Senior User Researcher

**Details**:
**Reference number**:

- 338270**Salary**:

- £57,000 - £62,700-
**Job grade**:

- Grade 7**Contract type**:

- Permanent**Business area**:

- HO - Digital Data and Technology - User Centred Design**Type of role**:

- Digital
- Information Technology**Working pattern**:

- Flexible working, Full-time, Part-time, Compressed hours**Number of jobs available**:

- 1Contents

Location

About the job

**Benefits**:
Things you need to know

Location
- Liverpool, Manchester, SheffieldAbout the job

**Job summary**:
We’re looking for** **a** **Senior User Researcher** **who wants to make a lasting impact on how the Home Office delivers user-centred products and services. We’re looking for a skilled and experienced Senior User Researcher who is passionate about what they can bring to delivering better services at the Home Office and prepared to be a vocal advocate for user needs.

By joining Data Services and Analytics now, you can help drive forward our aim to become recognised as the leading provider of data insight services in Government.

You’ll communicate insights from research in engaging and impactful ways to delivery teams and stakeholders to drive change and improve government services.

You can learn more about design and research in the Home Office on our blog:

- Establishing the Home Office User Research Ethics Board
- Using ‘cooperative usability testing’ with our expert users
- Psychological safety for researchers
- How inclusive services help us to deliver effectively

This is an exciting time to be at the Home Office. You’ll have a chance to shape the future and support our mission to deliver exceptional public services that work for everyone.

**Job description**:
Your main day-to-day responsibilities will include:

- Leading the planning, design and execution of user research and usability testing to understand user needs and behaviours and inform the design and development of government services
- Influencing how decisions are made and constructively challenging ways of thinking at both the team and senior stakeholder level
- Leading other user researchers within a digital delivery team, mentoring and up-skilling researchers and supporting the growth and development of the team
- Taking a user centred, evidence-based approach by turning user research findings into actionable insights that influence service/product development
- Supporting digital delivery teams to build accessible digital services by ensuring that participants with access needs and low digital skills are included in all research
- Sharing insights from research and examples of best practice where they can help other researchers across the Home Office
- Aligning user research activities with wider organisational objectives to provide strategic insights that inform policy and proposition

You will also be expected to carry out the following day to day activities:

- Presenting research findings and related recommendations to senior decision makers across government
- Identifying, mitigating or escalating risks to conducting and implementing research

**Person specification**:
**Essential Skills**

You’ll have a demonstrable passion for user-centred design, with the following skills or some experience in:

- Communicating insights from research in a clear and impactful way that drives change in the design of services and informs policy and proposition
- Establishing an effective user centred design culture in a team, and supporting them to embed user centred design practices into their agile workflow
- Convincing senior stakeholders about the benefits of adopting a user-centred approach, based on evidence
- Researching diverse audiences to help teams deliver accessible and inclusive digital services

Our skills align with the cross government DDaT Capability Framework

**Technical skills**:
We'll assess you against these technical skills during the selection process:

- Research
- Analysis and synthesis
- User-centred and Agile practices

**Benefits**:

- You’ll be set-up for hybrid working from day one
We provide you with Office 365 licence as well as access to industry standard tools.

You can help shape how we do design and research
- We support our community to become practice leads to pursue work which provides value to the wider community. We currently have practice leads in diversity and inclusion, sustainability, design ethics, and workshopping.
- You are supported by a government leading UCD Operations Team

We have a team of passionate people who help support designers and researchers with tools, recruitment support, professional onboarding, guidance and our research library.
- Lots of ways to learn and develop

In addition to our online training catalogue with O’Reilly and connections with professional training providers, we also offer peer learning, a comprehensive induction, and time to volunteer or do charity work.
- Flexible working options to enable you to achieve the work life balanc