User Research
Understanding people before designing solutions.
I use user research to uncover goals, behaviors, frustrations, workarounds, and decision-making patterns that help teams solve the right problems and create more useful products.
Research turns assumptions into evidence.
The strongest product decisions begin with a deeper understanding of people.
Research reveals how users think, what they are trying to accomplish, where they struggle, and why existing tools or processes may not support their needs.
I use research to help teams move beyond opinions and feature requests. The goal is to establish a shared understanding of the problem, identify meaningful opportunities, and create evidence that guides product strategy and design decisions.
Choosing the right method for the question.
Different research questions require different approaches. I select methods based on what the team needs to learn, the product stage, the available evidence, and the level of risk.
Understanding goals, motivations, and pain points.
I speak directly with users to understand their responsibilities, priorities, frustrations, expectations, and the context surrounding important tasks.
Learning by observing people in their environment.
Observation helps reveal interruptions, workarounds, hidden dependencies, environmental constraints, and behaviors that may not surface through interviews alone.
Understanding how work moves across people and systems.
I map tasks, handoffs, decisions, exceptions, tools, and dependencies to understand the complete workflow instead of evaluating one isolated screen.
Evaluating whether people can complete meaningful tasks.
I use prototypes and live products to identify confusion, friction, unmet expectations, accessibility barriers, and opportunities to improve the experience.
Connecting observed behavior with product performance.
Analytics, search behavior, support trends, and usage patterns help identify where users abandon tasks, encounter friction, or behave differently than expected.
Gathering structured feedback at a larger scale.
Surveys help compare experiences across a broader audience, measure perceptions, identify repeated concerns, and determine where deeper qualitative research may be needed.
Good research uncovers the questions teams do not know to ask.
Research is not only about confirming whether a proposed solution works. It helps teams discover unmet needs, challenge assumptions, and understand the context surrounding a product decision.
I connect each research activity to a clear decision so findings can influence product strategy, design direction, and implementation.
What are people trying to accomplish?
Identify goals, responsibilities, motivations, constraints, and the situations in which the product is used.
Why are they struggling?
Examine unclear information, inefficient workflows, missing context, workarounds, and organizational dependencies.
Does the solution actually help?
Test whether the proposed experience supports real tasks, reduces friction, and creates the intended outcome.
Learning from people across products, roles, and industries.
Researching decisions made under pressure.
I studied how dispatchers, drivers, brokers, and operational teams manage changing information, coordinate work, respond to exceptions, and communicate across transportation systems.
Understanding complex roles and connected workflows.
Enterprise research requires understanding how different users, departments, permissions, systems, and business rules influence the complete product experience.
Researching how students find and understand information.
I used analytics, content reviews, usability testing, and information architecture research to improve how prospective students explore programs and complete important enrollment tasks.
Learning from people working away from a desk.
Mobile research examines environmental constraints, interruptions, connectivity, urgency, device limitations, and the information people need while moving between locations.
Research becomes valuable when teams know what to do with it.
Identify repeated goals, frustrations, behaviors, language, and workflow problems across research sessions.
Understand how environment, responsibilities, policies, technology, and organizational culture influence behavior.
Separate high-impact user problems from isolated preferences and lower-value feature requests.
Translate unmet needs and recurring friction into meaningful areas for product improvement.
Connect research evidence to product strategy, information architecture, workflow changes, and design decisions.
Define how the team will determine whether the product created the intended improvement after launch.
Making research clear, useful, and actionable.
I communicate findings in formats that help product teams understand the evidence, align around the problem, and make informed decisions about what should happen next.
Goals, questions, participants, methods, timelines, and success criteria.
Structured questions designed to uncover behavior, context, and decision-making.
Visual representations of tasks, touchpoints, emotions, pain points, and opportunities.
Connected views of tasks, systems, decisions, handoffs, and dependencies.
Evidence-based themes, findings, risks, and recommended areas for action.
Prioritized issues supported by observations, task outcomes, and user feedback.
The strongest products begin with understanding the people who use them.
Research transforms assumptions into evidence, helping teams identify meaningful problems, reduce product risk, validate decisions, and create experiences that support real users and real work.
