusive Imperative
My journey has ultimately led me to believe that the ideal form of UX research aims toward full inclusion — designing for the complete spectrum of human diversity. This isn’t just an ethical stance; it’s a pathway to breakthrough innovation.
The evolution of voice interfaces illustrates this perfectly. Voice recognition technology initially emerged as an accessibility solution for people with mobility impairments who couldn’t use traditional keyboards or mice. What began as designing for a specific constraint expanded into mainstream innovations like Siri, Alexa, and Google Assistant that billions now use daily.
This pattern repeats throughout tech history: text messaging developed partly for deaf users; audiobooks created for the visually impaired; touch screens refined for those with motor control challenges. The most universal innovations often emerge from designing for the most specific constraints.
When you design for everyone — across abilities, languages, cultures, and contexts — you impose the most stringent constraints on your process. Yet it’s precisely these constraints that force genuine creativity and breakthrough thinking. The struggle to make something work for everyone often leads to solutions that work better for everyone.
Of course, in an imperfect world, not every project has the luxury of pursuing this inclusive ideal. Personally, I never found myself being in an envorment that allows for this level of idealism. Tight timelines, budgets constrains, too frequently I had to compromise.
But even when full inclusion isn’t possible, maintaining awareness of the excluded helps us build more ethically and create pathways toward greater accessibility in future iterations.
The Essence of Great UXR
Great user experience research isn’t about confirming what we already believe. It’s about systematically challenging our assumptions, embracing uncomfortable truths, and transforming them into opportunities for innovation.
As Steve Jobs said, “People don’t know what they want until you show it to them.” Our job isn’t simply to ask users what they want — it’s to observe deeply enough to uncover needs they haven’t articulated, even to themselves.
The best user researchers I’ve worked with share one quality: humility in the face of human complexity. They approach each project not as experts but as curious students of human behavior, ready to be surprised, challenged, and transformed by what they discover.
That beginner’s mind — the willingness to see with fresh eyes — remains our most powerful tool in a field that evolves as rapidly as the humans we study.
What if we could look at the problem with full, undivided attention — contemplating every aspect, not to confirm what we already know, but to unearth deeper truths about the human condition?
