While product managers have a minimum viable product (MVP), what's the closest equivalent for effective user research?
That question led us to the concept of minimum viable research (MVR), and in turn, the framework to ensure that people who do research can get projects off the ground with the fewest hurdles possible.
Read on for more on how we define minimum viable research, its origins, and a practical guide to putting the framework into action.
🎉 Surprise! We've rolled out a free Minimum Viable Research guide to support your next project. Download it here.
What is minimum viable research?
Minimum viable research is intended to help get research processes ramped up quickly and key findings out to stakeholders faster, all in an effort to make better decisions (product or otherwise). What an MVR should not be is an excuse for cutting corners – good research should still answer important questions and respect the deeper processes put into place by trained user experience research professionals.
And let's be clear: this concept isn’t entirely new, as it’s had roots (albeit under different names) with UX research for years (see: UXR expert Erika Hall's concept of Just Enough Research to support the research process).
From our point of view, minimum viable research can be distilled in four important steps:
1. Recruiting participants
Recruiting participants is a critical piece of the research process (and a topic we happen to know a thing or two about). In order to do this in an effective way, you should ensure that you have:
- Been clear about your research goals
- Determined if you need to target existing or new users
- Built a simple screener survey to vet those participants
- Distributed your screener survey to potential participants
- Contacted five people to set up in-person or remote sessions
- Compressed the timeframe of sessions to meet deadlines
2. Moderator preparation
Next is putting together a solid moderator guide. A moderator guide is an important tool to get the most out of your research sessions as possible. Here’s how you can create one that will set you up for user research success:
- Put your research mission and learning goals on the top of your guide
- Have a hypothesis or assumption you want to test
- Use open ended, “why”-oriented questions
- Write your opening and closing, verbatim
Here's a moderator guide cheat sheet you can use for your next session:
Need to run minimum viable unmoderated research? Read this guide for help.
3. Running an effective session
If your research session is poorly planned, there’s a high probability that the results will be lackluster as well. We see the building blocks of an effective research session as:
- Planning to listen more than speaking
- Probe, give context, set expectations
- Show something if you have something to show (like a prototype or concept)
- Take notes (or get a note taker to free your bandwidth)
4. Reviewing and sharing results
If you conduct research, but its results were never shared widely and clearly with stakeholders, did it ever really happen? Like trees that fall in woods, the best ways to ensure your research makes a sound for your organization include:
- Reviewing your notes and highlighting key insights
- Sharing those insights in a succinct, digestible manner
- Connecting with your stakeholders on your findings to determine next best steps
Minimum viable research: What to do next
Minimum viable research is just the precursor to going wider and deeper into user research. Once you've gotten a chance to read the full guide, here's some further resources to help you on your research journey.
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