Senior Research Manager, Design Research

RESPONSIBILITIES:

• Provide strategic leadership across design research, ensuring alignment with hardware, product, and organizational priorities.

• Scale early-stage research initiatives, working closely with cross-functional leaders to identify opportunities for research and set expectations for mixed-methods research, ensuring research is positioned as a critical input to decision-making. 

• Partner closely with Program Management and team members to intake research needs, assess tradeoffs, and guide prioritization and research direction.

• Manage, coach, and develop a team of senior researchers, fostering strong research craft, clear communication, and professional growth.

• Serve as a senior individual contributor on complex, high-impact research initiatives, particularly those adjacent to physical product and hardware development.

• Own relationships with external research vendors, including scoping projects, defining success criteria, and ensuring high-quality execution.

• Communicate research insights clearly and credibly to cross-functional partners and leadership, positioning research as a critical input to decision-making.

QUALIFICATIONS:

• Bachelor’s degree in a relevant field such as human factors, design research, user experience research, design anthropology, psychology, or a related discipline.

• 5+ years of experience conducting user research for physical products, ideally within hardware, health, or consumer product environments.

• 2+ years of people management experience, including coaching, feedback, and performance development.

• Strong mixed-methods research background, with demonstrated application of qualitative and quantitative approaches to real-world products.

• Experience working within or alongside hardware development lifecycles (not software-only).

• Experience managing or partnering with external research vendors, including project scoping and execution.

• Ability to manage multiple workstreams, navigate ambiguity, and influence without direct authority across cross-functional teams.

• Excellent written, verbal, and presentation skills, with the ability to communicate complex insights to executive audiences.

• Strong commitment to embracing and leveraging AI tools in day-to-day tasks, ensuring AI-assisted work aligns with the same high-quality standards as personal contributions.