DRC — Dave's Research Co. — is based in Porto, Portugal and works with product teams across the globe, remotely and on-site.
The practice is built on a pragmatic view of awareness in product development: we must build clarity around the work with rigor to match the risk, insight to match the opportunity.
There is no one-size-fits-all answer to moving the team forward. There are, however, certain modes of learning well-suited to each of our different challenges and opportunities.
Dave's Research Co. helps teams work on strategy and product initiatives with the right tools for the job.
About Dave
I'm a practicing brown belt in Brazilian jiu-jitsu, amateur winemaker, and read avidly, 50-70 books each year. Many of them are good.
I view research as a focused learning practice aimed at doing things better. It asks for humility, rewards attention, and demands competent advocacy. Lately, my scope of awareness is broadening into visualization for strategy, and what it means for product teams to operate with the right level of contextual awareness.
In that vein, I build DRC as a vehicle for pointing the tools of research inwards, exploring how the larger product context is co-evolving with research.
In general, I'm fascinated by the creative process and the notion of skill. Most of my work and play is driven by larger questions:
- How do we make good things?
- How does that work when groups of people are involved?
- What does it mean to master a craft?
- How do we effectively teach and share our understanding?
Conference / Speaker Bio
Dave Hora is the founder of Dave's Research Co., helping teams build clarity and learning loops into product and design initiatives.
In 2011, he began as the first researcher at a mobile startup in San Francisco, then went on to work as the first researcher five more times, at companies including ResearchGate, PlanGrid, and Instacart. In 2020, Dave began consulting as DRC out of Porto, Portugal, and works with teams across the globe.
Dave writes a weekly newsletter on critical thinking and learning in the organization, occasionally turns rice into sake, and is a practicing brown belt in Brazilian jiu-jitsu.
Talk and Workshop Index:
- Our Discomfort with Research Democratization Podcast — October 2023, Scaling Research
- Re-integrating Research into Product and Design — Miro Design Talk (internal), August, 2023
- Research That Influences Workshop — Rosenfeld Media Advancing Research, March 2023
- Advice for Establishing Research — December 2022, Rosenfeld Media Advancing Research
- Research Ops: Research Skills Framework Workshop— May 2022, UX LX Conference
- A Research Skills Evolution — March 2021, Rosenfeld Media Advancing Research
- The Research Skills We Need to Succeed — February 2021, UXRConf Anywhere
- The Power of Pattern Language — September 2020, EuroIA Conference
- Working with the Research Skills Framework workshop — September 2020, UXinsight Festival (with Tomomi Sasaki)
- Tools for the Trek — February 2020, Interaction 20 Milan (w/ Tomomi Sasaki)
- Shaping Effective Research — October 2019, IXDA Berlin
- Elevating Design: Create a strategic plan to increase your impact — September 2019, EuroIA 19 (w/ Alissa Briggs)
- Considering Research: function & impact — June 2019, User Research London
- Research: Goal, role, having an impact — June 2019, Strive UX Research
- Lean Learning: Applied UX Research — October 2018, Develop Denver
- "Maps & Markers: enacting a strategy to transform your design team" — August 2018, Adaptive Path UX Week (w/ Alissa Briggs)
- Lean Learning: Applied Product Research — May 2017, NASDAQ's "The Center"
- UX Research for Live Products — January 2015, ConveyUX
