Rhys Hillan — Research Manager at Ballpark
How to teach research to non-researchers
September 19, 2024
11:10
Research Business Impact
🇬🇧 English
Research Business Impact
Gaslight, gatekeep, girlboss! What went wrong in relations between product, design and research people
About
We are not planning a roast. Nor rant. But there will be some drama, cause the tension between research, design and product people is getting out of control - and discussions on Teresa Torres’ “Continous Discovery” seem to be a symptom, not a source of the problem.
Through our dynamic duet, we want to protect the world from devastation and unite all the people within the product nation. We will go through several fail (or near-fail) stories to identify the main problems in relations between research, design and product people.
Key topics we plan to include:
- What is the real goal of design/product research, and why “mitigating risks” or “building product backlog” are the tips of the same iceberg that might sink our Titanics?
- Where lies the green area between gatekeeping research and fully democratizing it, and why do none of the extreme approaches work?
- What are the most useless results that researchers can bring to the table, and what is the most thoughtless thing that designers and product managers can do with valid results?
- Why are the easiest methods used in the ways textbooks intended not enough, and when do you need researchers with more complex techniques to gain deeper knowledge?
- Why both researchers and designers/product managers are so eager to participate in research theatre with magic formulas (You only need to test with 5 users) and tools of wizardry (Let’s create personas, empathy maps, and customer journeys without research) instead of valid methodology?
We believe that synergy between different product areas is possible and are willing to share our approach tested in complex research and design projects (often completed with external research partners) for industries such as mobility, insurance, banking, and retail.
Watch the full talk
Watch this WaysConf session, then continue with related talks or explore the current programme.
From the recording
Talk in brief
A candid dialogue between a researcher and a service designer about why product, design, and research teams often distrust one another even when they need the same evidence. Product discovery terminology assigns work inconsistently, research reports can be methodologically impressive yet unusable, and product teams may reduce researchers to late-stage validation after important assumptions are fixed. The speakers challenge both extremes: raw data and obvious findings do not guide design, but fashionable research methods used without rigor do not create knowledge either. Metrics also require context, because an objective number can still measure the wrong thing. The proposed remedy is shared intent, early involvement, actionable interpretation, transparent methodology, and enough mutual trust to avoid research theater.
Key takeaways
- 01
Define discovery before dividing the work
Conflicting terminology hides who is responsible for learning, leaves researchers outside the product trio, and weakens collaboration.
Watch from 2:01 - 02
Connect every study to a decision
Research should begin with a clear intention and deliver evidence that product and design colleagues can build upon.
Watch from 8:02 - 03
Continuous contact is not automatically research
Frequent customer conversations create value only when questions, methods, interpretation, and accumulated evidence support real learning.
Watch from 12:02 - 04
Combine metrics with explanatory context
Numbers can be valid yet incomplete or distorted by collection methods, so qualitative understanding remains essential to interpretation.
Watch from 20:00 - 05
Share rigor without turning it into theater
Researchers should teach methodology and invite collaboration, while non-researchers must apply more than one fashionable rule or tool.
Watch from 28:01
Read edited transcript highlights
These concise notes were edited from automatic captions and checked against the talk structure. They are not a verbatim transcript.
Both professions are asking for useful learning
Designers say they need results they can build on, not lengthy explanations of a method followed by obvious conclusions. Researchers say product teams praise customer centricity while protecting assumptions they formed before evidence arrived. These complaints appear opposed, but both groups want discoveries that influence the product. The conflict grows when terminology and responsibilities prevent them from working toward that goal together.
Watch from 4:00A report is not the end of product research
Strategic research can seek a broader truth, but product work still requires a connection between evidence and action. A segmentation, journey map, or persona is not valuable merely because it was produced correctly. Starting with the intended decision or change helps a team choose an appropriate study and prevents repeated research from becoming a self-contained activity with no path into design.
Watch from 8:02Conversation frequency does not ensure discovery
Talking to customers every week may look like continuous discovery, yet contact alone does not guarantee that the team learns anything reliable. If researchers are separated from product work, other roles may gather anecdotes without method or lose useful evidence between sessions. Regular research needs accumulated questions, disciplined interpretation, and shared access to what has already been learned.
Watch from 12:02An objective measure can still be structurally biased
A service study attempted to avoid unreliable declarations by observing how long customers had waited. Participants also had to complete an interview, so people who arrived shortly before service could not be included. The method produced a precise average from a distorted sample. Choosing observation over self-report sounded rigorous, but the collection design made the result unusable.
Watch from 22:01Rigor and creativity need one another
Non-researchers sometimes adopt one memorable methodological rule while neglecting the rest of the study, and researchers can defend technically sound work that yields little product insight. A better partnership shares the reasons behind rigor and remains open to creative techniques when they fit the question. The goal is neither academic perfection nor novelty for its own sake, but evidence that can withstand challenge and guide action.
Watch from 28:01
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