User Researcher- Leeds or London

FDM is a global business and technology consultancy seeking a User Researcher to work for our client within the government sector. This is initially a 6  month contract with very good prospects to extend and will be a hybrid role that will be based in London or Leeds.

The government’s approach to digital and IT puts user needs at the heart of decision making. User researchers are key figures in service teams. They help service teams build a deep understanding of their users so they can design and deliver the services that their users need. They support service managers by generating new and useful user insights, and work closely with designers, analysts and developers to iteratively improve services for users. As a user researcher you will be experienced in using a variety of user research methods to reveal actionable insights.

Responsibilities:

• Working with lead user researchers and service managers to develop and advocate appropriate research strategies to understand user needs for a service, and to continually test and improve the service
• Fostering a culture of team involvement in user research, team analysis, design rationale and decision making based on user needs
• Managing and mentoring user researchers and junior user researchers to ensure quality of research, and drive improvements in practice.
• Planning, designing, preparing and running user research activities to support the design, development and continuous improvement of digital government services (including contextual discovery, experience mapping, diary studies, early stage concept and prototype testing, lab based and contextual usability and accessibility testing).
• Designing and running contextual and discovery research to develop a deep understanding of the needs of all users of a service
• Managing the usability and accessibility testing process from recruiting participants, designing test tasks, and preparing discussion guides, to test moderation, analysis and presenting results.
• Designing, executing and analysing quantitative surveys.
• Leading colleagues to analyse research data and synthesis findings so that research is shareable and traceable.
• Effectively communicating user research findings to the team and the wider organisation, so that they share a strong and empathetic understanding of their users (including presentations at show and tells, designing and maintaining research outputs on the team wall, formal reports).
• Working closely with designers and developers to turn user research findings into stories and actions that lead to valuable product and service features.
• Working closely with analytics colleagues to define user centered KPIs, to create a rich picture of user behaviour to tell the full story of how and why people use our services.
• Contributing to the user research community across government, presenting at meetups and writing for the user research blog.

• Demonstrable knowledge, experience in and passion for user centered design practices for web, service or software development.
• Proven experience of understanding user needs for web content, tools and transactional services, especially those with the most complex user journeys.
• Proven experience of designing, facilitating and analysing a wide range of qualitative and quantitative user research methods.
• Strong understanding of strengths and limitations of different research methods
• Proven experience of presenting user research findings in a wide variety of formats and contexts.
• Proven experience introducing and establishing user research practices in an organisation.
• Proven experience of working in an agile development environment with designers and developers and product managers to create new digital products and services

It is desirable that you have:

• Degree in HCI/Usability/Cognitive Psychology/Market Research or related field.
• Previous experience within government services.

We are a business and technology consultancy and one of the UK's leading employers, recruiting the brightest talent to become the innovators of tomorrow. We have centres across Europe, North America and Asia-Pacific, and a global workforce of over 3,500 Consultants. FDM has shown exponential growth throughout the years, firmly establishing itself as an award-winning employer and is listed on the FTSE4Good Index. 

Diversity and Inclusion  

FDM Group is an equal opportunity employer, and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, colour, religion, sex, sexual orientation, national origin, age, disability, veteran status or any other status protected by federal, provincial or local laws.

Why join us

• Career coaching, mentoring and access to upskilling throughout your entire FDM career
• Assignments with global companies and opportunities to work abroad
• Opportunity to re-skill and up-skill into new areas, develop non-linear career paths and build a skillset within your field
• Annual leave and work-place pension