User Researcher, Guidewire
Back-end software for P&C insurance
Be an early applicant
Back-end software for P&C insurance
1001+ employees
Be an early applicant
1001+ employees
Company mission
To constantly improve, so insurance companies can successfully respond to customer needs in a world where technology and risk are changing dramatically.
Role
Who you are
- Bachelor’s, Master’s, or Ph.D. with 3 – 5 years of experience in Human Factors, Human-Computer Interaction, Psychology, Cognitive Science, Design, or related fields or equivalent practical experience
- Passion for research and empathy for the user
- Experience conducting international research (Ideal but not required)
- Proven proficiency in common qualitative and quantitative research methods such as moderated and unmoderated usability studies, customer and user interviews, concept testing, cognitive walkthroughs, surveys, discount methods like heuristic evaluations and expert reviews, and benchmarking
- Experience in conducting both formative and summative research
- Experience working with designers, developers, and product partners to define research objectives, identify and prioritize research
- Ability to draw out insights from a variety of design research artifacts
- Experience with crafting UX artifacts like personas, storyboards, and journey maps to illustrate user needs and areas for opportunity
- Ability to communicate results and opportunities in clear, concise, and compelling ways a that fuel ideation and elevated designs
- Ability to prioritize and manage numerous projects simultaneously
- Flexibility to quickly respond to emerging issues under tight deadlines and lack of available end users
- Strong organization and time management skills
- Willingness to work across time zones - We have teams from California to Poland, so you should be comfortable working across those time zones
- We are looking for someone who is self-motivated, self-directing, and interested in growing as a strategic problem-solver on our friendly, global, customer-centric UX team
What the job involves
- Our team tackles a variety of domains within Property and Casualty insurance; as a design (UX) researcher you would be in charge of guiding, organizing, and executing research
- Working with support from our Lead Design Researcher, you will help our UX designers and product managers in Dublin and Poland to determine when and how the research will help them make better business and design decisions
- Help user experience teams and the business solidify research objectives and identify problems to be explored. Then, translate these objectives into key research questions for study and/or exploration
- Work across teams to plan and conduct an array of practical and impactful design research to uncover user attitudes, behaviors, needs, and motivations
- Understand when and which quantitative and qualitative research methods to use and their pros and cons. Guide teams on which research tradeoffs are acceptable given research questions, business goals, timeline, and resources
- Design and execute end-to-end custom, primary research. This includes but is not limited to building study plans, participant screeners, and discussion guides as well as recruiting study participants, moderation research sessions, and generating reports
- Uncover useful findings and actionable insights that drive tactical and strategic product decisions. Use third-party, market research, analytics, and user research to generate solid insights to foster solutions that consider a holistic view of people, technology, and business
- Cultivate user empathy by translating research into compelling stories of how users of our solutions think, feel, and behave
- Build artifacts such as personas, journey maps, presentations, reports, etc. to communicate the needs of users and customers to key stakeholders in clear and memorable ways
- Assist with coaching and training developers, designers, product managers, and others on basic research best practices, enabling them to quickly turn-around meaningful, useful insights
- Help to build and maintain an archive of research activities, results, and insights that can easily be shared with product shareholders and the user experience team
- Understand the importance of scaling user research and assist with developing and maturing research at Guidewire
Our take
Insurance is an age-old industry rooted in ancient technology. Despite the substantial power and revenue of these companies, their backend systems have become outdated, leading to rising relative costs. The challenge of modernizing such entrenched systems has been a significant hurdle for many insurers.
Guidewire is at the forefront of transforming Property and Casualty insurance by offering cutting-edge software solutions delivered via the cloud. The company is dedicated to evolving its offerings through close collaboration with its extensive customer base. This intimate engagement helps Guideire refine and enhance its cloud solutions to better meet the needs of it sclients.
Despite its successes in facilitating the cloud transition, the future may see the emergence of insurance providers built on entirely different infrastructures. Guidewire's ability to adapt and leverage its expertise and adapt will be crucial for maintaining its role as a leading technology provider.
Steph
Company Specialist
Insights
Company
Funding (2 rounds)
Mar 2008
$0.8m
SERIES C
Sep 2007
$24m
SERIES C
Total funding: $24.8m
Company values
- Integrity: We build and maintain honest, candid, and caring relationships with clients, potential customers, partners, investors, and of course, each other!
- Rationality: All we do is supported by factual evidence—whether it’s building awesome products, making decisions, or communicating with each other
- Collegiality: We’re in it together—so we’re all equal. We work in professional harmony, with respect, without arrogance, and as part of a structure where responsibility is shared and owned by all of us
Company HQ
South San Mateo, San Mateo, CA
Articles
Leadership
Mike Rosenbaum
(CEO, not founder)Prior to Guidewire, they led Product Management and Go-To-Market Strategy for core CRM products at Salesforce and served in the US Navy as a Submarine Officer.
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