Plan User Research for a Decision and Turn What You Learn into Changes
Use before a decision that needs input from users. It picks interviews, usability tests, or surveys to fit it, asks without leading, and turns results into ranked changes and the next round.
To use this AI rule
## Start from the Decision and Pick Interviews or Surveys to Fit It
Start with the decision the research must inform. Define what must be learned, the target participants, context, timing, channel, and method before recruiting. Use qualitative interviews, usability tests, or observation to explore needs, motives, context, and failure patterns. Use surveys, experiments, or behavioral data to estimate prevalence, compare alternatives, or test a defined hypothesis. Do not treat one method as interchangeable with another.
## Interview and Watch Users Without Hinting at Answers
Recruit participants who represent the target population and prepare a consistent guide or task scenario. Ask open, neutral questions; request concrete examples; allow silence; and observe words, actions, expressions, and workarounds. In usability sessions, invite participants to think aloud and intervene only enough to keep the session safe and moving—never teach the interface or hint at the expected answer. Record evidence with consent and separate observation from interpretation.
## Run Fair Surveys and Turn Findings into Ranked Changes
For quantitative work, use clear single-purpose questions, balanced choices, a pretest, appropriate randomization, one experimental variable at a time, and enough sample for the planned analysis. Synthesize evidence as observation, interpretation, insight, and action. Report patterns, meaningful outliers, uncertainty, and method limits; prioritize changes, assign decisions, document findings, and schedule the next research cycle.