User researcher role standards - Home Office User-Centred Design ManualProfessional standards and guidance

User researcher role standard

Key responsibilities

What are your key responsibilities as a user researcher?

  • you help your team to learn about the people that use our services
  • you plan and run research activities with users
  • you use a range of research methods including interviews, observations and usability testing to build a picture of users’ environments, needs and contexts of use
  • you analyse research findings to produce actionable insights, which enables an evidence-based approach and reduces risks to delivery This page will cover the main activities of the user researcher role and the standards that you are expected to adhere to. These standards have originated from the GOV.UK Service Standard for user research.

1. Research planning and approved research methods

Overview

In the user researcher role, you need to understand and apply a range of qualitative and quantitative user research methods for different life cycle phases and advise others on these methods.

When you start research planning, set out your research questions/objectives, timings and recruitment methods.

You may decide to use research methods such as -

  • user research interviews including semi-structured/exploratory interviews, observation/contextual inquiries and usability testing
  • card sorting
  • tree testing

This is not an exhaustive list and there are other research methods available. Check with the principal user researcher in your area if you would like to use a different method to the suggestions above.

Standard

1.1 You must choose the most appropriate methods for the type of research you are planning. You must decide the methods, objectives and questions when you start research planning.

1.2 You must have a clear set of objectives and questions as part of your research plan.

1.3 Contact the UCD Ops team if you have further questions on the systems and tooling used for these methods.

2. User selection and recruiting research participants

Overview

Who are your users? Who will be using the product and in what context? Try to gain as much information from the product team as you can to take forward in user selection and recruitment.

You might be working on an internal project; in which case you will usually have internal users and not members of the public.

If you are having trouble recruiting users, reach out to your user researcher colleagues for advice via the UK Home Office #research Slack channel or contact senior colleagues directly. Make sure you are linked in with the principal user researcher for the area where you are trying to recruit internal staff.

An internal staff panel is available for user research purposes. Look at the internal staff panel page on the UCD community hub for more information.

Standard

2.1 Select a broad range of users from different backgrounds and with different abilities (including those that face any barriers to engaging with digital services, with limited digital access and confidence, people with a range of visual, hearing, motor and cognitive access needs).

2.2 Where possible, you should also include at least one person with an access need in each round of research. Review this on an ongoing basis and discuss alternative approaches with a principal user researcher to address any concerns.

2.3 You should provide an incentive for external users to take part. Staff users cannot receive monetised incentives. You can find more information on incentives through the UCD community hub.

3. Accessibility and inclusion

Overview

Be an advocate for accessibility and inclusion in your team. You can keep up to date on this topic by becoming a member of the #ask-accessibility channel on the Home Office Slack. If you have any specific questions, you can also contact the Accessibility team. It's mandatory to keep up to date with accessibility training. Accessibility guidance and resources for UCD staff can be found on the UCD community hub.

Standard

3.1 24% of the UK public have a disability, so around 1 in 5 people taking part in research should be represented. Take a look at the guidance we have for this on the UCD community hub. 3.2 You must conduct research with users who can help the service team to meet its legal accessibility and inclusion responsibilities.

3.3 You must access the Home Office accessibility training when you are a new starter. Look out for more details on dedicated user research accessibility training on the Slack channel highlighted above.

4. Ethics, consent and data handling

Overview

We work in a department that delivers services to vulnerable or disadvantaged groups. This means that we often do research with vulnerable participants. Working at pace and on emotionally sensitive topics can have a big impact on researchers as well. User researchers must submit a research proposal for review by the ethics board if one or both of the following applies:

  • you are planning to involve vulnerable participants
  • your research may present risks to the researcher

You should contact users ethically when you are planning and conducting research. Supply your users with clear information on consent, ensuring that they fully understand what they’re agreeing to throughout the process, not just at the beginning.

Make sure you receive written and informed consent from your users before conducting the research. This consent needs to be freely given, opt in and granular. When needed, you should also collect explicit consent for special category data. Find out more about consent in the UCD community hub.

Build a positive rapport with your users so they ‘feel safe’ to share their views with you. Avoid data breaches by adhering to General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) legislation and the Market Research Society code of conduct. Be cautious about the information you present to your users.

If you work within Migration and Borders Technology Portfolio (MBTP), you must comply with the data curators’ guidance and action any requests made by a Data Guru. Raise any potential security breaches with your line manager as soon as they arise. If you are unsure who your local Data Guru is, you can ask on the UK Home Office #ethics or #research Slack channels.

Take a look at the Home Office style guide for more information on the words and phrases that you should use when creating content.

Read the ethics training and guidance on the UCD community hub.

Standard

4.1 Complete all four modules of the ethics training for user researchers before conducting any user research and within 3 months of starting employment at the Home Office.

4.2 You must safeguard the wellbeing of your participants, fellow researchers and colleagues when conducting research activities by applying our ethical research standards and practices.

4.3 Handle and store your users’ data, research playbacks and findings according to Home Office and GDPR regulations.

4.4 Provide participants with clear, transparent, comprehensive information. Make it clear that the information you are sharing is a prototype.

4.5 Delete any personal data if/when requested by the user.

4.6 Delete any personal data after 2 years or when it’s no longer needed.

4.7 Contact the ethics board if you have a high-risk query or request. A high-risk query or request would involve vulnerable participants or something that poses a risk to the user researcher. You can read more on the ethics board submissions page linked above.

4.8 Do not record any live data digitally or manually for example during note taking. In most cases you won’t use real government data when carrying out your user research, such as user data or politically sensitive information. However, there may be cases where you will observe systems/processes where live data is present. If you are unsure, check with your principal user researcher.

5. Sharing research

Overview

It is your role to bring your users’ stories to life so the rest of your team can understand their experiences. You will be sharing research findings with your team so they can understand the user journey.

Standard

5.1 Remove any personal identifiers or confidential information from transcripts and videos before sharing with others.

6. Community, collaboration and advocating UCD

Overview

Get involved with the wider UCD community – join meetups, group sessions and more. You can find out more about these through the #research channel on Slack or the UCD community hub.

Standard

6.1 Actively collaborate with the wider UCD community, whether this is via the Home Office Slack, group meet ups or more.

6.2 If you work in a delivery team, work effectively with the rest of the team to embed user centred design practices into their workflow.

6.3 Actively seek opportunities to advocate for UCD with colleagues and stakeholders.

7. User research during agile phases

Discovery

Overview

Work collaboratively with the rest of your project team to address real user problems.

Understand the project that you are working on before you create your research plan. Who are the decision makers? What are their questions for the users that can be turned into research questions? What assumptions are they making about the product and how the user will tackle it?

Remember that your role is not to answer all of the questions through the users. It all relies on the research outcomes.

Champion the user journey in your team. Make sure that your team understand the importance of user research in each stage of a project, starting with discovery.

Discovery

Standard

7.1 Design research studies including sampling and recruitment.

7.2 Apply appropriate user research methods for the life cycle phase of the project.

7.3 Work with your colleagues to identify assumptions, create hypotheses and list possible approaches.

Alpha

Overview

Conduct usability testing using prototypes and other materials as appropriate. You may work with designers to understand how designs meet and don’t meet user needs and iterate accordingly.

Note that you might still be interviewing users at this stage, but the focus often shifts towards usability testing.

Alpha

Standard

7.4 Conduct user research with real users, collecting evidence and analysing findings.

7.5 Communicate research insights to a range of audiences, including senior stakeholders, in a way that influences and drives change.

7.6 Involve colleagues in analysis and synthesis to increase consensus and challenge assumptions.

Beta

Overview

Do further research once the project is in the beta phase.

Keep measuring it against user needs and desired outcomes.

Beta

Standard

7.7 Support the team to evaluate that the product or service meets user needs in the right ways.

7.8 All user researchers at Grades 7 and 6 should be service assessors. Speak to the service assessor team for more details on this.

Live

Overview

Continue to learn how the product can be improved.

Live

Standard

7.9 Continue regular testing with real users of the service while the product is live, feeding back any user needs and blockers to the team.

8. Required training

Overview

The UCD Operations team provide essential training for all user researchers.

Standard

8.1 All user researchers must complete the essential training, covering ethics and data handling.

8.2 There might be other essential training that you will need for your specific area. Speak to your principal user researcher if you are unsure.

Accountabilities and professional development

  • Home Office values - Respectful, Compassionate, Courageous and Collaborative
  • career development/role definition/career paths – User researcher – Government Digital and Data Profession Capability Framework
  • set your professional goals on Metis, found via the intranet hub
  • attend meet ups and show and tells where possible
  • for the MBTP directorate, SEO user researchers work together as a team to organise the bi-monthly Thursday MBTP user research meet-up
  • develop a Continuous Professional Development (CPD) plan and maintain a CPD log of your learning, showing evidence of your growth

All user researchers must set and maintain their goals for professional development. You can find information on this and ideas for goals through the user researcher SharePoint.

For MBTP user researchers, there are standard goals in the MBTP UR SharePoint area. Please discuss and agree your goals with your line manager before uploading to Metis.

Further reading