The User Researcher’s guide to UX discoveries

The discovery phase is the starting point for any agile User Experience (UX) project. More and more organisations are adopting agile project management when designing products and services and UX research is vital in supporting this.

But what does this mean for the User Researcher? In this class we’ll explore what the discovery phase looks like, including:

• What discovery really means

• The reasons to conduct a discovery

• What the discovery team looks like

• Where to recruit users

• The common research methods

• …and how to bring it all together and present back to the team

At the end of the class, you’ll be able to confidently guide your organisation or client through their first discovery.

Some questions you might have:

01 – Do I need to be a user experience expert to take this course?

Definitely not. You will need a basic understanding of user research, but I try to provide a simple guide to all the things that make up a discovery and the tasks you’ll likely perform. Think of it as a tour of the flow of a discovery phase, with real-world ideas for getting it done and examples from my own experiences. I’ll give you a list of avenues for recruiting users, a checklist of research techniques you can perform and a set of downloadable templates to get you going. My aim is to give you a blueprint for your own discovery phase.

02 – I’m not a user researcher so is this relevant to me?

Absolutely! Service design is rarely a 1-person event. This is for anyone wanting to understand what a UX discovery is. If you’re a Product Owner, Project Manager, Business Analyst, Content Designer, UX Designer, Developer or similar, then you’ll likely work on a discovery at some point. Anyone looking to build or redesign products and services will get something from this course. I’ve put this course together from the User Researchers point of view as that’s the hat I wear but, ultimately, the same processes and end goals apply to all the team on a discovery.

03 – Why have I never heard of a discovery phase?

In the private sector, a discovery phase can be seen as a waste of time and money and are often avoided. I 100% believe this is a mistake and is exactly why I created this course. All UK government projects follow the government digital service standard. As part of that standard, teams are expected to follow the agile delivery approach. That starts with a discovery phase, before usually moving onto other phases such as Alpha, Beta and Live. That’s where my experience comes from – I’ve conducted many discoveries across many different types of product and services, in both the public and private sector, and I want to show you how this intense period of research will almost certainly save time and money in the future and produce a happier end user!

04 – These are the templates I include:

• Discovery / research plan

• Sample interview framework

• Interview write-up guide

• Findings log with sample session write-up

• Persona template

• Service blueprint

• Journey map

• Empathy map

• Research debt report

• A research findings playback slide deck

You don’t have to use these templates. If you’re already researching and producing outputs then you’ll likely have your own. I’ve included them to give you a feel for how I document the research when conducting discoveries myself. If you’ve not created some of these before then feel free to use them in your own research.

I hope that sounds exciting. I love discoveries and cannot wait to show you how fun and rewarding they are!

Who this course is for:

• User experience (UX) professionals wanting to understand the part UX research plays in the agile delivery model
• User researchers looking to understand the importance of the discovery phase in UX research
• Business Analysts looking to understand the role UX research plays in the discovery phase
• Anyone looking to understand the part user research plays in designing products and services