Senior UX Researcher, Cognizant Accelerator, May 2018-present

• Researcher for cross-disciplinary innovation team focused on idea generation and integrating new technologies into enterprise digital products; focus on products using data science and machine learning, and API-first products.

• Established user research practice for new research team at Cognizant Accelerator, including setting the framework for generative research for new products and evaluative methods for existing products.

• UX Researcher for products in Insurance, Banking and Finance, Healthcare, and Content, including research design, stakeholder analysis, participant recruiting, interviewing/prototype testing, data collection and analysis, and presentation to stakeholders and leadership.

• International UX Research (remote) with users in India, use background in cultural translation to help US and India teams work together more productively.

• Close collaboration with design, engineering, product strategy, product owners, and agile product management.

• Continually discovering best practices for user research in enterprise digital products.

• Educating stakeholders about UX research, design thinking, and innovation through workshops and educational documents/websites.

• Mentor and advisor for junior UX Researchers and Designers interested in research.

What is Cognizant Accelerator?

• Cognizant is a Fortune 200 technology services company with over 250K employees globally, largely based in India, that works with enterprise customers in industries such as insurance, healthcare, manufacturing, financial services, etc.

• Three years ago they acquired a custom software development agency in Boulder, Colorado and turned it into their product accelerator. Cognizant Accelerator uses an agile software development process and is responsible for developing and launching new products as well as improving existing products and helping to integrate acquisitions.

• Each industry division holds challenges to source new product ideas that they submit to the Accelerator, which selects 3-4 to be part of the Launchpad program. This 6-month program develops the product idea and finds potential customers, leading up to a Pitch Day where leadership votes on funding. The Accelerator then builds the funded projects.

• My current role includes generative and evaluative UX Research for Accelerator products. I have led research on two LaunchPad products and two Graduate products, and have worked on several existing products and acquisitions.

• Most recently I have been the lead researcher on a new team focused on innovation and emerging technologies that is tasked with generating more mature product ideas for the accelerator. This research has focused within subject areas and on specialized technology such as artificial intelligence and deep learning.

Sample Projects

Project 1: LaunchPad product, Content

Challenge: Content is difficult to use (or sell) because it is not tagged or otherwise enriched
Methods: International UX Research studies (remote), including interviews and prototype testing, with content enrichment teams in India
Outcome: Discovered that content enrichment is specialized by field, so flagged product as risky

Project 2: LaunchPad product, Insurance

Challenge: Insurance customers need a faster turnaround time to getting a quote
Methods: Interviews and prototype testing with agents and underwriters who get the quote to the customer
Outcome: Focused product on one user type, but identified data access as main risk

Project 3: Funded product, Healthcare

Challenge: Health records are too long and messy for insurance companies to use productively
Methods: Interviews, prototype and usability testing, user feedback survey
Outcome: Identified critical information for the tech team to find in records

Project 4: Innovation Team

Challenge: Many LaunchPad ideas are not mature or technologically innovative enough for the program
Methods: Subject area research, SME interviews, learning about new technologies such as evolutionary neural networks or API-first products, bridging gap between technology and business goals
Outcome: Identified challenges in industry areas, gathered SME feedback on new product ideas

Regular research activities include:

• Designing and conducting stakeholder interviews, desk research, problem space analysis, subject matter expert identification and interviews, user research plan and timeline

• Identifying user types, writing screeners, recruiting (using industry associations, online forums, and recruiting agencies), writing interview scripts, conducting and documenting user interviews

• Analyzing qualitative data, creating personas and process journey maps, identifying and prioritizing key trends from the data

• Presenting risks and mitigations, product recommendations, and prioritized features

• Working with designers to create design prototypes, writing scripts for usability interviews and testing, conducting and documenting tests, analyzing data, and presenting recommendations

• Affinity mapping or creating a phased journey map with stakeholders in a workshop

• User feedback surveys, used in when products are in beta or GA

• 2x2 matrices mapping features on importance to users to development effort or risk

Outreach in UX Research:

• Delivered five lunchtime lectures for the Accelerator:

  • “UX Research for Impact” with UX Research team, Interactive presentation on typical barriers that product teams encounter when deciding how to incorporate UX Research, with suggestions for solutions using case study examples from the Accelerator

  • “A Brief History of Qualitative Research in Tech,” Presentation on the origins of qualitative methods in Anthropology and other fields, how qualitative researchers began working in technology, and current trends based on 2019 EPIC conference

  • “What do I need to know about the Internet of Things (IoT)?,” Presentation and workshop on categories of IoT devices and technologies, current trends, and brainstorming session for varied contexts

  • “Anthropo Means Humankind: A Recap of the American Anthropological Association Meetings,” Presentation with Molly Rempe on our double panel “Anthropology Outside Academia” with main insights from presenters, and relevant ideas gathered in other sessions/workshops

  • “Women in Tech: Career Paths,” Lecture on my dissertation research on women in tech in India and career ideation workshop for Cognizant Accelerator Women in Software group

• Published article “So You’re Interested in User Experience (UX) Research? Thoughts from an Anthropologist Working in Industry.” in November 2019 for American Ethnologist Professionalization blog.

• Mentor for two aspiring UX Researchers for Hexagon UX in spring 2019, which supports bringing more women and people of color into UX. Hosted 12 weeks of biweekly meetings with mentees to share methods, review portfolios, set up projects, and help with networking.

• Boulder Startup Week:

  • 2020, UX Research Track Captain

  • 2019, Design Track Captain, Organized Panel "Rapid UX Research" (2019), Organized Workshop "Journey Mapping for UX Research” (2019)

  • 2018, Volunteer, Organized Panel “Translating Research to Design” (2018)

• American Anthropological Association, Panel Organizer (2018)

  • Double Panel “Anthropology Outside Academia,” one featuring UX Researchers

  • Presented paper “What Do User Experience Researchers Do Besides Interview Users?: Definitions, Mediation, and Responsibility in UX Research.”