Design Research Lead - Manager level

Design Research Lead - Manager level

Capital One’s Experience Design organization is focused on co-creating memorable, meaningful customer and associate experiences that build our brand with humanity and drive business advantage. The goal of Experience Design Research is to accelerate teams’ learning velocity. We do this by conducting primary research studies, assessments, and testing. Additionally, we oversee democratized research/testing conducted by others. A key aspect of our role is to find and synthesize existing research and data to help teams acquire the knowledge they seek to make informed decisions. 

Role Overview

As a Design Research leader, you are primarily responsible for translating key business drivers into comprehensive research strategies and ensuring insights are leveraged for maximum impact. You will independently consult with Product leadership to create and maintain robust research agendas, ensuring the elimination of critical knowledge gaps. You will lead the rigorous execution, analysis, and delivery of actionable, pragmatic recommendations, finding opportunities to scale the impact of research beyond single product teams and across the broader organization.
 

Role Expectations

This leadership role requires deep expertise in research execution, strategic business partnership, and demonstrated independence in driving results.

Research Excellence and Delivery

• Learning Objective Clarity: Consults with Product teams to create and maintain clear research agendas and roadmaps. Develops primary research questions and objectives that align with business strategy and ensures research eliminates key knowledge gaps.

• Research Execution: Selects the most effective research methods and produces comprehensive research plans. Executes high-quality research and ensures appropriate touchpoints for cross-functional partners are maintained throughout the process.

• Expert Analysis: Applies expertise in human factors and human behavior to analyze and synthesize research data, surfacing relevant and actionable insights that directly answer research questions and produces all promised deliverables.

• Actionable Recommendations: Authors useful, pragmatic, and concrete recommendations. Ensures product teams can action these recommendations and establishes follow-up mechanisms for tracking throughout the Product Development Lifecycle.

• Scaled Impact: Increases the altitude and aperture of research to create additional leverage. Actively finds and identifies opportunities to scale research impact across Capital One beyond a single product team.

• Enablement: Leads Consult Hours and ad hoc consultations to advise non-researchers on method selection and research approach.

Strategic Influence & Collaboration
 

• Results Focus: Translates business goals into clear, measurable objectives and guides teams to consistently achieve impactful outcomes.

• Influence: Influences the strategic direction of a product area with cross functional teams, fostering a culture where researchers effectively advocate for their recommendations and stakeholders understand the value of research

• Collaboration: Sets clear expectations for teamwork and mutual support, fostering strong relationships within cross functional teams, proactively resolving team conflicts

• Communication: Presents work across levels and job functions using a human-centered approach to articulate compelling insights and recommendations that influence strategic decision-making and direction at senior levels

Basic Qualifications

• At least 3 years of professional experience conducting user experience research in a corporate environment

• At least 5 years of experience conducting quantitative research, qualitative research, or a combination of both

• At least 4 years of experience conducting data analysis (such as: survey data, behavioral analytics, etc.)

Preferred Qualifications

• At least 7 years managing user experience research in a corporate environment

• At least 4 years experience working and influencing senior level executives

At this time, Capital One will not sponsor a new applicant for employment authorization for this position.

The minimum and maximum full-time annual salaries for this role are listed below, by location. Please note that this salary information is solely for candidates hired to perform work within one of