Research Repositories that Deliver


**As of March 10, this workshop is sold out. You can join the waiting list by filling out this form.**


1 day virtual workshop
March 30, 2023, 8:00 am-4:00 pm PT

UX research, data science, market research, and other insight-generators fuel decisions in today’s product organizations – yet their work is too often experienced as fleeting inspiration, when it could instead become durable shared knowledge. Leading firms are investing in knowledge management solutions for their lost research content, but new tools often fail to deliver on expectations.

In this workshop, we’ll discuss the state of research knowledge management in tech, and dig into what success could look like beyond making assets findable, including: driving product goals, integrating into backlogs, initiating design concepts, and more. We’ll then unpack how to plan your next research repository effort based on the increased impacts you want to see.

Target audience

Researcher leaders and repository managers who want to increase their organization’s use of under-utilized research, in order to better meet overall business goals and launch meaningful impacts for the people you’re striving to serve.

If you’re passionate about getting more done with existing research – and looking for collective ways forward – this workshop is for you.

Take-aways

You’ll learn how to:

  • Understand common pitfalls in research knowledge management.
  • Use a framework to identify current and desired research impacts in product development practices.
  • Map current and desired research knowledge locations in your organization.
  • Choose outcomes to drive meaningful requirements for research repository tooling and new operations.

Agenda

Optional Homework

  • Investigate where different kinds of research assets are stored in your organization.
  • Ask researchers and key stakeholders about 1) which research they see as being impactful, and 2) where they want to see customer insights have more impact.

Introductions and getting started (55 minutes)

  • Welcome + About your facilitator
  • Overview
  • Exercise: Add a templated ‘intro card’ to shared board
  • Discussion
  • Model: What do we mean by research repositories?
  • Model: 5 ‘Our current state’ statements
  • Exercise: Indicate your agreement with 5 ‘Our current state’ statements
  • Discussion

Best practices in research knowledge management (50 minutes)

  • Top-level challenges that are driving efforts in research knowledge management
  • Teams are encountering pitfalls, which we can preempt with best practices
  • 1. Step up from silos
  • 2. Focus on end results
  • 3. Create a systemic view
  • 4. Organize for impact
  • 5. Clarify what matters most
  • Summary model – and how what we’ll cover today addresses it
  • Discussion

Takeaway artifact: Model of knowledge management best practices (and the pitfalls they avoid)

Identify current and desired research impacts in product development (65 minutes total, including a halftime break)

  • Model: Three types of impact
  • Model: Abstracted product development flow
  • Exercise: Annotate map with where you are seeing research impacts of different types
  • Exercise: Annotate map with your organizations’ next critical impacts
  • Discussion

Takeaway artifact: Annotated mapping of current and desired research impacts in product development

Lunch (45 Minutes)

Map current and desired research knowledge locations in your organization (55 minutes)

  • Model: Types of research assets
  • Model: Generalized location map for research assets
  • Exercise: Create your own location mapping of who, asset types, repository types
  • Discussion

Takeaway artifact: Annotated location map for your organization’s research assets

Rank the importance of research repository outcomes for your organization (50 minutes)

  • Overall model: Types of outcomes from research repository initiatives
  • Walk through each outcome in model in detail:
  • Exercise: Review your impact map + select your own current and desired outcomes
  • Discussion

Takeaway artifact: Annotated model of research repository outcomes

Explore requirements and operations to enable repository outcomes (50 minutes)

  • Overview: Types of research repository objects
  • Overview: Types of metadata and their purposes
  • Overview: Types of supporting operations
  • Model: Research objects, metadata, and operations that enable each repository outcome
  • Walk through each area in model in detail:
  • Exercise: Capture notes on model of research objects, metadata, and operations that enable your repository outcomes
  • Discussion

Takeaway artifact: Annotated model of research objects, metadata, and operations that enable your repository outcomes

Conclusion: Bringing it together (60 minutes, including optional Q and A time)

  • Tips for making the pitch(es) to leadership
  • Discussion
  • What you can start rallying your research community around as first steps:
  • Exercise: Capture your 3 biggest takeaways and 3 next steps
  • Discussion
  • Related reading / who to follow in this space
  • Thank yous
  • Q&A

Takeaway artifact: Your key takeaways and your next steps