Research Operations Playbook
This project focused on designing a comprehensive operating model for how teams engage with research and insights. The challenge was to reduce inefficiency, improve collaboration, and increase the strategic impact of research across the organisation.
Context and brief
Stakeholders often approached research teams with unclear or poorly defined requests, leading to inefficiencies, misaligned expectations, and sub-optimal outcomes. There was also inconsistency in how research was scoped, executed, and delivered.
Objective
Create a clear and scalable operating model that standardized workflows, improved stakeholder engagement, gave Insight Leads clear expectations and timelines for their stakeholders and increased the impact of research outputs.
Role and responsibilities
I designed and documented the research operations playbook, drawing on real project experience and existing best practices.
This included defining how stakeholders should engage with research teams, how projects should be structured, and how insights should be delivered and used.
We also created an 'analytics cookbook' to ensure consistency in survey design, statistical analysis, and reporting standards.
Approach
The playbook was structured around the full research lifecycle, from initial problem definition through to delivery and impact.
I introduced a formal briefing process to ensure all projects started with a clear understanding of the business problem, objectives, and success criteria.
I also defined standard workflows, timelines, and collaboration models, including guidance on how to scope projects, engage stakeholders early, and align on expectations.
On the analytics side, I incorporated standardized approaches to statistical testing, weighting, and data quality, ensuring consistency and rigor across projects.
Output
A comprehensive research operations playbook including workflows, process documentation, templates, stakeholder guidance, and analytical standards.
As well as a stakeholder facing deck that detailed what they could expect from our team regarding timelines and outputs depending on the project type and the tools we used.
Impact
Since implementation, project lead times have decreased by 20% and team sentiment regarding administrative burden has significantly improved.
More importantly, cross-departmental stakeholders now have a clearer understanding of how to engage with the insight function, leading to higher strategic alignment.
Stakeholder feedback about our team through our regular survey also improved by approx. 15%