Q&A with a client-side researcher
Editor's note: If you're an end-client researcher and interested in participating in a Q&A with Quirk's, please e-mail me at emilyk@quirks.com.
What inspires you as a researcher?
I am perpetually curious about why humans behave the way that they do, and well-designed research can help uncover those insights. It is exciting to me when insights lead to business solutions that change the growth trajectory of the business.
Do you have any tips for insights professionals looking to build their resumes and stay competitive in today’s job market?
Based on my experience, I recommend building a broad range of industry and subject-matter expertise to make yourself marketable to a wide variety of roles and companies. Go deep in a few areas that you’re most passionate about but make sure to stay nimble and an easy sell to multiple different opportunities. Sometimes this may mean – intentionally, and carefully – making a lateral or even downward title or pay scale move in order to gain experiences you’re missing. A successful career is not always a 45-degree angle trajectory.
Are you planning on leveraging any new tools or techniques in the next year?
My team is continuing to explore the right places for AI to play a role. One place I have found it very valuable is to be able to leverage open-end text boxes more in simple surveys, and leverage AI to take the first pass at analyzing the results. Especially in the early stages of a project, I often worry that forcing consumers into a “select all” or other answer choice question can miss the real insight or ascribe false importance to a list that the corporate team came up with rather than more purely hear from consumers.