How much is enough user research?

We all know how important real world insights are to the success of our endeavours, but when navigating ambiguity how do we know we have learnt enough to make effective decisions about the way forward?

The purpose of learning in an organisation is vital to making good decisions. We invest time in gathering insights to understand consequences and mitigate risk in our decision making, to make more informed decisions.

Leaders who encounter the challenge of navigating ambiguity realises the need to sharpen their instinct for balancing insight and risk.

However, learning can take a significant amount of time and resource. As speed can often be one of the most important aspects of building a business — whether due to investment runway, ambitious targets, stakeholder pressure, or aggressive competition — we need to be smart in how we approach our learning. For decision makers there is an ongoing trade off between waiting to find out more, and acting on what is already known.

Let’s imagine a learning spectrum going from two extremes, from having no insight about our market on one side, to having lots of insight on the other.

If we find ourselves too far on the no insight side of the spectrum we risk acting on our own bias rather than actual insights, using assumptions we have made about the market, audience, or proposition. We don’t have enough insight to make well-informed decisions, or at least understand and mitigate the risks behind those decisions. We are effectively working blind, and therefore our success or failure is at the mercy of luck and fortune. In team settings, this can lead to debates and conclusions mostly based on the opinions of the loudest voices.

However, If we find ourselves too far on the lots of insight side of the spectrum, we have probably spent too long trying to gather insights, rather than making decisions on the…

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