Isn’t the human mind grand? One of the most fascinating parts of user experience research is witnessing the ways different people approach the same problem. Sometimes people interact with whatever we are testing in ways we, as product developers, never imagined! Beautiful, creative, problem-solving minds abound in our world, so of course, the same is true in our researcher community!

A great example of our beautiful research minds at work is the different ways my colleagues and my Ask Like A Pro workshop students approach analysis and synthesis — sorting through hours of interviews with multiple participants to find the larger patterns and make sense of it all.

These three quick videos by Ask Like A Pro alumni highlight their favorite analysis tools and workflows. One problem, three minds, three approaches … Maybe one will inspire you!

Sam B. (ALAP All-In SP21) uses Trello to begin his individual interview debrief process. He listens to session recordings while taking notes directly in a Trello list. As patterns emerge, Trello’s drag-and-drop interface allows him to easily sort the notes into additional lists and add tags. See Sam’s video here.

Randy B. (ALAP All-In SU20) uses Airtable, an online database made for sorting and sharing data. He imports CSV files, then can filter and tag data to create a variety of grid views. Airtable allows him to quickly share partial data with others. See Randy’s video here.

Miaoxin W. (ALAP All-In SP21) starts in Dovetail and moves to Miro. She uses Dovetail to add detailed tags to her data, then exports it to a spreadsheet program, then moves that to Miro for visual affinity mapping and plotting on frameworks. See Miaoxin’s video here.

Of course, different minds “crunch” info in different ways. In the Ask Like A Pro series, we encourage you to explore different approaches, tools and platforms to find the ones that make sense to you. It’s important for every researcher to have more than one option in the toolkit — sometimes when you’re stumped, looking at the information in a slightly different way is the key!

I’m always looking to learn from my colleagues in UX design and research! Have a great workflow or tool you’d love to share? I’d love to hear about it!

What did YOUR path to UX research look like?

I’ll be speaking at the QRCA Annual Conference in San Diego next month. My session, on Friday, January 21st, is called “Oh the places you will go."

I’m collecting these fascinating stories to dispel the myth that you do NOT need to have a specific background to succeed in our field. I want current hiring managers and UXR practitioners to hear and celebrate these journeys so we can stop this nonsense that you need to know everything about X, Y and Z plus have a background in Human Factors and or marketing, statistics, psychology, design, etc. to thrive in our industry! My hope is that these stories will inspire people to remember how important it is to seize new opportunities, keep an open mind, try new things and champion diversity in all shapes and sizes. To me, life is one huge adventure, jam-packed with unexpected twists and turns. Pivots and possibilities abound! Let’s embrace them!

Do you have an interesting path to share? Do you have a “non-traditional” applied research background? Have you made an unorthodox pivot? Please lmk! I’d love to hear from you. We’re collecting video stories and written recaps!

Speak up, get involved, share the love

• Follow me on LinkedIn for more UXR tips and UX discussions.

• Read about Curiosity Tank workshops (the next Ask Like A Pro series begins in February!)

• Participate as an On-Demand, or as an Observer, for less!

• Register for Michele's General Assembly classes (next class is TBD)

• Forward this email to someone who you think might enjoy it. Better yet, sign them up here. It will be the gift that keeps on giving.

• Ask us questions related to user research. Seriously, bad research keeps us up at night!

And that’s a wrap!

We try to alternate between a theme and UX/UXR jobs, events, classes, articles, and other happenings every few weeks. What do you think? We're constantly iterating and would love to hear your input.

Stay curious,
- Michele and the Curiosity Tank team

PS: We’ve raised a WHOPPING $7756.29 for our three non-profits with our “Conducting Accessible UXR Event Series” in collaboration with Fable! Have you registered yet? Please help us reach our $10k goal! Register for the Curiosity Tank / Fable Accessible Research Series here, now! Together we can create more awareness for accessibility research and raise more money for causes that matter.