Job Description

In a nutshell:

IDEO Europe is looking for a Contract Design Research Operations Specialist based in Munich, who will work closely with the European Design Research community and project teams in Munich and London. In essence, your focus will be on managing research operations across projects, helping create research plans, and recruiting participants.

Why is this role important for IDEO’s work?

Design research is the cornerstone of our human-centered approach to design and innovation. It is about gaining insight, empathy, and inspiration for the design process. It helps inform the future and inspire opportunities. The Design Research Operations Specialist plays a critical role in helping shape research, empower teams, and find participants and experts to give our designers and clients unique perspectives on the problem we are designing for.

Your ability to operationalize research systems for projects and resourcefully identify and onboard the right participants is crucial for fueling design inspiration. Furthermore, you will hold a broad view of our global research efforts and are able to help the community build better processes that enable us to push the edges of human-centered research.

Once here you will:

Help build the future of Design Research Operations at IDEO, support the design and creation of resources—tools, assets and relationships—and find great people to participate in research and inspire design.

• Plan and execute on a recruiting plan for each project with different ways of reaching people and screening them, including targeted outreach via social channels, relevant organizations, or working with external recruiting agencies
• Show curiosity and flexibility to switch between projects in different industries from medical to consumer products to financial services
• Use creative methodologies to identify and recruit diverse participants and build the necessary networks to execute on them
• Screen respondents to ensure they are appropriate for a particular project
• Manage the project recruit infrastructure, guidelines, and templates on each of your projects
• Co-design research trips and coordinate the logistics behind participant interviews, group discussions and events supporting each project team’s design research needs locally and internationally e.g. hiring cultural guides, translators
• Build, manage, and maintain vendor relationships
• Help IDEO to respect the privacy and rights of the users we speak to, keeping us GDPR compliant and maintaining our contact database
• Help prototype ways to optimise knowledge exchange across the IDEO DR Europe community e.g. a research library
• Participate in our global design research community, helping streamline local / global efforts

What does IDEO Europe offer you?

Ask anyone at IDEO why they like working here, and they will say it’s our people and the diversity of challenges. It’s a place where you can solve complex challenges for people, organisations and society, alongside thoughtful, intelligent individuals who lead with curiosity, empathy, and optimism.

We certainly work hard, but we also intentionally create an environment and culture where we’re able to pause, create, and connect.

We encourage our community to bring their whole selves to work and respect the need for work-life balance. IDEO provides you support and development throughout your time here, while allowing for autonomy in the design process and in your career.

IDEO Europe has studios in London and Munich, and a limited number of employees working remotely from other European countries. Over the past 30 years we have grown in the scale of our influence and impact. Although we still work across every industry and sector, our consistent purpose to deliver positive impact through design, has meant that we have enabled companies all over the world to be creatively competitive.

This role may be based out of our London or Munich studio, however, until further notice to manage the health and safety of our teams our workforce is predominantly working remotely due to COVID-19. We hope to return to our studios in a hybrid fashion when it is safe to do so and will be guided by Government guidance in the UK and Germany.

Relevant experience and mindset:

• Relevant experience in a people-focused role such as participant recruiter, project/program manager/coordinator, community manager, executive/administrative support
• Curiosity in people and ability to empathise with a diverse range of experiences
• Ability to push teams to think outside-of-the-box, while providing structure
• Confident communicator, with great interpersonal skills - you will engage with people across the organisation and be happy to engage with the general public e.g. via social media and navigate online communities and channels
• Balance multiple tasks and prioritize, executing them rigorously
• Learn new software and digital services relevant to the task at hand
• An optimistic, highly organised, can-do approach. Embraces change and is excited about exploring new ground and trying new things
• Experience working with / in creative industries is a plus
• Strong network of a diverse array of subject matter experts is a plus
• Fluent in German and English
• In addition please mention if any of the following apply to you:
• Experience in medical recruiting
• Experience in recruiting of experts
• Experience in online community building
• Experience in recruiting for quantitative research
• Focus on diverse, inclusive and equitable recruitment, e.g. incorporating intersectionality into recruitment, the ethics of capturing data on protected characteristics
• Strong international network

Here is some of our favorite work:

Take some time to explore our work Here are a few case studies that stand out to us. The Design Research Operations team works closely with all of our project teams, these examples showcase the wide range of design challenges and communities that we interact with:

• Designing the First All-in-one, Wearable Breast Pump
• Driving Growth at Europe's Largest Online Retailer
• Arming a 19th Century Company with a 21st Century Digital Offer
• Designing the Connected Future of Diabetes Management

Application requirements and instructions

Equal Opportunity Employer

IDEO is an equal opportunity employer; applicants are considered for all roles without regard to race, color, religious creed, sex, national origin, citizenship status, age, physical or mental disability, sexual orientation, marital, parental, veteran or military status, unfavorable military discharge, or any other status protected by applicable federal, state or local law.