Awkward Silences

Erin May talks with Jared Forney, Research Operations Principal at Okta, about how the role of research and research operations is shifting as AI accelerates product development. Jared explains why scale and rigor do not have to be opposing forces and why teams need to return to their core goals before adding new tools. Jared dives into how he builds trust across legal, product, and design teams a...

This week we're revisiting one of Awkward Silences' most memorable episodes. Much of the conversation around AI in UX involves how it will shape and change researchers' work. This episodes's guest, Jess Holbrook, who leads UX research for Microsoft AI, thinks  a lot about how this technology can be improved with design and UX best practices. Jess has spent over a decade working on the UX of AI at...

Erin May sits down with Alec Levin, CEO and Co-Founder of Learners, to explore how researchers can navigate the rapid changes reshaping their field. Alec shares his vision for how AI and automation are creating unprecedented opportunities for research teams willing to step up and lead. Alec argues that while AI can handle routine tasks like usability testing and surveys, researchers have a chance...

This week we're revisiting one of Awkward Silences' most memorable episodes. This episode welcomed Ruby Pryor, founder of Rex, a consulting firm specializing in UX research and strategic design. This episode gets into what it means to demonstrate the "business value" of one's work, specifically how researchers can and should quantify their impact in terms that are tangible to the company. Ruby sha...

Erin May sits down with Sam Ladner, Senior Principal Researcher of Strategy at Workday, to explore the evolving role of AI in qualitative research. Sam brings a refreshingly balanced perspective on where AI can genuinely help researchers and where it fundamentally cannot replace human insight. Sam explains how AI has transformed labor-intensive tasks like transcription and closed coding, freeing r...

This week we're revisiting one of Awkward Silences' most memorable episodes. This episode welcomed George Whitfield, an expert in applying AI to the analysis of qualitative data. George discussed the intricate challenges of leveraging language models to interpret expansive open-ended data (like interview transcripts), and emphasized the importance of context and not just keyword or topic identific...

Erin May sits down with Aneta Kmiecik, founder of Be Your Own Design Team, to tackle one of the biggest questions facing designers today: how to position AI skills in portfolios and resumes. With 15 years in creative industries and a community of 200,000 followers, Aneta brings unique insights into navigating career strategy during this AI transformation. Aneta reveals her Past Present Future fram...

Ben Wiedmaier sits down with user research consultant Nikki Anderson to explore how researchers can stay relevant when budgets are tight and stakeholders are stressed. Nikki runs Drop in Research where she helps teams conduct research, facilitate better meetings, and build research practices from the ground up. She shares how companies are increasingly coming to her with validation requests rather...

Ben talks with Kristen DeLap, fractional COO at Econify, to explore how UX'ers can build influence without formal authority. Kristen brings a unique perspective, having evolved from interior design to leading product teams at Herman Miller and now working as an operations executive. She shares practical strategies for understanding decision-making processes, translating design work into business i...

Erin and Ben chat with Laura Klein, Principal Experience Specialist at Nielsen Norman Group, about the practical realities of AI in user research. Laura teaches a class on AI for researchers and brings a refreshingly balanced perspective to cut through the hype. She explains why those "five simple prompts that will change your life" are mostly nonsense and shares where AI actually works well versu...

Ben sits down with Basel Fakhoury, CEO and Co-founder of User Interviews, and Baran Erkel, Chief Strategy Officer at UserTesting, for a conversation about the research industry's evolution. With AI reshaping customer behaviors and business decisions, both executives emphasize how the need for customer insights has never been greater, even as budget pressures mount across organizations. Basek and B...

Ben Wiedmaier sits with Karl Randay, Experience Director at 383, to explore how designers can stay relevant in an increasingly automated world. Karl shares insights from working with major brands like Hilton and Jaguar on digital innovation projects that blend strategy, research, and rapid prototyping. They also talk about the "beige-ification" of design, where templated systems and AI tools risk...

Ben is joined by Maria Rosala from Nielsen Norman Group and John Whalen from Brilliant Experience to wrap up 2025 and make some predictions for 2026. Maria and John share practical insights on everything from AI moderation tools to synthetic users, offering a balanced view of where these technologies excel and where human researchers remain irreplaceable. Maria and John also dig into the democrati...

Erin May sits down with Kate Towsey, founder of Cha Cha Club and author of Research That Scales, for Research Ops Appreciation Week. Kate shares insights from producing an audio documentary series on the future of research ops, including her fascinating experience co-creating content with AI. She reveals how research ops teams are increasingly surviving layoffs while research teams are cut, explai...

Ben talks with Lyndsi Lee, UX Manager at Turnitin, about moving beyond traditional metrics like NPS and CSAT to measure user experiences more effectively.  The conversation centers on outcome-based assessment, a framework that breaks user experiences into atomic outcomes. Rather than asking broad satisfaction questions, this approach focuses on specific user goals like "users can complete repetiti...

Ben is joined by Shalin Pei, Head of Design and Research and Natalie Golub, Head of UXR , both from Coinbase's Base product. Base is part of the crypto space, functioning as a network that offers secure and low cost ways to build decentralized apps, essentially helping create what they call the new internet. The conversation reveals how their small but mighty teams operate in one of the fastest mo...

Erin is joined by Samira Jain, Serena Hillman, and Jackie Ianni from Microsoft Azure Data to discuss how they built the Swift Research Lab over the past two years. The team shares their systematic five-step approach for creating research programs that result in stakeholder satisfaction while delivering insights every 1.5 weeks. The Azure Data team also break down their method for fostering relatio...

Ben sits down with Jake Burghardt from Integrating Research to discuss his new book Stop Wasting Research and how organizations can maximize the product impact of their customer insights. Jake breaks down the critical problem of research waste, where valuable insights from studies get left behind instead of informing future decisions and planning cycles. Jake introduces his framework of three root...

The popularity of AI moderation tools, increased attention on "big" data sets (and streams), and the ongoing uncertainty in the research job market have (understandably) led some to wonder about the future of qualitative research. Our guest today, however, is bullish, and explains why. Nancy Baum leads the qualitative research practice at C+R Research. She has nearly 20 years' experience in the fi...

In just ten years, ResearchOps has transformed from an obscure Silicon Valley speciality into a vibrant global profession. Despite economic headwinds, ResearchOps roles are emerging across industries far beyond tech, and the field is evolving at breathtaking speed. But where have we come from, and where are we going? In this five-part audio documentary, we’re exploring the past, present, and futur...

In just ten years, ResearchOps has transformed from an obscure Silicon Valley speciality into a vibrant global profession. Despite economic headwinds, ResearchOps roles are emerging across industries far beyond tech, and the field is evolving at breathtaking speed. But where have we come from, and where are we going? In this five-part audio documentary, we’re exploring the past, present, and futur...

In just ten years, ResearchOps has transformed from an obscure Silicon Valley speciality into a vibrant global profession. Despite economic headwinds, ResearchOps roles are emerging across industries far beyond tech, and the field is evolving at breathtaking speed. But where have we come from, and where are we going? In this five-part audio documentary, we’re exploring the past, present, and futur...

Erin May sits down with Larry Becker and Gavin Lew of Bold Insight to explore how researchers can prototype AI experiences that don't exist yet. They're joined by Katie Johnson, Global Head of Research for Panasonic Well. All share their methods for testing everything from voice interfaces for blind users to family wellness bots using low fidelity simulation techniques. ⭐️ Larry, Katie, and Gavin...

In just 10 years, ResearchOps has transformed from an obscure Silicon Valley speciality into a vibrant global profession. Despite economic headwinds, ResearchOps roles are emerging across industries far beyond tech, and the field is evolving at breathtaking speed. But where has it come from, and where is it going? In this five-part audio documentary series, Kate Towsey of Cha Cha Club explores the...

In just 10 years, ResearchOps has transformed from an obscure Silicon Valley speciality into a vibrant global profession. Despite economic headwinds, ResearchOps roles are emerging across industries far beyond tech, and the field is evolving at breathtaking speed. But where has it come from, and where is it going? In this five-part audio documentary series, Kate Towsey of Cha Cha Club explores the...