Research briefs/proposals

A research brief is an important document.

It contains information on: * the research questions you plan to answer through the research activity * the research methods that you plan to carry out * the timelines associated with the work * who you plan to recruit for the research and any associated costs (e.g. incentives) * intended outputs from the research (such as show and tell presentations, user journey maps, problem statements, and so on) * considerations around ethics, safeguarding and other procedures you will need to address to ensure the research can run effectively

The purpose of a research brief is to share your intentions with your team, get their buy-in and ensure everyone has the same understanding of what needs to be done. It also operates as a way to get sign off of any costs and set deadlines.

While research is a collaborative process, research briefs or proposals are written by user researchers. It is important that the brief is ethically sound and appropriate, which requires user researcher expertise.

You can do this at any level and at any point in your career, but you may find it useful to get the guidance of a senior or lead user researcher when writing a brief if you’re unsure. When forming a brief, it can be useful to bring the wider team together and collaborate on generating research questions and who to recruit for research.

Sharing a research brief with your team may spark some debate. This is part of the process – the rest of your team are stakeholders in the research, and you need to manage their expectations and opinions. Discussing the brief within the team can help you reach a consensus and highlight any concerns, particularly with costs and deadlines.

Once a research brief has been agreed collectively by the team and any stakeholders, user researchers should then have the clarity and autonomy needed to progress with the work and get the research project going.