Senior User Researcher – Power Portals

We are looking for a passionate and collaborative Senior User Researcher to join our Power Platform Design studio. The rapid growth of the Microsoft Power Platform (Power Apps, Power Automate, Power Virtual Agents, Power BI), is fueled by orgranizations across the globe to invest in leveraging low-code/no-code development model to accelerate their digital transformation ambitions, to create next generation of business productivity software through radically simplified experience and without requiring extensive and costly training. Our success depends on teams that include people from different backgrounds and experiences who can challenge each other's assumptions with fresh perspective. We are a diverse team of researchers that come from various research backgrounds that include academia and applied product design. We encourage you to keep reading to see if your values align with the vision we have for democratizing technology for all businesses, and especially for the people in them.

Our team is proud to scale this ambition by investing in Power Portals – an early emergent-stage product within Power Platform suite currently used by customers to enable collaboration with users both internal and external to their organizations, especially for those looking to modernize and transform their business by empowering everyday people to become self-empowered developers through a no-code, low-code technology platform. Our customers range from people with highly technical skills to front-line workers using cloud-enabled devices and services. As researchers, we are customer obsessed and advocate for them in the product design & development process.

Our Design studio brings together talented individual contributors, managers, and producers to co-create experiences that matter. We are big advocates of systems thinking and human centered design. We partner with world class Program Managers, Data Scientists, Developers, Producers, Designers, and Researchers who strategize together on ambiguous and ambitious challenges to bridge the tech skills gap facing the world today through product releases, technological challenges, and ongoing customer feedback. Researchers are pivotal to guiding the creation of creative solutions that are relentlessly simple, intuitive, and humanistic. 

We are looking for a strong storyteller who inspires change at all stages of product development by delivering engaging, insightful, and action-oriented recommendations that are easy to digest and act upon. Your primary job as an advocate for our users is to help the product team understand what would make a user’s experiences useful, valuable, and delightful.

Responsibilities

You will build a deep understanding of users, competition and market, and conduct analyses in a fast-paced, agile environment. You will improve products by uncovering actionable insights for the existing offering, as well as gaps, needs, and opportunities to guide future investments.

Responsibilities:

• Work closely with cross-functional product teams to develop a research strategy that includes generative and evaluative research studies, and ensure the right data is being collected to positively impact the product direction.
• Conduct mixed methods research to inform product design, including but not limited to: usability studies, heuristic evaluations, interviews, contextual inquiry, focus groups, surveys, user journey maps, UX health studies and personas.
• Identify, evangelize, and pursue research opportunities that help your product team stay ahead of industry trends and customer needs.
• Communicate your findings in a clear, concise, and visual (when appropriate) manner to our key stakeholders on the product and design teams, and drive meaningful action based on those findings.
• Create durable research insights that align with user-centered design principles and positively impact Power Automate and broader Microsoft product portfolio.

Qualifications

Requirements:

• A minimum of MA/MS in Experimental Psychology, Cognitive Psychology, Human Factors, Human-Computer Interaction or a related field, OR significant industry experience
• 5-8 years of experience conducting product design research
• Demonstrated experience with a wide variety of design research methodologies including but not limited to: usability studies, prototype testing, concept value testing, field/remote studies, in-depth interviews, heuristic evaluations, user journey mapping, personas, competitive reviews, and surveys
• Ability to quickly and effectively analyze research data and present rich findings simply and clearly to influence product design and direction
• Ability to work independently in a fast-paced environment.
• Excellent collaboration skills across disciplines - PM, Data Science, Engineering, and Product Design.
• Strong leadership skills to deliver projects and customer insights within and across product teams that resulted in strong product impact.
• Passion for learning new technologies and understanding the needs of users across a wide range of technical abilities.
• Excellent communication and project management skills.
• Experience with UI design best practices and agile software development.

You can learn more about our digital transformation efforts and various initiatives to democratize tech for everyone here:

Ability to meet Microsoft, customer and/or government security screening requirements are required for this role. These requirements include, but are not limited to the following specialized security screenings: Microsoft Cloud Background Check: This position will be required to pass the Microsoft Cloud background check upon hire/transfer and every two years thereafter.

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Microsoft is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, ancestry, color, family or medical care leave, gender identity or expression, genetic information, marital status, medical condition, national origin, physical or mental disability, political affiliation, protected veteran status, race, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, or any other characteristic protected by applicable laws, regulations and ordinances. If you need assistance and/or a reasonable accommodation due to a disability during the application or the recruiting process, please send a request via the Accommodation request form.

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