Episode #55: Making UX Research and Collaboration Work Together with Johnathan Le

A strong UX proposal still has to survive business priorities, engineering capacity, and a real release date. In Episode #55, Johnathan Le, Senior UX Designer at Appian, explains how designers can research user needs while building productive relationships with product managers and developers. His advice is practical: make users comfortable enough to be candid, study patterns in their feedback, and negotiate what the team can ship.

What you'll learn

• How Johnathan moved from graphic design into UX

• Why visual polish is only one part of a usable product

• How to create a more comfortable usability session

• Why senior designers expand their influence by supporting others

• How UX, product, and engineering can negotiate phased solutions

Treat graphic design and UX as different jobs

Johnathan studied graphic design in college and initially knew little about technology. A classmate introduced him to UX as a field, and a usability course showed him how data could inform design decisions. During a visual design internship at a software company, he asked the UX director for UX tasks that he could add to his experience. He then practiced interviews, built a portfolio with three case studies, and secured his first UX role at Cvent.

He had also applied to Appian after a cousin referred him, but the available position was a consulting role. Johnathan wanted to use his design education, so he chose Cvent while staying in contact with the Appian recruiter. When a UX opening appeared a year later, that relationship helped him return as a candidate.

Johnathan is clear that graphic design did not prepare him for every part of UX. Visual skill transferred, but the objectives were different. Graphic design often needs to market a product or service and attract attention. UX design is concerned with building a product that works well enough for people to adopt and continue using it. At his first job, he discovered that UX involved far more than creating mockups in design software.

Expand influence without leaving individual contribution

As a senior UX designer, Johnathan remained an individual contributor, but his sphere of influence had widened. He was no longer focused only on supporting one sprint team or completing his own work. He mentored other UX designers, managed interns during the summer, and helped people around him stay productive and motivated. He was considering a management path, while acknowledging that he might later prefer a principal designer path.

The larger lesson is that seniority changes the scope of responsibility. A senior designer can improve outcomes by helping junior designers grow and by supporting teams beyond an assigned project. This depends on relationships, not title alone. When Johnathan started a new job, he committed to building a good foundation with product managers and becoming a reliable point of contact for developers. He describes stronger cross-functional work as an improvement built through daily effort rather than an overnight change in design ability.

Create conditions for honest user feedback

Johnathan has used surveys and usability tests to understand users. Both methods can take time. He reviews responses and notes, looks for patterns shared by multiple participants, and thinks critically about how those patterns should inform a product decision. Research is not finished when a session ends; the analysis is where separate observations become evidence the team can use.

Before starting tasks with a new participant, Johnathan tries to build rapport. He might ask about the person's day or the meeting they just left instead of moving immediately into the script. He also says that negative feedback will not hurt his feelings and explains that candid reactions will help improve the product. During screen-based tasks, he asks participants to voice their thoughts as they proceed.

These small choices address a common research problem: participants may try to be polite. A welcoming introduction, explicit permission to criticize, and a think-aloud prompt can lower that barrier. The goal is not to pressure someone into negativity. It is to make clear that honest confusion or dislike is useful research evidence.

Negotiate across user, business, and delivery needs

Johnathan identifies alignment among product managers, UX designers, and developers as one of the job's hardest daily challenges. Each discipline brings a different focus. Product managers face business goals and leadership pressure. UX designers advocate for users and contribute product and design practices. Developers manage time, capacity, and what can be completed before a release deadline.

When those constraints conflict, Johnathan may propose increments or a reduced version of the experience so the team can release something before an important date. That is not the same as allowing a product manager to dictate a design. He describes the relationship as a partnership: a PM may prioritize and identify the problem, then PM and UX work together to refine the specification, UX requirements, and solution. Developers add the delivery constraints that make the plan real.

This partnership was once Johnathan's weakness. Early at Cvent, he did not understand the product manager's role and questioned why that person was telling him what to do. Trial and error taught him what works with different PMs. He turned that uncertainty into an ability to collaborate, negotiate, and find an approach suited to each working relationship.

Listen to Episode #55 for a grounded discussion of how UX designers can invite candid research feedback and build the partnerships needed to ship it.