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Published on <a href="https://blog.prototypr.io/building-the-foundational-research-framework-in-your-organization-d5ccd5ba672f?source=rss----eb297ea1161a---4">| Prototyping: From UX to Front End &mdash; Medium</a> Claire Menke 
Since publishing <a href="https://blog.prototypr.io/the-goldilocks-experience-of-developing-a-foundational-research-framework-finding-a-practice-a8c647b906e3">my most recent article</a> about generating a foundational research framework, I’ve received a lot of questions mostly about how researchers and product people can bring this type of foundational research thinking into their organization. Questions such as “I’m considering blending personas with JTBD — how did you go about it?” and “How can I position this work within the organization to secure buy-in for the outcome?” are common. I thought I’d write out some recommendations, both for people starting from ground zero and for those who have one of the research components.
Again, here is the framework:
<img alt="" src="https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/800/0*xq3W6O25MZie2Ahu.">
Per the foundational research framework, attitudes shape situations, which in turn determine your experience. In reality, the creation of the framework at Udemy was less about the technical components of each research piece, and more about listening to the needs of my business stakeholders. A lot of what drove the creation of the framework was my evolving comprehension of what the internal stakeholders wanted and needed as a research output. And my organization is different than yours! You have to ask yourself — which component does your team care about? Do they care more about attitudes, situations or the experience?
And let’s be honest, in many companies it’s hard to find bandwidth to create and utilize all of these foundational components as I’ve been so fortunate to be able to do. You may only have resources to choose one. So if you’re starting from scratch, which do you choose?
My answer: It depends.
<img alt="" src="https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/500/0*YquCJ1nJmisIVSX_.">Don’t let this be you — think it through!
I don’t have a magic bullet, and there is no singular solution, but here are some questions to ask yourself to help guide your decision.
<h4>Why do you want to do this? Is it necessary for your organization?</h4>
<ul>
<li>This is the first question I always ask myself before I conduct research. If you don’t have a solid, business-driven reason to do it, it may not be the right time or place for doing foundational research.</li>
</ul>
<h4>What do you already know about your users? (aka What can you leverage or offset?)</h4>
<ul>
<li>Foundational research is a great way to supplement or complement other research you’ve already done. Maybe you know a lot about demographics and purchasing habits. Learning more about situational motivations (JTBD) could be a beneficial qualitative addition to that data. Or you could use that purchasing habit data to narrow in on what their on-product experience is like, segmented by how they purchased it. Journeys may be a better first step.</li>
</ul>
<h4>Which team is asking for this increased understanding of its users? Is there a specific team asking for this research? Or is it being spearheaded by the research team itself?</h4>
<ul>
<li>If this is being spearheaded by the research team, be cognizant of the fact that someone with business impact will need to buy into this research for it to be adopted by the organization.</li>
<li>If it’s being requested by another team, great! Your next step is to understand what they want and need out of this research. If it’s marketing or brand, they may be happy with personas. Product might need journeys or JTBD. Talk through it with them to understand if they could better leverage a more complete look into attitudes, situations, or experiences in the nearest term. Remember this is just the first step — you can always do more later!</li>
</ul>
<h4>Which team drives strategy decisions?</h4>
<ul>
<li>Whenever you do foundational research it should impact the organization as a whole. That means you may have to sell the impact of foundational research to the group that has the largest strategy impact. In some organizations that owner is product, in others it’s sales, or marketing, or other. You need to make sure you have that group on your side and bought into the process before you get it off the ground.</li>
<li>Sometimes you can also get to this strategic partner through the team with the most urgent business need, if those groups are separate. By leveraging one team to put pressure on another to gain research support can work in your favor — you automatically increase the number of people bought into the process.</li>
</ul>
<h4>Which team naturally buys to research? Which do you need to win over?</h4>
<ul>
<li>It’s good to have both of these groups bought into and *participating in* the research. Involving individuals, particularly those that are skeptical to the process, can give them a forum to ask questions and increase their empathy for the process. It will also help to create shared language about research outputs. If you are able to successfully integrate them you will have gained a cheerleader in every corner as you begin sharing the research more widely.</li>
</ul>
Hopefully those questions give you a framework to assess which foundational research component to start with. But what if you already have a component?
Let’s say you’ve received enough buy-in to have one of the components — personas, JTBD, or a customer journey. You may be asking yourself, which should I do next?
Well actually, the first question you should ask yourself is: “Should I embark on generating another foundational research component?” If your company is happily moving along with the piece you do have, I wouldn’t suggest creating another artifact. These research pieces tend to be time and resource intensive, require a lot of buy-in, and take a lot of energy to build into the company’s DNA. Just remember- every time you introduce another framework it adds cognitive load to your employees. So if they’re happy, you should be happy too!
If something is missing, however, then think through what would be the best addition or supplement for your team. The same question as above apply:
<ul>
<li>What do you already know about your users?</li>
<li>Where is there currently dissonance with the component you do have?</li>
<li>Which team is asking for this increased understanding of the users?</li>
<li>Which team drives strategy decisions? And which team buys in best to research? Who do you need to win over?</li>
</ul>
Answering those questions may help you move toward an answer. And if you’re still struggling to come up with your own research strategy using the questions outlined above, here are some of my recommendations.
If you already have personas… I suggest digging into JTBD. In some companies personas may include enough of the motivational and situational components of the user’s psyche to render JTBD unnecessary. Outside of that, it may help (as it did in Udemy’s case) to develop a higher degree of understanding about the motivations and context behind the purchase trigger, data that more directly impacts groups like Product.
If you already have JTBD… I’d continue moving down the chain and develop a customer journey for your primary JTBD. The journey can be used as a benchmark to monitor how well your product helps users accomplish their goals for that primary situation of use. As you develop the product you can measure against this benchmark as a sort of health check.
If you have a customer journey… I’d step back to the top of the funnel and see if you can leverage existing behavioral data or market research to understand more about the users that are currently experiencing your product. When you rely so heavily on a journey it can be easy to get bogged down in the existing product minutiae — stepping back up a couple of levels can bubble up new and innovative directions that are rooted in deeper customer empathy.
Hopefully these recommendations help you get started with or continue in the correct direction for your organization! Still have more questions? Don’t hesitate to <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/clairemenke/">get in touch</a>.
<img alt="" src="https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/500/0*JjzGEtWpA0_WlV-S.">When your team gets in sync with the research, it should feel this smooth 😊
🎉🎉 Udemy is hiring! <a href="https://about.udemy.com/careers/">Follow this link</a> to join an amazing team with an empowering mission. We’re looking for both experienced and up-and-coming UX Researchers to join the team.
The beliefs and statements included in this article are my own opinions, and do not necessarily reflect those of my employer.
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<a href="https://blog.prototypr.io/building-the-foundational-research-framework-in-your-organization-d5ccd5ba672f">Building the Foundational Research Framework in your Organization</a> was originally published in <a href="https://blog.prototypr.io">prototypr</a> on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Building the Foundational Research Framework in your Organization

Building the Foundational Research Framework in your Organization

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