Senior ResearcherThis is a remote position.
JOB ID #942 The
Veterans Affairs business unit helps transform the VA into a modern digital services organization where Veteran outcomes are at the center of every effort. We partner with the VA to design and deliver seamless user experiences for Veterans, their families and caregivers, and VA employees. By applying better practices in service design, product management, and technology, we enable the VA to increase the use, quality, and reliability of services and decrease the time Veterans spend waiting for outcomes.
Primary Responsibilities The Senior Researcher serves as an experienced individual contributor within a team, with the expectation of continuing to develop leadership, guidance, and mentoring skills. With minimal oversight from leadership, you will support the team in meeting scope, schedule, and delivery requirements.
A Senior Researcher contributes to the long-term goals of the program and the development of the program's research strategy. You may serve as the discipline's primary lead when working with stakeholders and use strong influencing skills to drive improvements in research processes and practices.
Primary expectations of a Senior Researcher include: - Builds strong relationships with team members, government and company stakeholders, and program management
- Leads cross-functional efforts with team members and team leads
- Navigates ambiguous requirements and environments to support successful delivery
- Plans, conducts, analyzes, and shares research based on team questions, needs, and goals
- Prioritizes research projects based on team needs, goals, and research capacity
- Plans and facilitates collaboration between researchers, product team members, and stakeholders
- Influences and communicates the research strategy for the program
- Coaches and mentors researchers, providing actionable feedback that supports growth within the research discipline
- Participates in evaluating candidate homework assignments and panel interviews
- Identifies risks, communicates them to leadership, and provides recommendations to mitigate identified risks
- Oversees research scope and the development of recommendations, effectively communicating results to internal and external stakeholders
- Contributes to the planning, execution, and synthesis of research
- IA standards stewardship: Upholds and interprets VA.gov information architecture (IA) and design component standards, ensuring products align with established structural patterns, naming conventions, and experience expectations
- Cross-team IA guidance: Helps product teams understand IA standards, how to apply them, and when to engage the Content & Information Architecture team during early phases of product design
- Structural evaluation: Reviews the implementation of IA structures, navigation elements, and content hierarchy to ensure they align with documented IA decisions and support clarity, predictability, and usability
- Issue identification and documentation: Identifies structural issues, assesses their severity, and clearly documents findings so teams understand what needs to be addressed and why
- Governance checkpoint engagement: Participates in collaboration cycle checkpoints, providing an IA perspective on product readiness, structural coherence, and alignment with experience standards
- Standards feedback loop: Surfaces large or systemic IA issues to the Content & IA team and provides insight into gaps or emerging problem areas based on patterns observed across products
- Governance internal contribution: Contributes to internal Governance initiatives, including research on Collaboration Cycle effectiveness, sprint-based process improvements, and updates to documentation and guidance materials
Basic Qualifications - Bachelor's degree and 7+ years of relevant experience
- Relevant years of experience may be substituted for education
- Prior experience mentoring junior-level team members
- Extensive experience with research principles, methodologies, and relevant technologies
- Strong understanding of adjacent disciplines and how research work impacts product, program, and business goals
Preferred Qualifications N/A
To learn more about working at Ad Hoc, please visit: https://adhocteam.us/join
Benefits: - Company-subsidized health, dental, and vision insurance
- Flexible PTO
- 401K with employer match
- Paid parental leave after one year of service
- Employee Assistance Program
job reference:
https://adhoc.team/
