In this interactive keynote session, Uday will provoke thought-provoking conversations about overcoming the limitations of conventional user research practices. Explore innovative opportunities to expand influence and impact by shifting the focus from digital assets to social imagination and tasks to rituals. Discover new ways to transform user research and broaden its potential in our ever-evolving digital landscape. The underlying framework for this conversation will be rethinking what it means to be human in a post-pandemic, AI-driven future.

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In this talk, Prachi will share examples of unconventional, out of box thinking that helped her and her team derive the maximum value from user research. This talk will cover research methods, synthesis and product making as a team sport, all of which together contribute to building products with empathy.

Discover the transformative power of empathy and kindness in design innovation. This talk delves into how uncovering hidden, unmet needs can spark solutions that not only delight customers but also drive disproportionate business impact. Through captivating stories from healthcare, technology, and design, explore how kindness, i.e., putting empathy into action can unlock opportunities to create meaningful connections and sustainable growth.

This presentation explores how to translate evaluative research insights into actionable design decisions while advocating for continuous user feedback throughout the product lifecycle. It covers strategies for synthesizing research into recommendations, maintaining a user feedback loop, and gaining stakeholder buy-in. The focus is on integrating research into iterative development, balancing user-centered design with business goals, and fostering collaboration across teams.

User research is evolving in surprising ways, expanding from product tweaks to strategic decisions and ecosystem connections. This talk, rooted in the unique perspective of an independent agency, uncovers how organizations across sectors are rethinking research’s role. Whether you’re a researcher, product owner, or business leader, explore emerging trends and insights to inspire a fresh perspective on user research and its transformative potential.

This talk is a call to action for researchers to become aggressive, result-oriented, data-first, AI-friendly professionals. At a crossroads today, user research needs to rebrand itself and barge into the leadership table. In this talk, I’ll share my experience and opinion on how we can do this, offering actionable strategies to elevate the impact of research in driving business and design decisions.

This talk explores a transformative approach to organisational development by reframing uncertainty as a strategic asset. By leveraging design research methodologies, organisations can interrupt entrenched systemic patterns and cultivate a culture that views “not knowing” as an opportunity for innovation and growth. The talk will demonstrate how strategic curiosity can be systematically integrated into organisational knowledge creation and control mechanisms, ultimately driving more adaptive and resilient enterprises and people’s experiences.

To understand where our discipline of user research can go further, it was important to unravel the past, connect the dots with the present and hypothesise the future. Achyutha’s journey as narrated would cover a perspective of how the user research practice has evolved and the value it can provide to the startup ecosystem and matured large companies. He proposes an ideal structure, value and impact of User Research to optimise companies’ RoI. He goes on to share a foresight on how we might shape our discipline with a few guiding principles and contribute to the growth stage of User Research.

This talk will unlock the secrets to standing out in the job market by treating your hiring journey like a user-centered design process. Learn how to research your audience (the hiring manager), tailor your portfolio, and refine your interview narrative with data-driven storytelling and iterative improvements. Leverage AI tools to practice, polish, and position yourself as the solution to their needs, and land that dream offer!

Discover how eye-tracking technology can revolutionize UX research and design decisions in this engaging, hands-on workshop. Learn the fundamentals of eye-tracking, from understanding the technology and designing experiments to collecting and analyzing data. Through practical exercises and real-world case studies, you’ll gain the skills to uncover deeper insights into user behavior and apply them to create more effective and user-centric designs.

This ‘going in the depths’ workshop offers a practical guide to applying mixed methods research in UX. Learn how to design and conduct mixed methods studies, analyze diverse data sets, and generate actionable insights that inform design decisions and have product impact.