Your team needs to improve their UX Research skills. How can you help them achieve that?

Begin by identifying the areas where our team may be lacking and thoroughly grasp the context to pinpoint the reasons behind these shortcomings, determining where further research is needed. Once the situation is understood, leverage the array of frameworks available to select the most suitable one for addressing our business challenges effectively.

To enhance your team's UX Research skills: Evaluate Skills: Assess each member's skills to identify gaps. Benchmark: Compare these skills against industry standards. Plan Development: Create personalized plans focusing on workshops, courses, and projects. Set Goals: Establish SMART goals and metrics for tracking progress. Encourage Learning: Promote a culture of continuous learning and reflection. Monitor Progress: Regularly review and adjust plans, celebrating achievements. This ensures targeted improvement aligned with industry practices and team growth.

The approach that I will take is, 1. Observe and analyse the current skill set of every individual. 2. Point out what they are good at and what needs more work. 3. Involve them in research work and create small tasks. 4. Make small groups of 2 to 3 people max for each task according to their strong and weak points. 5. Collaborate with them and help in every step by providing necessary help and documentation. 6. Continuous feedback loop.

Assign team with tasks for detailed competitor analysis, do ethnography, define some benchmarks, review tasks, give frequent feedback, and follow the cycle. Once it becomes a habit then they will feel the change.

To help my team improve their UX Research skills, I would take the following steps: Training and Workshops: Organize training sessions and workshops focused on various aspects of UX research, including methodologies, techniques, and best practices. Invite experienced professionals or external trainers to conduct sessions and share their expertise. Skill Assessment: Assess the current skill level of team members through evaluations or self-assessment surveys. Identify areas where improvement is needed and tailor training programs accordingly.

Providing resources is a great way to get the team on the same page, short articles and podcasts on the specific matter your team's addressing would be better than an A-Z guide, it's unlikely that they have the time to dive as deep as you, and you want to make sure that you are not passing for a teacher giving them homework. Gathering resources in a document / folder will help your team access them more easily, and not get lost in Slack threads. If your team needs serious upskilling, you can provide training. Structured masterclasses relevant to the current project means that you won't have to look too far for a sample project to work on, AND you can get some work done during the class by organizing team workshop. Two birds in one stone.

I believe more in practicals than just reading books when it comes to learning, in my opinion to help the team we should of course create a proper documentation so that everyone is aligned with expected outcomes but also involve them in practical work, if needed may be some practice work is also a good idea to do the thing your self and learn from it.

Offer targeted training sessions and resources to enhance your team's UX Research skills. This could include workshops on research methodologies, online courses covering UX research techniques, or access to industry-standard tools and software. For instance, providing training on conducting effective user interviews or usability testing can equip your team with practical skills they can apply in their research projects.

Provide access to relevant resources, such as books, online courses, webinars, research tools, and industry publications, to support continuous learning and skill enhancement. Create a curated list of recommended resources and encourage team members to explore them.

An under utilized training or resource is connecting with other researchers on linkedin. 1. Follow active accounts that share guidance 2. Comment on those active account posts with questions 3. If you are feeling super brave reach out to those people and see if they can help you grow by having a quick chat to answer some question you have. I have always been down to grab time with people that take the time to reach out with a specific request to grow. Doesn't hurt to ask.

This is my favourite part! Involving the team into a practical scenario is a very good option, It provides everyone with lots of opportunities and challenges, the team learns collaboration, application of gathered knowledge, time management, communication and other lots of things all together.

Offer opportunities for hands-on experience through participation in real-world projects, cross-functional teams, and client engagements. Assign challenging research tasks, provide mentorship and support, and encourage experimentation and innovation.

Encourage team members to take on different roles within the research process, such as planning, conducting research activities, or analyzing data. This immersive experience allows them to apply theoretical knowledge in practical settings and gain valuable insights through firsthand experience.

This is a core part of working in an industry setting and what this collaboration looks like will depend on your organization’s research maturity and openness. Be patient and empathetic. Clear and concise communication is key. Don’t assume that non researchers will find jargon or even what you find to be basic research practices understandable. Wear a teacher hat with a participatory research style.

Engage team in real UX Research projects across various stages. Assign roles, offer feedback, and provide guidance to build hands-on experience and confidence.

Foster a culture of continual learning and skill development within the team by promoting curiosity, exploration, and a growth mindset. Encourage team members to take ownership of their learning journey and pursue opportunities for growth and development.

Connecting your research team to different parts of your organization can encourage them to expand their network. This builds credibility by understanding more about the organization, but enters opportunities for them to gather information that will help drive forward their career. Always a good idea to get input and network with people and teams with different contexts.

Let's broaden our horizons! Bring in external experts, stakeholders, or users to share insights. Organize field visits or immersion activities for diverse perspectives. Encourage exploring various domains and cultures to keep things inspiring and assumptions in check!

Shadowing is a great way to learn new skills or acquire new knowledge. Have your team members team up and shadow each other. Not only will help it improve the teamwork and create better outcomes through discussions, but it will also help team members understand the thinking behind certain actions and methods. They will learn how to execute instead of learning the methods only.

Learning any new skill can be a journey with pitfalls and trials. Your teammates will make mistakes and so will you. A strong tactic I have seen when it comes to fostering a new skill in someone is to encourage and praise their contributions and work publicly and to provide feedback privately. When reviewing user research outcomes with the organization, clients and other team members, call out the strengths and contributions made by your team. Make it a hobby to find ways to praise and encourage other’s contributions. This helps foster an environment where learning and growth is encouraged and creates a culture of teaming.

Provide support and recognition to team members who demonstrate a commitment to improving their UX research skills. Celebrate achievements, acknowledge progress, and reward individuals who actively contribute to the team's success.

Celebrate wins and learnings! Showcase team's UX Research work through presentations, reports, or portfolios. Highlight the impact on organization, clients, or users. Acknowledge challenges faced and lessons learned to keep growing together.

UX Research can often times feel intangible. More effort is often needed to "show impact." Being outcome driven over output has value and can be seen through users. An Interviewee feeling like they're being heard or finding problem tickets decrease has value. The ability to recognize such wins and finding a way to highlight those achievements go a long way to supplementing the value and contributions of a team.

I think it would be wise to start with workload assessment and allocating time for learning. For employees to learn new skills they should have time and energy for it.

Also, regularly evaluate the team's UX research skills and capabilities through self-assessments, peer evaluations, and performance reviews. Encourage team members to reflect on their experiences, identify areas for growth, and set goals for continuous improvement.

Promote a culture of continuous learning and feedback, providing mentorship opportunities for junior team members, or allocating dedicated time and resources for research skill development. Try to create a testing pool with your users if you can, or access different targets with dedicated tools with shared access within your team. This may impact your team's ability to improve their UX Research skills, and create an environment that supports ongoing growth and improvement.