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Specialty

ResearchOps

Designs and maintains the systems that let an organization research with people continuously, respectfully and at scale, without starting from scratch in every study.

Origin
Professional practice; reference handbook: Towsey (2024)

What problem it addresses

When many teams do research, each one finds participants, tools and permissions on its own, and what is learned gets lost in documents no one opens again.

Principles

  • Systems before paperwork

    The job is to design systems that serve every team, not just to handle paperwork.

  • Learning within reach

    A repository where findings are stored, searched and reused.

  • Respect for participants

    Consent, privacy and care for data in every study.

Applications in design

  • Use it like this

    Start when several teams research at once: centralize participants, permissions and findings.

  • Avoid

    Reducing it to buying tools or recruiting participants.

  • Don’t fall for it

    A repository no one consults is useless: also design how it is used.

Authors and works

  1. 2024

    Kate Towsey

    Organized the discipline in a handbook: how to find participants, choose tools, take care of ethics and manage research knowledge. She warns it is not an administrative or support role.

Sources

Original sources

Last reviewed: