Dollars to Donuts
44 episodes - English - Latest episode: 6 days ago - ★★★★★ - 51 ratingsThe podcast where we talk with the people who lead user research in their organization.
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Episodes
43. Leanne Waldal returns
April 19, 2024 16:15 - 50 minutes - 34.7 MBIn this episode of Dollars to Donuts I catch up with Leanne Waldal, five years after she first appeared on the podcast. She’s now a Principal in User Experience at ADP. A couple of years ago, I realized I know things. We all know things, but sometimes we go through life thinking there’s always something […] The post 43. Leanne Waldal returns first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
42. Celeste Ridlen of Robinhood
April 12, 2024 17:38 - 1 hour - 43.4 MBFor this episode of Dollars to Donuts I had a wonderful conversation with Celeste Ridlen, the Head of Research at Robinhood This is a fundamental leadership-y thing where no two people are going to do that same leadership role the same way. You’re never going to do them the same way as somebody else. And […] The post 42. Celeste Ridlen of Robinhood first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
41. Carol Rossi returns
March 25, 2024 14:19 - 1 hour - 43.4 MBIn this episode of Dollars to Donuts Carol Rossi returns to update us on the last 9 years. She’s now a consultant who focuses on user research leadership. I’m happy making the contributions that I’m making, even though it’s hard to directly measure impact. I’m hearing from people that they’re finding value from the work […] The post 41. Carol Rossi returns first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
40. Gregg Bernstein returns
March 18, 2024 18:23 - 58 minutes - 40.2 MBIn this episode of Dollars to Donuts I welcome Gregg Bernstein back for a follow-up episode. He’s now Director of User Research at Hearst Magazines. The thing that I always come back to is that there is no one way to do research. And I also think there’s no one way to do research leadership. […] The post 40. Gregg Bernstein returns first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
39. Mani Pande of Cisco Meraki
March 14, 2024 02:06 - 54 minutes - 37.6 MBThis episode of Dollars to Donuts features my interview with Mani Pande, Director and Head of Research at Cisco Meraki. We used to do these immersion events where we would bring everybody who worked on, who was our stakeholder, to come and listen and talk to our customers. And we would do these focus groups, […] The post 39. Mani Pande of Cisco Meraki first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
38. Vanessa Whatley of Twilio
February 28, 2024 17:54 - 1 hour - 50.5 MBThis episode of Dollars to Donuts features my interview with Vanessa Whatley, UX Director – Research & Documentation at Twilio. For many years, I had anxiety and regret around not starting my career in the field that I’m in sooner because I felt very very lost stumbling through all of the different fields and roles, […] The post 38. Vanessa Whatley of Twilio first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
37. Nizar Saqqar of Snowflake
February 21, 2024 19:21 - 1 hour - 46.5 MBThis episode of Dollars to Donuts features my interview with Nizar Saqqar, the Head of User Research at Snowflake. For a domain that takes a lot of pride and empathy and how we can represent the end user, there’s a component that sometimes gets overshadowed, which is the empathy with cross-functional partners. With every domain, […] The post 37. Nizar Saqqar of Snowflake first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
36. Noam Segal returns
February 15, 2024 03:29 - 1 hour - 52.3 MBThis episode of Dollars to Donuts features a return visit from Noam Segal, now a Senior Research Manager at Upwork. AI will help us see opportunities for research that we haven’t seen. It will help us settle a bunch of debates that maybe we’ve struggled to settle before. It will help us to connect with […] The post 36. Noam Segal returns first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
New episodes! New book!
October 10, 2023 16:10 - 37 minutes - 60.2 MBToday we’ve got a quick program note about new episodes of Dollars to Donuts, an announcement about my new book, and an interview with Steve Portigal. Show Links Interviewing Users (2nd Edition) Steve on The Rosenfeld Review Podcast “How-to with John Wilson” on HBO Introduction Steve Portigal: Hi, everyone, it’s Steve Portigal. The podcast has […] The post New episodes! New book! first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
35. Danielle Smith of Express Scripts
May 11, 2020 01:53 - 55 minutes - 50.9 MBThis episode of Dollars to Donuts features my interview with Danielle Smith, the Senior Director of Experience Research & Accessibility at Express Scripts. Something that I’ve really changed the way I thought about since I’ve been at Express Scripts — we are in the healthcare ecosystem. So the experiences we deliver, if they are not […] The post 35. Danielle Smith of Express Scripts first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
34. Amber Lindholm of Duo Security
May 05, 2020 03:21 - 59 minutes - 54.7 MBThis episode of Dollars to Donuts features my interview with Amber Lindholm, the Head of User Research at Duo Security. That’s the sign of a really good researcher – it can never be just about research for research’s sake, like this is a cool project, this is a neat thing, I really wanna go in-depth […] The post 34. Amber Lindholm of Duo Security first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
33. Julia Nelson of MOO
April 28, 2020 18:14 - 56 minutes - 51.6 MBThis episode of Dollars to Donuts features my interview with Julia Nelson, the Director Of Research at MOO. All researchers say to some degree that they don’t necessarily have a traditional background when they come into the research field. But I think there’s a lot of strength in welcoming people with different perspectives onto your […] The post 33. Julia Nelson of MOO first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
32. Chris Kovel of First Abu Dhabi Bank
April 15, 2020 22:58 - 1 hour - 56.2 MBThis episode of Dollars to Donuts features my interview with Chris Kovel, the Head Of Research at First Abu Dhabi Bank (FAB). I look at needs as proximate needs and ultimate needs. An ultimate need is why the product exists in the first place. And then the proximate need is the experience of using that […] The post 32. Chris Kovel of First Abu Dhabi Bank first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
31. Noam Segal of Wealthfront
April 08, 2020 15:42 - 1 hour - 59.7 MBThis episode of Dollars to Donuts features my interview with Noam Segal, the Director of Research at Wealthfront. Everyone from PMs to designers, researchers, obviously, engineers, data scientists, marketing, we’re all trying to to understand our clients, we’re all taking part in that process in some way, shape or form. And so I view my […] The post 31. Noam Segal of Wealthfront first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
30. Laith Ulaby of Udemy
April 04, 2020 00:38 - 1 hour - 61 MBIn this episode of Dollars to Donuts I speak with Laith Ullaby, the Head of Research at Udemy. I’m really into the idea of questioning what we do. That can be the methods and that conversation about getting out of our comfort zone. It can be thinking about our relationships with stakeholders and trying to […] The post 30. Laith Ulaby of Udemy first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
29. Kathryn Campbell of Ticketmaster
March 29, 2020 01:31 - 1 hour - 59.7 MBIn this episode of Dollars to Donuts I speak with Kathryn Campbell, the Director of Research & Insights at Ticketmaster. Whenever there is availability of somebody that might normally work on the marketplace side, they might tag team on an account manager project and that helps to inform them about that product. It gives them […] The post 29. Kathryn Campbell of Ticketmaster first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
28. Laura Faulkner of Rackspace
March 27, 2020 03:22 - 1 hour - 60.1 MBIn this episode of Dollars to Donuts I speak with Laura Faulkner, the Head of Research at Rackspace. I’ve never just sat and done just what I was asked to do. I’m always looking for something new, something else. It’s probably just part of how I’m built but it’s also a conscious choice of, of […] The post 28. Laura Faulkner of Rackspace first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
27. Colin MacArthur of the Canadian Digital Service
January 07, 2020 01:39 - 1 hour - 46.1 MBIn this episode of Dollars to Donuts I chat with Colin MacArthur, the Head of Design Research at the Canadian Digital Service. We talk about bureaucracy hacking, spreading the gospel of research throughout government, and embedding researchers in complex domains. Often the idiosyncrasies in people’s research and the sort of surprises that don’t fit within […] The post 27. Colin MacArthur of the Canadian Digital Service first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
26. Jesse Zolna of ADP
September 05, 2019 13:14 - 1 hour - 57.1 MBIn this episode of Dollars to Donuts I talk to Jesse Zolna, who leads the User Experience Research Team at ADP’s Innovation Lab. We talk about driving change as an experiment, exposing the organization to how customers solve problems, and engineering psychology. One of the challenges we face is getting “credit” for the work that […] The post 26. Jesse Zolna of ADP first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
25. Juliette Melton of The New York Times
August 22, 2019 18:41 - 1 hour - 55.9 MBIn this episode of Dollars to Donuts I speak with Juliette Melton, Director of User Insight and Strategy at The New York Times. We talk about updating the old “design research” label, user research in a journalism culture, and the role of coaching. I think that researchers can bring a kind of brightness into a […] The post 25. Juliette Melton of The New York Times first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
24. Ashley Graham of IBM
July 25, 2019 21:35 - 1 hour - 60.3 MBThis episode of Dollars to Donuts features my conversation with Ashley Graham, a design research leader at IBM. We discuss synthesis as a collaborative, co-located activity, being mission-driven, and building a process that addresses complexity. When I look at the wonderful research community, I don’t see a ton of people that look like me and […] The post 24. Ashley Graham of IBM first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
23. Michele Marut of CBRE Build
July 14, 2019 23:12 - 54 minutes - 49.7 MBIn this episode of Dollars to Donuts I speak with Michele Marut who leads user experience research at CBRE Build. We discuss the curation of research repositories, using research to go beyond fixing things, and building processes and tools that can be used by researchers and people who do research. The philosophy is that the […] The post 23. Michele Marut of CBRE Build first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
22. Vicki Tollemache of Grubhub
June 27, 2019 19:37 - 57 minutes - 79.7 MBIn this episode of Dollars to Donuts I speak with Vicki Tollemache, the Director of UX Research at Grubhub. We discuss how to manage incoming research requests, running a weekly research session for testing designs, and why candidates should come into job interviews with a point of view about the company’s product. To me, researchers […] The post 22. Vicki Tollemache of Grubhub first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
21. Ruth Ellison of Digital Transformation Agency
June 15, 2019 15:52 - 57 minutes - 78.4 MBIn this episode of Dollars to Donuts I speak with Ruth Ellison, Head of User Research at DTA, the Digital Transformation Agency in Australia. We discuss the challenges of user research – and digital product development – in government, embedding researchers into product teams but maintaining a guild model to connect them, and how research […] The post 21. Ruth Ellison of Digital Transformation Agency first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
20. Leisa Reichelt of Atlassian (Part 2)
May 29, 2019 15:01 - 44 minutes - 61 MBThis episode of Dollars to Donuts is part 2 of my conversation with Leisa Reichelt of Atlassian. If you haven’t listened to part 1 yet, you can find it here. We talk about corporate versus government work, scaling research, and changing organizational DNA. I love research, I love the way that we learn things and […] The post 20. Leisa Reichelt of Atlassian (Part 2) first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
19. Leisa Reichelt of Atlassian (Part 1)
May 22, 2019 11:41 - 47 minutes - 65.2 MBThis episode of Dollars to Donuts features part 1 of my two-part conversation with Leisa Reichelt of Atlassian. We talk about educating the organization to do user research better, the limitations of horizontal products, and the tension between “good” and “bad” research. If you’re working on a product that has got some more foundational issues […] The post 19. Leisa Reichelt of Atlassian (Part 1) first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
18. Kathleen Asjes of Schibsted Media
April 26, 2019 01:16 - 1 hour - 86.9 MBThis episode of Dollars to Donuts features Kathleen Asjes of Schibsted Media. In our conversation, we talk about what happens when research need exceeds resources, the importance of keeping the knowledge inside the organization, and the benefit of diversity in a research team. It’s not so much about which university do I go to and […] The post 18. Kathleen Asjes of Schibsted Media first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
17. Tomer Sharon of Goldman Sachs
March 24, 2019 19:16 - 1 hour - 83.3 MBIn this episode of Dollars to Donuts, I talk with Tomer Sharon, the Head of User Research and Metrics at Goldman Sachs. We talk about how to assess potential hires for user research positions, infrastructure for capturing and searching a body of data, and developing a practice inside a willing, yet large, organization. Some parts […] The post 17. Tomer Sharon of Goldman Sachs first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
16. Marianne Berkovich of Glooko
March 06, 2019 01:38 - 50 minutes - 69.4 MBIn this episode of Dollars to Donuts, I speak with Marianne Berkovich, Head of User Research & Consumer Insights at Glooko. We talk about doing research through leadership changes, setting up opportunities for self-critique, and how to build empathy, especially in health technology, by experiencing some aspect of the condition and treatment yourself. It really […] The post 16. Marianne Berkovich of Glooko first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
15. Leanne Waldal of New Relic
February 14, 2019 23:06 - 1 hour - 84.1 MBWelcome back to Dollars to Donuts. This episode features Leanne Waldal, Senior Director of Product Research at New Relic. We talk about establishing research in an organization for the first time, building up a diverse set of research collaborators, and the pleasure of taking on certain types of challenges. I’ve seen hopeful examples in startups […] The post 15. Leanne Waldal of New Relic first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
14. Monal Chokshi of Lyft
May 10, 2016 12:42 - 1 hour - 30.5 MBIn the final episode of the season I speak with Monal Chokshi, Head of User Experience Research at Lyft. We discuss traditional paths to a user research career, creating routines for meeting different types of users, and the emergence of leadership roles in user research. The post 14. Monal Chokshi of Lyft first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
13. Kate Lawrence of EBSCO
April 26, 2016 12:19 - 1 hour - 35.6 MBIn this episode I speak with Kate Lawrence, Vice President of User Research at EBSCO Information Services. Our conversation covers where to place user research in the organization, emotions in fieldwork, and empowering others to advocate for information literacy. The post 13. Kate Lawrence of EBSCO first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
12. Pree Kolari of eBay
April 12, 2016 12:02 - 1 hour - 33.6 MBThis episode features Pree Kolari, the Senior Director of Design Strategy and Research at eBay. We talk about the career arc of a researcher, having impact on the product, and breaking down organizational walls. The post 12. Pree Kolari of eBay first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
11. Gabe Trionfi of Pinterest
March 15, 2016 13:17 - 1 hour - 35.8 MBThis episode features Gabe Trionfi, the Manager of Research at Pinterest. We discuss the evolution of user research, collaboration between disciplines and the journey versus the destination. The post 11. Gabe Trionfi of Pinterest first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
10. Elizabeth Kell of Comcast
March 01, 2016 12:25 - 54 minutes - 24.9 MBIn this episode I chat with Elizabeth Kell, the Senior Director of User Research at Comcast. We talk about the growth of Comcast's user research practice, essential soft skills for research candidates, and putting a human face on the people that use your products. The post 10. Elizabeth Kell of Comcast first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
9. Kavita Appachu of Kelley Blue Book
February 16, 2016 17:32 - 58 minutes - 26.8 MBToday I chat with Kavita Appachu, the Senior Manager of User Experience Research at Kelley Blue Book. She describes the different roles she's had in different organizations, moving from design to research, and explains the change effort underway at Kelley Blue Book. The post 9. Kavita Appachu of Kelley Blue Book first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
8. Aviva Rosenstein of DocuSign
February 02, 2016 12:18 - 56 minutes - 25.8 MBIn today's episode I speak with Aviva Rosenstein, the Senior Manager of User Experience Research at DocuSign. We explore how to make all types of research actionable, the benefit of doing your own recruiting, and the evolution from building a usability lab to having an in-house research capability. The post 8. Aviva Rosenstein of DocuSign first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
7. Judd Antin of Airbnb
January 19, 2016 19:16 - 1 hour - 37 MBWe kick off the second season with Judd Antin, the Director of Experience Research at Airbnb. Judd and I speak about their model for embedding talented generalists with product teams, skill-sharing among researchers, and just what exactly makes research "sexy." The post 7. Judd Antin of Airbnb first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
6. Carol Rossi of Edmunds.com
February 18, 2015 21:51 - 51 minutes - 23.7 MBToday's guest is Carol Rossi. She's the Senior Director of UX Research at Edmunds.com. In our conversation, we discuss her small-but-mighty team, Edmund.com's collaborative workplace culture, and the personal driver of "doing good." The post 6. Carol Rossi of Edmunds.com first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
5. Kerry McAleer-Forte of Sears Holdings
February 11, 2015 21:47 - 57 minutes - 26.4 MBToday's guest is Kerry McAleer-Forte, the Director of User Experience Research for Sears Holdings. We discuss how researchers need to think like storytellers, getting at the underlying need behind a research request, and the risk of using research to make recommendations. The post 5. Kerry McAleer-Forte of Sears Holdings first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
4. Nancy Frishberg of Financial Engines
January 28, 2015 21:44 - 58 minutes - 40.6 MBMy guest today is Nancy Frishberg, the manager of user research at Financial Engines. We discuss recruiting participants in an enterprise setting (where users are customers of your customers), finding the generative in the evaluative and how to think about collaborative workspace as entirely separate from reporting structure. The post 4. Nancy Frishberg of Financial Engines first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
3. Frances Karandy of Citrix
January 21, 2015 21:18 - 50 minutes - 29.3 MBToday’s guest is Frances Karandy, a senior manager within the Customer Experience Group at Citrix. We discuss doing product-focused research in a company with a large number of products, what to look for when hiring researchers, and how to select projects that not only support the business but also help team members to develop. The post 3. Frances Karandy of Citrix first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
2. Alex Wright of Etsy
January 14, 2015 21:12 - 53 minutes - 30.8 MBToday’s guest is Alex Wright, who is the director of research at Etsy. We discuss the partnership between qualitative and quantitative research at Etsy and how his background in journalism helps him with the storytelling aspects of managing the research function. The post 2. Alex Wright of Etsy first appeared on Portigal Consulting.
1. Gregg Bernstein of MailChimp
January 07, 2015 15:55 - 50 minutes - 34.9 MBWelcome to the debut episode of Dollars to Donuts. Today's guest is Gregg Bernstein, who manages customer research at MailChimp. We discuss how MailChimp uses research to uncover new product opportunities, how the right research artifacts can best provide value to different internal audiences and how humility is an essential soft skill for successful researchers. The post 1. Gregg Bernstein of MailChimp first appeared on Portigal Consulting.