Lead User Experience Researcher (On-Call)

The Company
ICF is a mission-driven company filled with people who care deeply about improving the lives of others and making the world a better place. Our core values include Embracing Difference; we seek candidates who are passionate about building a culture that encourages, embraces, and hires dimensions of difference.
@ ICF Next Government, we are fearless in finding new ways to solve problems, relentless in making sure it pays off for our clients and committed to making a positive change in the world. Join our community of mission-driven creatives, communicators, strategists, and technologists to challenge the status quo.
We're currently hiring for a Senior User Researcher (Part-Time; ~29 hours/week).
The Team
This position will report into ICF's Experience Practice within the Digital Line of Business. This practice includes a large team of professionals in fields such as content strategy and information architecture; User Experience research and design; digital performance optimization through web analytics, testing, search, and feedback tools; and customer experience strategy.
This matrixed team supports primarily federal technology and CX projects across many ICF divisions. The team's goal is to apply unconventional intelligence and human-centered design to deliver better experiences to the people who matter most to our clients. By joining this team, you'll work across an exciting, diverse range of clients in many domains. You'll enjoy the thrill of solving complex digital challenges while improving the lives of the people who interact with the systems we design.
The Work
When you join ICF's Experience Practice you will work on projects that matter to our country's health, environment and technological advancements. In your role as User Researcher, your work will require:

• Conducting formative and exploratory research.
• Creating findings and recommendations reports to inform project decisions related to product, design, and content.
• Collaborating with project teams and clients to help clients better understand their primary audiences and improve their digital products.

The Role
The User Researcher must:

• Have strong User Experience research skills to help lead and conduct user research projects including usability studies, user interviews, heuristic evaluations, card sorting, tree testing, etc.
• Work with clients and team members to discover and understand business requirements and develop and carry out user research activities.
• Analyze and synthesize feedback from internal stakeholders and internal and external users and present findings and recommendations to project teams and clients.

In addition to research skills, the User Researcher must:

• Have strong client relationship management and project management skills.
• Be comfortable interfacing with clients and proactively speaking up to drive projects forward in a way that is tactful, thoughtful, and collaborative.
• Strong oral and written communication skills.

Key Responsibilities

• Support clients to make data-driven decisions about improving User Experience metrics using both qualitative and quantitative methods and data.
• Work collaboratively with the project team to understand User Experience goals and gaps.
• Host workshops with client stakeholders to understand their needs and assumptions about end users.
• Identify target audiences; draft jobs-to-be-done and journey maps.
• Conduct heuristic evaluations and comparative analyses.
• Develop research plans, moderator guides, and conduct user research activities, especially user interviews.
• Complete qualitative analysis to identify key insights and develop recommendation reports.
• Proactively communicate with all relevant team members to manage team and client expectations, project plans and timelines.

Required Qualifications

• 5+ years of experience as UX researcher, Human Factors Engineer or a similar role
• Masters' degree required in psychology, industrial design health and safety medicine life sciences, human-computer interaction, computer science, library science, or a related field.
• 7+ years of experience with an Bachelor's degree or 5 years of experience with Bachelor's degree requirement.
• 3+ years' experience with Human Factors Engineering
• 3+ years' experience creating research plans, moderator guides, and recommendations reports.
• 3+ years' experience facilitating client sessions and user interviews.
• 3+ years' experience analyzing and synthesizing qualitative data.
• 3+ years' experience recruiting participants for research studies.
• 3+ years' experience in client-facing roles requiring tactful communications in fast-moving workplace.
• Excellent written and oral communication skills with a focus on attention to detail to produce client-ready reports and presentations.
• Ability to collaborate with teams in an agile setting and work with many workstreams including product, content and design teams.
• Experience working independently to achieve goals and meet deadlines.
• Ability to plan ahead and anticipate obstacles and risk in projects and proactively seeking solutions to mitigate them.

Preferred Qualifications

• Preferred experience conducting usability testing with design prototypes or existing digital systems, as well as with information architecture testing methods such as card sorting or tree testing.
• Preferred experience analyzing and synthesizing large amounts of qualitative data using methods like open coding and affinity mapping.
• Special consideration will be given to any candidates with federal government experience as a contractor or employee.
• Special consideration will be given to any candidates with existing Public Trust or other clearance level.

Job Location(s): This is a remote position (work times will primarily need to align with Eastern time zone due to client requirements) open to all U.S. citizens.
Working at ICF
ICF is a global advisory and technology services provider, but we're not your typical consultants. We combine unmatched expertise with cutting-edge technology to help clients solve their most complex challenges, navigate change, and shape the future.
We can only solve the world's toughest challenges by building an inclusive workplace that allows everyone to thrive. We are an equal opportunity employer, committed to hiring regardless of any protected characteristic, such as race, ethnicity, national origin, color, sex, gender identity/expression, sexual orientation, religion, age, disability status, or military/veteran status. Together, our employees are empowered to share their expertise and collaborate with others to achieve personal and professional goals. For more information, please read our EEO & AA policy.
Reasonable Accommodations are available, including, but not limited to, for disabled veterans, individuals with disabilities, and individuals with sincerely held religious beliefs, in all phases of the application and employment process. To request an accommodation please email icfcareercenter@icf.com and we will be happy to assist. All information you provide will be kept confidential and will be used only to the extent required to provide needed reasonable accommodations. Read more about non-discrimination: Know Your Rights and Pay Transparency Statement.
Pay Range - There are multiple factors that are considered in determining final pay for a position, including, but not limited to, relevant work experience, skills, certifications and competencies that align to the specified role, geographic location, education and certifications as well as contract provisions regarding labor categories that are specific to the position. The pay range for this position is:
$110,037.00 - $187,064.00
Nationwide Remote Office (US99)