Self-care for user researchers with Jane Reid and Janice Hannaway

Design Feeling

#009 - If you’re a user researcher, you probably put your users first. But maybe it’s time to put yourself first. In this episode, user researcher and former civil servant Jane Reid and user researcher and psychodynamic therapist Janice Hannaway stress the need for self-care in user research. User researchers working in complex areas such as homelessness, drug abuse and domestic violence, user researchers can experience vicarious trauma. Too often, this is not addressed properly or even spoken about. With almost 50 years of experience between them, Jane and Janice share their stories of working in these areas and their advice on how to look out for symptoms of trauma. We also talk about ways to maintain your wellbeing through self-care routines, respecting organisational boundaries and being aware of transference.
In this episode:

• What is self-care for user researchers?
• Why there’s not much talk of self care for user researchers?
• What to do when your work conflicts with your values
• How do you know when you need self-care?
• Establishing a self-care routine
• Accepting what you’re feeling and identifying the cause for it
• Believing that you’ve done your best
• Impact of remote working on research

Shownotes

Join Jane and Janice for a fireside chat on Thursday 7th April 2022
www.designfeeling.co/fireside
ResearchU
https://researchutraining.com/
Self-care in user research
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/exposure-others-trauma-toxic-jane-reid/
Sex and/or gender — working together to get the question right
https://blogs.gov.scot/digital/2018/07/05/sex-and-or-gender-working-together-to-get-the-question-right/
Contacting Jane Reid
https://twitter.com/janereid73
https://www.linkedin.com/in/jane-reid-1bbb9196/
Contacting Janice Hannaway
https://twitter.com/jahconsultancy
https://www.linkedin.com/in/janice-hannaway-24366a8b/
Credits
Illustrations by Isa Vicente
https://www.instagram.com/isadezgz/
Music by Brad Porter
https://prtr.co/
Episode edited by Niall Mackay
https://sevenmillionbikes.com/

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Kapitel

1. Intro (00:00:00)

2. Jane's journey into self-care for user researchers (00:02:42)

3. Janice's journey from psychodynamic therapist to user researcher (00:04:43)

4. What does self-care in user research mean? (00:07:34)

5. Working of products or policies your values don't align with (00:21:59)

6. Janice and Jane's self-care routines (00:36:38)

7. Challenges with working from home (00:38:59)

8. Be aware of the transference (00:42:50)

9. Janice and Jane's message to humanity (00:49:07)