User research community
The user research community exists to:
- develop user research knowledge and skills across government
- discuss and challenge the way government carries out user research to improve services and content
- bring together people with an interest in improving user research practices across government
Who the community is for
You might be interested in this community if you:
- are involved in user research
- want to learn about users of government services
You don’t have to be in a user research role.
Get involved
Online
Use these online spaces to discuss user research issues:
- user research for government services discussion group - to get access, contact [email protected] using your government email address
- UK Government Digital #user-research Slack channel - a place to chat and share real-time news about user research issues (create a Slack account using your government email address)
If you can’t access these, please email [email protected] for help.
Training and events
The community co-hosts regular training sessions and events for colleagues across government, including:
- cross-government user research meetups - informal show and tell events that take place every other month
- user research and other training on user-centred design - including training for people who are new to user research and masterclasses for experienced practitioners
As a civil servant, you can also book a place on user research fundamentals training through Civil Service Learning. This will give you 5 days of practical user research experience.
Community resources
Use these resources to learn more about user research in government:
- user research blog - user research stories and case studies from across government
- Inside GOV.UK blog - stories about how data and user research have helped improve GOV.UK
Use these for hiring user researchers:
- DDaT profession user researcher role, level and capability definitions
- job description for a user researcher
User research in the Service Manual
The Service Manual guides to user research show what we currently believe to be best practice for government services. They cover:
- understanding user research
- user research in the different design phases
- preparing for user research
- user research methods
- analysing and sharing findings
Help us keep the Service Manual up to date by:
- contributing to discussions in our user research guidance group
- telling us if something is wrong or out of date using the feedback link at the top of each guide
Other communities
You may want to find out more about the following communities:
- Last update:
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Added guides for research in discovery, alpha, beta and live.
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Added guides to getting users' consent for research, sharing findings and analysing research sessions.
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Guidance first published