User Experience Researcher
On Ambiguity
Companies increasingly expect UX Researchers to be capable of operating, comfortably, within ambiguous problems spaces. Where problems, the affected users, the causes, and opportunities for desired outcomes are not clearly understood and defined. Often this Problem ambiguity exists within an Organizational ambiguity in which stakeholders have different understandings of what problems the business is trying to solve in a way that is fiscally viable.
In response to these expectations, a compelling continuum of capabilities has emerged from UX Researchers that reveals an interesting relationship between ambiguity and seniority:
Tolerance
Navigation
Structuring
Sensemaking
Leading
Junior
»
Mid
»
Senior
»
Staff
»
Principal
I'm comfortable with ambiguity.
I navigate ambiguity.
I structure ambiguous problems.
I bring clarity to ambiguity.
I enable decisions in ambiguity.
This positioning suggests that companies and researchers are not valuing ambiguity itself, but rather forced to contend with it. It implies that ambiguity is inherently negative; and while understandable, it is an incomplete perspective on a quality that also has profound positivity.
As I look to define my own relationship to ambiguity and position myself in the greater community of UX Research with my sanctimonious self-righteousness opinions :) , I thought I'd apply some of my tactics in conducting semantic differential research. I'll start with a common definition of the term.
ambiguity:
A state or quality where a word, phrase, sentence, or situation can be understood in two or more different ways.
Now does that sound so bad?
Well, it depends...
A clear, singular definition does not inoculate a word from the ambiguity of its many meanings. So let's push the definition through a simple framework, a continuum from negative to positive and explore ambiguity in those contexts.
NEGATIVE
A lack of shared understanding that impedes effective decision-making or action.
NEUTRAL
A state in which multiple plausible interpretations or directions remain unresolved.
POSITIVE
An open state in which multiple plausible interpretations or directions create opportunity for exploration and discovery.
How might you feel?
Disoriented
Confused
Frustrated
Overwhelmed
Impatient
Undecided
Questioning
Receptive
Reflective
Observant
Curious
Energized
Playful
Optimistic
Adventurous
Lost
Blocked
Defensive
Investigating
Evaluating
Exploring
Imagining
Creating
Generating
Resolve
Illuminate
Expand
Reduce uncertainty that
is obstructing progress.
Understand and structure the possibilities.
Explore and generate possibilities before narrowing.
Enable
progress
Enable
understanding
Enable
exploration
What cognitive state might you be in?
What role might research play?
Positioning ambiguity through the continuum from negative to positive (or maybe it's merely the act of laying it out from left to right) illuminates a chronological order of operation for the researcher in an organization where the researcher:
Resolves obstructing uncertainty
then
illuminates possibilities
and then
helps team expand upon solutions
But in my experience, I've also encountered an interesting condition of certainty that reveals the beautiful paradox of ambiguity in its negative form. This adds another role to the research position that I've not seen in job descriptions nor in researcher profiles, productive destabilization. As Esther Perel is known to say, "Certainty is the enemy of change." When product teams seek certainty prematurely it eliminate possibilities - though it's certainly not their intent.
"We're wired to grab onto certainty - especially when the world feels off the rails - and that shapes how we show up both at work and in the world."
Brene Brown
The pace of technological change has created a persistent pressure for tech companies to move at an ever accelerated pace. This has created an incredible tension between a company's need for speed in resolving ambiguity and innovation's requirement to remain in ambiguity long enough to discover better things.
This highlights for me that when we are tasked to perform in ambiguous, uncertain conditions - to navigate, reduce, and remove - it's often the pressure of Organizational ambiguity we are contending with. Contrast this to Problem ambiguity in the space of the proverbial "user" where we perform by exploring, illuminating, and inducing a curious mindset.
Now this often makes research uncomfortable for businesses whose leaders interpret this as a call to move slowly, but I have found that creative teams like to move quickly - this includes research.
So when I re-approach my relationship with ambiguity, ultimately to respond the requirements outlined in job descriptions, I do so from a dual perspective. On one hand you have the disempowering qualities of ambiguity, perhaps better referred to as doubt, in which innovative thinking is slowed and suppressed and on the other hand is empowerment where ambiguity unleashes creative thinking.
Admittedly, I struggle to bottle that up into one simple, sellable catch phrase that is interpreted in such a way that expresses the value I bring as a researcher. But here goes....