Role Description 

Our Research Operations team sets the stage for our Research & Insights team to uncover actionable insights from our users that shape our products and elevate the overall Dropbox experience. In this role, you’ll lead a team of Researchers who focus on evaluative research and democratization, as well as Research Operations professionals, who will program manage large strategic research projects and others who will manage our entire research participant recruitment process. You and your team will play a critical role in our product development lifecycle and are integral at turning customers into advocates.

Responsibilities

• Build and manage a team of evaluative Researchers & Research Operations professionals (Program Managers, Participant Recruiting Coordinators) - including responsibility for hiring, onboarding, and performance management
• Partner with Research & cross-functional team leads to understand and clarify upcoming research needs, advise on feasibility and timelines, and leverage that insight to triage incoming requests, ensuring effective allocation of team resources to the highest priority projects across the business
• Establish and promote high-quality craft, methods, and processes
• Direct strategic initiatives that increase the broader Research team’s impact (e.g., creating and managing panels, promoting insights sharing, etc)
• Drive the vendor onboarding to payment process with partners in Security, Legal, Privacy, Procurement, and Finance within established SLAs
• Own the Research budget, collaborating with Finance and our greater Design Operations team
• Ensure optimized end-to-end participant recruiting processes which comply with company policies
• Manage our research democratization program, ensuring our cross-functional partners and stakeholders have well-governed access to speak with our customers, as well as education on best practices for doing so.
• Oversee Research lab spaces, forecast needs, and ensure Researchers are trained on using the space and technologies
• Communicate regularly and transparently with the Research team on the status of participant recruitment, program management, and evaluative & democratized research projects

Requirements 

• 3+ years working as a UX/Design Researcher and/or in a Program Management/Operations role with Research teams, ideally at a product-focused tech company
• 2+ years managing a team
• Experience with various research methods, including evaluative and “democratized” research, and knowledge of when and how to recruit participants to match the needs of research studies
• Experience with program / project management & best practices
• Experience overseeing / leading end-to-end research participant recruiting processes
• Experience with UX research tools, e.g., Qualtrics, Usertesting.com, DScout, Ethnio, etc - sufficient to onboard your team members around when & how to use them
• Experience in data privacy policies (GDPR, etc.), onboarding and managing contracts & relationships with vendors (including participation in vendor sourcing & selection, drafting SOWs, negotiating scope, cost), procurement, and expense management systems 
• Systems thinker with excellence in process analysis and track record of improving processes as a team scales, resulting in greater operational efficiency and team productivity
• Demonstrated service-oriented mindset - you seek to understand, adapt to shifting priorities, and are empathetic while resilient when negotiating tradeoffs with stakeholders
• Advanced relationship-building skills that promote trusted partnerships with functions across the org that your team relies on - Legal, Privacy, Security, Procurement, Finance, etc.
• Strong prioritization skills - able to determine what’s feasible given time and resource requirements, distinguish critical from non-critical issues and set team focus and priorities accordingly.