UKCEH is looking for a UX (User Experience) Design Researcher to join our team of talent individuals, contributing to scientific discovery and generating the data, insights and solutions that researchers, businesses and governments need to solve complex environmental challenges.

Working at UKCEH is rewarding. Our science makes a real difference, enabling people and the environment to prosper, and enriching society. We are the custodians of a wealth of environmental data, collected by UKCEH and its predecessors over the course of more than 60 years.

As a valued member of our team, you’ll get:

• 27 days annual leave, rising to 29 days after five years
• 10% employer pension contribution
• Enhanced maternity and paternity leave
• 24 hour, 365-day access to support with physical, mental, social, health or financial issues
• Flexible working opportunities
• And much more

You’ll be joining the Environmental Data Science (EDS) group at UKCEH Lancaster, a multidisciplinary team that draws on co-design approaches to develop Digital Research Infrastructure (DRI) for environmental science. In this role you’ll lead engagement activities with various environmental science communities to understand their requirements for DRI and create interactive, inclusive, and novel designs for stakeholder services.

DRI at UKCEH supports the full lifecycle of environmental science projects, from monitoring and processing data to analysing and visualising data for decision-making under uncertainty. This involves numerous services for stakeholders including, for example, tools to manage data and other research assets (e.g., Environmental Information Data Centre catalogue), virtual laboratories for science collaborations (e.g., DataLabs), and visualisation and decision-making tools for organisations and policymakers.

You’ll be working in an agile development team to apply UX design principles, approaches and research activities in a fast-paced agile development environment, focused on delivering value quickly and iteratively to a variety of stakeholders. To do this, you’ll run regular activities such as workshops with different communities (e.g., scientists, policymakers) across all domains of environmental science, to gain continuous stakeholder feedback on core DRI services and specify iterative updates for implementation.

You’ll identify and explore innovative tools and methodologies (e.g., Lean UX) to create new service designs with stakeholders, and support initiatives that grow UKCEH’s understanding of the stakeholders using the DRI. All activities will be in collaboration with the Design and Software Development sub-teams of EDS as well as environmental scientists across UKCEH, and you will be able to innovate on design approaches – publishing your insights with colleagues and external stakeholders in high quality publications (e.g., in Human-Computer Interaction venues).

You’ll be joining a leading independent, not-for-profit research institute that’s committed to recruiting talented people like you, progressing your career and giving you the support you need to thrive at UKCEH.

Your main responsibilities will include:

• Evaluating and reiterating the current UX design of existing stakeholder services in UKCEH’s core digital research infrastructure to create novel service designs and prototypes
• Utilising current and emerging best practices in UX design to gain regular feedback on services from stakeholders across the environmental science community
• Working in an agile development environment alongside a team of software engineers, conducting continuous research and engagement activities with stakeholders for rapid, iterative development
• Taking responsibility for the management of stakeholders using DRI in various environmental science communities, including inclusively recruiting stakeholders and ethically managing research data
• Collaborating with the Design and Software Development sub-teams in EDS, as well as other colleagues internally and externally to UKCEH
• Presenting and disseminating DRI design insights with the wider community, including with the Human-Computer Interaction research community through high quality publications

For the role of UX Design Researcher, we’re looking for somebody who:

• Has a good degree in an appropriate subject (e.g., Interaction Design, Computer Science), as well as a PhD or equivalent relevant experience
• Has evidence of continuing professional development and up to date knowledge of research in their field, including best practices in UX design and applying these in agile development environment
• Has experience of applying design research methods for understanding stakeholder needs specific to UX, and desirably in a fast-paced agile development environment
• Can present work and stakeholder services clearly to a variety of audiences including non-specialists, and actively pursues opportunities to collaborate with others
• Can transform stakeholder needs into engaging UX designs, translating these into specific features for implementation
• Works with minimal supervision, keeping managers appraised as appropriate
• Can publish papers on their design insights, particularly with the Human-Computer Interaction community (including conferences such as CHI, DIS, CSCW, etc.)
• Shows a clear interest in designing DRI for environmental research communities

If we’ve just described you, we’d love to meet. Apply now, or if you have any questions about the role or working in the Environmental Data Science team at UKCEH, please feel free to contact us.

Unfortunately, we are unable to offer visa sponsorship for this position at this time.