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Research & Analysis

Results are ready... and then what? Research repository & insights management

September 20, 2024 10:25 AM

Power Talk

🇬🇧 English

Bratysława 2

About

It's not surprising that just sending stakeholders a report or showing them slides with insights is not enough to make full use of research results. But how to engage them more in UX research activities and utilize the results effectively, especially working in a small research team (or even solo)? I will share my experiences from building insights management processes and implementing the Condens repository tool at AirHelp, initially as a team of one.

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Talk by

Photo of Aga Kaim, Senior UX Researcher at AirHelp

Senior UX Researcher at AirHelp

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From the recording

Talk in brief

At WaysConf 2024, Aga Kaim, Senior UX Researcher at AirHelp, advocates for equipping user research teams with dedicated repository and insights management tools rather than forcing them to rely on generic slide decks, spreadsheets, or digital whiteboards. Drawing from AirHelp's successful implementation of Condense, Kaim explains how specialized tools streamline qualitative analysis, democratize stakeholder access, and prevent critical knowledge loss. She details how AirHelp's small research team structures their repository around comprehensive reports and standalone, semi-atomic insights. These categorized insights are tagged by product area, journey stage, and action status, allowing product managers and stakeholders to easily filter, prioritize, and integrate past research directly into quarterly and annual planning cycles. Ultimately, Kaim emphasizes that while tools are essential, they must be paired with structured processes that embed research evidence into the company's decision-making framework.

Key takeaways

01
Dedicated Tools are Essential for Researchers
Just as developers and HR professionals require specialized platforms to perform their duties, user researchers need dedicated repository tools to avoid the high maintenance and poor searchability of generic whiteboards and spreadsheets.
Watch from 3:01
02
Repositories Streamline Qualitative Analysis
Specialized repository platforms allow researchers to tag transcripts, cluster findings, and drag highlights into reports on a split screen, significantly reducing cognitive load and manual effort even for solo research teams.
Watch from 8:05
03
Democratization Begins with Open Access
True research democratization starts by giving all company employees access to a centralized repository, which encourages collaborative co-analysis and builds user empathy through engaging video highlights.
Watch from 10:31
04
Preventing Knowledge Loss with Meta-Studies
Maintaining a searchable, updated repository prevents different departments from duplicating work and allows teams to answer new questions by conducting meta-studies on existing data.
Watch from 12:40
05
Integrating Insights into Planning Cycles
By tagging standalone insights with product areas, journey stages, and actionability status, stakeholders can easily filter and prioritize unresolved user needs during quarterly and annual planning.
Watch from 15:11

Video chapters

0:06Introduction and Team Context
Aga Kaim introduces the organizational structure of the UX and research teams at AirHelp and outlines the product areas they support.
3:01The Problem with Non-Dedicated Tools
Kaim highlights the industry-wide issue of researchers lacking specialized tools and explains the limitations of using spreadsheets or whiteboards.
8:05The Mechanics of Qualitative Analysis in Repositories
The speaker demonstrates how dedicated repository tools simplify the tagging, clustering, and synthesizing of qualitative data.
10:31Fostering Stakeholder Collaboration and Empathy
Kaim discusses how open repositories and video highlights foster collaboration, co-analysis, and empathy among product teams.
12:40Preserving Knowledge and Preventing Duplication
This section covers how centralized repositories preserve institutional knowledge, enable meta-studies, and prevent redundant research efforts.
14:08Structuring Actionable Reports and Standalone Insights
Kaim explains how AirHelp utilizes structured reports and tagged, semi-atomic insights to directly influence product planning and decision-making.

Read edited transcript highlights

These concise notes were edited from automatic captions and checked against the talk structure. They are not a verbatim transcript.

The Organizational Context of AirHelp Research

At AirHelp, a company of 400 people, the product team consists of 27 individuals, with 10 in UX and a small research team of two and a half people. This lean research unit supports multiple product teams handling core claim processing, subscription services, and travel insurance, as well as non-product departments like localization, operations, and marketing. This organizational setup requires the research team to work highly efficiently across various business domains.

Watch from 0:23

The Call for Dedicated Research Platforms

Decision-makers and product leaders must provide researchers with specialized tools designed for their specific workflows. Just as companies do not expect developers to write code in presentation software or HR teams to manage personnel without dedicated platforms, researchers should not be left to manage complex insights using generic spreadsheets or digital whiteboards. Providing dedicated tools is essential for maximizing the impact of research.

Watch from 4:56

Limitations of Generic Storage and Whiteboards

Industry data reveals that while some researchers use dedicated repositories, many still rely on non-dedicated tools like spreadsheets and whiteboards. These generic platforms require excessive setup and maintenance, offer poor search functionality across different studies, fail to support qualitative analysis, and make onboarding new team members or contractors highly complicated. They ultimately fail to scale as the volume of research grows.

Watch from 6:37

Enhancing Analysis and Reducing Cognitive Load

Implementing a dedicated repository tool like Condense, even for a team of one, transforms the qualitative analysis process. Researchers can view transcripts on one side of a split screen while tagging, clustering, and dragging highlights directly into report templates on the other, which drastically reduces cognitive load and automatically populates the stakeholder-facing repository without requiring extra slide creation.

Watch from 8:05

Democratizing Access and Mitigating Stakeholder Bias

True research democratization begins with open access to findings across the entire organization. By publishing engaging reports with video highlights in a centralized repository, stakeholders can quickly grasp key user pain points without the bias that occurs when they only have time to watch two or three full-length interviews. This collaborative approach allows product designers, writers, and managers to participate directly in co-analysis.

Watch from 10:31

Leveraging Tagged Insights for Strategic Planning

To ensure research directly impacts company decisions, AirHelp publishes both full reports and standalone, semi-atomic insights. These individual insights are tagged by product area, customer journey stage, and action status, enabling stakeholders to easily filter and prioritize unaddressed user needs during quarterly and annual planning sessions. This systematic approach embeds evidence directly into the company's strategic roadmap.

Watch from 14:56

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