UX Ops: Hiring
How Might We Standardize UX Hiring?
The UX team was growing fast, which meant more people were being pulled into interviews without a consistent basis for evaluation. Interviewers brought their own instincts; panels varied in what they assessed.
Without shared rubrics, defensible decisions about candidate fit were hard to make. Stakeholder interviews and literature reviews helped me surface what the organization actually valued at each level—and build that shared understanding into the guides.
| My Role | One of three researchers on UX ops; I created the interview guidelines and co-led new hire onboarding. |
|---|---|
| Timeline | 4 months (2020–2021) |
| Methods | Literature reviews, Stakeholder interviews, Archival data analysis (previous job postings), Post-launch evaluation |
| Deliverables |
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| Tools Used | Miro, MaxQDA, Microsoft Word |
| Company | Sam’s Club |
|---|---|
| Stakeholders | Research & Experience Strategy, Design, Content Design |
| Outcomes |
Hiring process standardized
Research team grew from 7 to 13 members
20+ designers hired using the standardized rubrics
|
From Job Posting Audits to Post-Launch Evaluation
Job Posting Audit
I gathered recent job postings and conducted a thematic analysis to identify patterns and gaps using MaxQDA. Those themes turned into sticky notes on Miro, as shown below:
Work board of interview rubric development based on job posting audit, stakeholder interviews, and literature reviews and competitive analysis
Literature Reviews
To incorporate best practices, I read The Ideal Team Player by Patrick Lencioni, recommended by the Head of Design & Research; reviewed other companies' hiring processes and online posts of job interview experiences; and examined Walmart’s intern interview guides. Walmart’s intern interview guides focused on candidate qualities other than skillset; and some of the example questions were applicable to higher-level candidates.
Stakeholder Interviews
To assess the hiring process, I interviewed all design and research team leads. Each team’s process differed slightly, and their input shaped a consistent, structured interview framework. I also interviewed senior ICs for technical aspects.
I uncovered what qualities they valued most and discussed at which stage each attribute should be assessed.
Synthesis across stakeholder interviews, literature reviews, and job posting audit, organized by candidate attribute and seniority tier
Post-Launch Evaluation
When the guidelines and rubrics were launched, I gathered questions and feedback from interviewers and revised the documents accordingly.
Key Candidate Attributes
Common Attributes Across All Disciplines
I structured the analysis by seniority tier: junior to senior IC (×3 & ×4), lead to principal IC (×5 & ×6), and senior manager I & II (×5 & ×6 people manager), across design, content design, and research. The following themes emerged across all disciplines.
Discipline-Specific Attributes
Standardized Hiring Process and Interview Guides
Standardized Hiring Process
Standardized interview process, with a qualifying 1:1 added for research candidates before panel building
Interview Guides
Synthesizing the findings, I created detailed, role-specific interview guides for design, content design, and research roles, covering junior to principal ICs and people managers. Each set includes desired skills, associated questions, and what to look for during the 2nd and 3rd round interviews. These sets were reviewed by team leads and then deployed to job interviews for pilot testing.
Excerpt from one of the interview guides: small group or 1:1 peer interview rubrics (designer ×3/4) covering how candidates handle conflicts, humility, hunger, and people-smartness
Onboarding Process Map with Timeline
Three of us mapped the onboarding process and associated timeline. We also adopted a buddy program from Walmart and pilot tested it with a new hire.
A Rapidly Scaling UX Organization
The hiring framework drove measurable growth across the UX organization:
- The interview guides were quickly adopted across the full UX org as the team was growing rapidly: 9 sets covering the second and third rounds were created for design, content design, and research roles.
- Our onboarding flow with clear timelines and tasks guided hiring managers, reducing delays and setting new hires up for success from day one.
- The research team grew from 7 to 13 members during this period, with the interview guides supporting consistent evaluation throughout the expansion.
- 20+ designers were hired using the standardized rubrics, ensuring alignment across disciplines and seniority levels.
Designing for the Interviewer, Not Just the Process
This was my first ResearchOps project, and it started with a personal experience: I was asked to interview a designer candidate with no guidance, no rubric, and no preparation materials. I did not feel confident or know what the team was actually looking for. That experience inspired me to bring hiring process standardization to the UX Ops discussions and lead the work.
The literature reviews and stakeholder interviews surfaced a lot of qualities teams valued in candidates. So I prioritized them, decided at which stage they could be evaluated, and fitted each session’s guide on one page. The guides became comprehensive enough to serve as a starting point for career development frameworks—something the team had identified as a recurring gap in annual associate work experience surveys.