Forward Deployed UX Researcher

Company Description

Job Description

As a Forward Deployed UX Researcher/Designer, you will embed directly with our customers in the field to understand in detail their mission and how they evaluate continuous readiness. You will do that through a deep understanding of the end-user's jobs, problems, needs, and friction to achieve their goals. You turn this understanding into a product direction and work with other forward-deployed roles to design and develop innovative AI-native solutions to create a 10x better way of satisfying customer needs, instantly. . This is a highly collaborative, fast-paced, customer-facing role where you own the discovery work end-to-end—from framing the question to delivering insights that direct what we deliver.

To succeed in this role, you are a curious and rigorous problem solver who values outcomes over process, exercises exceptional judgment when balancing competing priorities, and thrives in ambiguous, high-stakes, empowered environments.

This role is a full-time position located out of our office in Arlington, VA / Pittsburgh, PA / San Francisco, CA / Anywhere in the US.

This role may require up to 75% travel.

Scope of Responsibilities

• Partner with other forward-deployed roles (engineers, data scientists) to scope research, frame hypotheses, and translate findings into 0-to-1 product initiatives and prototypes.
• Run fast, pragmatic research: contextual inquiry, interviews, usability sessions, and concept tests against working prototypes.
• Assess, prioritize, and help correct the most important gaps in solutions under development based on what you hear from users.
• Synthesize quickly, share insights early, and iterate—learn fast, adjust, and go again.
• Work with core platform researchers, designers, and product managers to distill what’s customer-specific and what needs to become part of our core offering.

Qualifications

• U.S. Citizenship is required

• Bachelor’s degree in Human-Computer Interaction, Psychology, Design, a related field, or equivalent practical experience.
• Worked in a startup or entrepreneurial environment.
• Experience conducting applied UX or product research in a professional setting, including planning studies and synthesizing findings independently.
• Strong command of qualitative methods (interviews, contextual inquiry, usability testing) and comfort with mixed-methods work.
• Ability to work independently with minimal supervision and a strong desire to work in a challenging, fast-paced environment.
• Excellent communication skills—able to tell a clear, compelling story with research and influence cross-functional partners.
• Experience in AIND to generate prototypes and validate

Desired Skills:

• A current U.S. security clearance, or the ability to obtain one with Air’s sponsorship.
• Experience researching complex, domain-heavy, or enterprise software, ideally in defense, government, or other regulated settings.
• Experience working within the boundaries of a federally accredited software environment.
• Experience in a customer-facing, consulting, or embedded role.