AR2021-Two Jobs in One: “Leader Who is a Researcher” and “Researcher Who is a Leader” (Nolini Kotamraju, Salesforce)
—> Thank you everyone for joining me today, and inspiration, and I’m glad to be conference with participants who have such commitment to research
—> I remember my point when I thought of myself as researcher,
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It was a hypothesis about the effectiveness of laundry detergent versus hand soap, in a science fair experiment
—> I built upon my passion and people’s theories and asked data and imperfect answers, and it sustained me through my career
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Worked as researcher for industries and companies
—> Research is at the core of who I am, and my calling
—> I don’t remember the moment when I began to identify as a leader
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I recognized moments at work when people expected me to be a leader, and asking for the vision of the team. Other incidents included:
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Complimenting my brand as leader
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Justiyfing company decisions that were made
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—> While I had decades of experience ins research, hadn’t thought much about leading
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Manager was something silly to me
—> So I applied all research goodness to be a leader, looking at literature, interviewing leaders I admired, observing leaders I wanted to avoid emulating, and thinking of ways to be a leader
—> I also analyzed employee surveys and looked on my feedback as a leader
—> As I threw herself into leadership, I realized that books implied I had to leave my discipline in order to be a leader
—> For the most part, leadership was talked about as being distinct from training or discipline
—> So how should I think of the duality of my role as researcher and leader?
—> First, some context around my current role
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I work at Salesforce (50,000 person company) that makes CRM cloud-based software
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Companies hire Salesforce for whatever software is needed to interact with customers
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I lead a Research and Insights team of ReOps, strategists, and others
—> In five years, I found the ability to grow as leader, along with certain discomforts
—> I will share three types of discomfort I experienced in this talk
—> My first years at Salesforce were in leading and maturing the UX research team, improving/growing the team, and ensuring the best possible insights
—> Part of UX leadership team, and reported to SVP of product design
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Sat in leadership meetings, and debated budget for UX team
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Debate was lively, and she raised point about spending money
—> Someone said I was wearing “UX research” hat not “UX leadership hat”
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Recognized being leader in UX meant prioritizing what was best for entire UX org, not just research
—> So what was I leading?
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Career was focused on building best outcome for research, regardless of broader UX team impacted
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Success of team was built on focus of research and what was best for research
—> Leader role meant I had to see myself as a leader, full-stop, and making decisions on behalf of UX organization, without betraying my identity as researcher
—> Early on in tenure, sat in on meeting with significant product decision.
—> I advocated moving researchers into product making meetings
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Accomplishment in that research function was represented at high-level of decision making
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Sense of having full seat at table
—> Up to that point, naively though that data reigned supreme
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Understood people made decisions that deviated from data, but thought that was due to better data being out there that contradicted what was found in UX research
—> Stunned by debate, in that product leaders didn’t have more data than UX researchers did
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Debate swirled around best course of action
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I thought aloud why couldn’t I get more data from customers
—> Room, made significant product decision with data that they had, and ignored my suggestion
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So why wasn’t I taken seriously at meeting?
—> The more I reflected, she came to the following conclusion
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Identity variables did play a role
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Main reason, was that I solely relied on her instincts as a researcher
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I.e. Ask more questions, get more data
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A “Wait there’s more!” approach to research
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Wasn’t useful in overall context, and giving leadership version, and cop-out of more data is needed
—> Leadership response is to make best decision possible given what we know now
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People always think there’s more to know and believe we have have responsibility to learn more, and here more from customers
—> In meetings, I’m at now, distance and time between analysis and decision is short, and the consequences big
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The closer you sit to business decision you accept the limitation and inadequacy of what needs to be produced
—> Periodically, Salesforce conducts company wide survey to assess employee satisfaction
—> UXR responded with fervor to study and took the process seriously
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Similar to large company, survey questionnaire has stable measures and experiments with new ones, once in a while
—> My pet peeve I this survey was double-barreled question
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(i.e. Rate a statement, but the statement contains two elements that don’t have relationship with each other, such as, do you agree desert is delicious and chocolatey?)
—> Disgruntlement with question was in two ways
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#1: Lack of actionability (i.e. which variable is being measured, and how do you measure it)
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#2: Anger on behalf of the survey designers, and how anyone could create such a bad survey to go out to the company s a whole?
—> As leader, I see only more and more opportunities for better quality research.
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Part of my mandate to apply high quality methods to research question
—> However, do I have a responsibility to evangelize research throughout entire company?
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How much should I think about research and quality throughout a company?
—> In this instance, I found myself with colleagues and asked them to explain why have that double-barreled question?
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It turns out there were incredibly legitimate reasons behind why the question was worded the way it was
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Research in the real-world is full of compromise
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—> Mark Nevins, a leadership mentor, said:
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Mode not a title, as anyone can be a leader
—> Leader is accessible to all, but I don’t experience it that way emotionally
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Researcher knows what I’m responsible for- turning data into insights,
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Researcher role doesn’t keep me up at night
—> As leader, I’m responsible for team’s well being, legal commitments, fiduciary resposnbilites, team culture, and delivering right things for business at sacle
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Along with research
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Responsibility and accountability keeps me up at night
—> So I shared three discomforts on the duality of being researcher and leader
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Leadership at scale is at odds of leadership of team. I need to choose between greater good of team vs. company
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Making decisions on limited data, recognizing that business decisions force us to act right away (and I need to learn to like it more)
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How often does I need to carry torch for quality research, how long, and to which places in company?
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Even if I had unlimited hours, I can’t evangelize good research practice as much as anyone
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—> Normally I would offer solutions, but I’m just sharing acknowledgement of discomfort I have had in my role as a leader
—> I’m sure I will experience more discomfort
—> Final story
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Joined meeting (online) with group of colleagues to see review of multi-disciplinary collaboration (research, product management, etc.)
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I knew the designer who convened the meetin
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Showed something to get feedback from executive leader
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I asked who was leadership? And the designer said it was me
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Q&A:
- One of the themes of today has been about how to communicate/translate research for influence and impact. Given that that is one of the challenges of the discipline, I wonder if that’s also a perception barrier for researchers to see themselves as leaders?
A: 50% of work getting it done, but getting it used is the other 50%
— People are not as comfortable with work of persuasion
- Addressing the “UX Lead” vs “Researcher ” divide, is this more of an organizational problem, a topical concern, or something else?I feel like I’d approach it really differently (i.e. with different level of stress) if I understood it as “navigating org dynamics” vs. “changing what I’m talking about and valuing”?
A: In larger org as a leader, you need to be collectively responsible for more than your immediate team
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Greater good/ tragedy of commons approach
- Is there ever a situation where the best leadership decision is to put off the decision until you have more data? I wonder if the urgency of all the decisions is real or imaginary
A: Instances where one can push back on urgency
—> As one advances in org, you face decisions like do we buy this company, and some things we have to move quickly on
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Repercussions of failure can be very big, and people want egos storked
- How do you prioritize research within the scope of your team’s work and other ways research can contribute (and potentially have a higher impact)?
A: There can be an easy decision matrix, but what’s interesting is when there’s a research priority that emerges out of left field and important to company
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If that’s the case, focus on creating enough space to accommodate sudden shifts in priorities
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How good a system do you have to prioritize right thing, without buying out the team
- You’re in a management position, which obviously has a built-in leadership component. I’m curious about your advice for folks leading from the bottom up or middle out.
A: May be unsatisfactory answer. Success was in knowing all pockets of organization
—> As more of the company hears about research work, the more it reinforces research work
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People underestimate who findings can be shared with broadly and managing outwardly
- Wondering how much control you feel you have in choosing how much time you spend in researcher vs leader role/mindset/expectation?
A: Don’t know
—> Times where I am in researcher mode, around jobs to be done
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Bigger responsibilities you get, the more distance you get from methods
—> Sometimes about being called on as being researcher
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Don’t have control over that (both good and bad)
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Some of it is being in setting where someone asks question, but you know there is a way to answer the question being raised
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Being asked to solvable problem
- How do you handle difficult questions from your research team about the compromises you’re making for greater good?
A: Transparency and honesty about only approach. Sometimes talk about greater good, and have luxury to be values driven in decision making
—> Thinking of company as collective, and accepting the anger the team may have at the compromises
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But anger can be about lack of transparency, and truthfulness
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What is the process of moving from UX to strategy?
A: Whole different talk
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Don’t know if caught Molly Stevens where she talked about future of research and positionality within feature
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Strengths of what she says, as long game and right business decision
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People think of research as where team sits in
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Broader question is business rationale, and point where broader range of skills and strategy need to be answered
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Complicated, but not spur of the moment and an organizational decision