CX Researcher: Adrian Figueroa
Meet Adrian, one of our team’s User Experience Researcher leaders. Adrian is our WebFirst CX Teams advocate for establishing customer experience feedback loops. His research –along with his storytelling approach to framing customer challenges and potential solutions – has been instrumental in moving the needle towards higher trust ratings and improved outcomes for our federal clients.
Why did you go into user research?
“I’ve always been interested in understanding people and what motivates and drives people. And when I was young I was interested in psychology and design, so it seemed like a natural fit for both – for combining them.”
What was your education path to becoming a user researcher?
I started out doing film photography. With film I was moreso interested in capturing ideas in a visual way and then that lead me to industrial design where there was a lot of drawing and a lot of before you design–whether a car, product or environment–you have to understand what it’s for and what the business goals were. There was a lot of that research for the design and that is when I found out that I liked the research side of design and understanding why we’re making what we’re making; what the users needs are; and what the needs of the business are; and then coming up with the strategy for the design. That checks all those three things.
Do you have a favorite project you’ve worked on?
At WebFirst, it has to be the navigation work. Even though it hasn’t been implemented, it drove me to figure out ways to overcome challenges when using all the tools at my disposable. I learned how to harness them to get insights from data, user comments, and to try and really paint a full picture (as one can without interviewing). It’s my favorite because of the challenge of finding those insights without having access to as many users as I would like. I was able to show the benefits of our designs using the tools that I had avialable.
Outside of WebFirst, there was a project I worked on for Ford that was unique and interesting. They wanted to have mini dealerships in high traffic areas like malls and public spaces with a lot of people. I worked on the design strategy for those ‘pop-up’ style stores, and I had direct access to the client and ability to present the teams ideas to the client and to the users. We had to think about how to entice them to enter the space, how to pull them through the space, and how we communicate with them digitally during the experience. It truly was a CX project because we had to think about what the experience is like physically, from walking into the space, getting them to a test drive, and making the purchase process efficient.
Why federal space?
I like the idea of working in the health field, but specifically in government. I always said, and continue to say, that we’re here to serve people of the US. We’re ultimately paid by them. For me, it’s about how we can best serve their needs as well as the client.
What are you most proud of – contributions wise from your work?
I would say it has to be continuing to highlight the needs of our users. It’s showing how the sites we work on are already helping them and also how they continue to need us to help them.
What research finding has been most ‘surprising’ or learning?
I was once doing interviews at university. I was researching students, both younger and older, and interviewing them about autonomous vehicles. and getting their perspectives on them and general opinions about them. I expected that the younger people would gravitate towards and adopters of the new technology but it was the opposite. Older students, 50+, were more interested in the use of autonomous vehicles because they could see the benefit of it. They could see how it could help them when they might become fatigued – for the car to take over the driving. Since the younger students weren’t aware of that potential benefit yet, they weren’t as receptive. That was surprising to me.
What changes have you seen in the field since becoming a researcher?
Initially, research really focused on the end user. In the field, there’s emerging acknowledgement that we need to not only focus on user objectives, but also focus on your business objectives and clients’ business objectives. I agree that we, as researchers should be tying in the needs of the business as well as those of the users. In other words, we really have to focus on business objectives, not just users. At first when research and HCD started becoming more well known, there was this big push to ‘empathy’ as a key word and the idea of empathy towards users became the big focal point. While that is very important, you also have to interweave the business processes and goals.
If you could change something about the way research is looked at in federal spaces, what would it be?
Do you want the honest answer? (Laughing) I don’t know if it’s because it’s something relatively newer to the federal space, but I’d love to see a fundamental understanding take shape about how research can really help make long term business decisions. If you start it early enough, it can help leaders make impactful and smart decisions that can help guide organizations in the long term and not just in the immediate future.
What do you enjoy most about being part of the CX Practice at WebFirst?
I appreciate the collaborative environment and the recognition I feel at WebFirst. At WebFirst, one’s input is not only listened to but it is considered. Clients, managers, and co-workers value everyone’s input and expertise. Oftentimes, other agencies communicate only top-down, where at WebFirst it is a collaborative effort of bottom-up and top-down.
What agency would you hope WebFirst gets the opportunity to work with? Why?
As far as a federal agency, I’d go with the National Park Service. I love nature and I’ve hiked in national parks in the US, and in Iceland as well. It’s something I enjoy, and it’d be nice to bring CX into that space, Being a hiker, I’ve noticed opportunities for CX – from digital booking, directions, parking and maneuvering oneself around the park—those would be fun servicing experiences to dive into.
Favorites:
What’s your favorite food? Middle-eastern food
What’s your favorite show? I don’t really have one, but I’ve recently watched the Ayrton Senna series on Netflix.
What’s your favorite holiday? Why?
Thanksgiving. It’s important to have a moment for gratitude and nice to have that every year to reflect and be thankful for everything we have.
Vacation spot? Iceland.
Dogs or cats? Both.
Why Detroit? Wasn’t by choice. I ended up here due to my Dad’s job in automotive.
Sport? Soccer.