The document discusses the importance of conducting experience gap research to understand how underrepresented groups experience products and services. It notes that qualitative research should be done with specific underrepresented populations to identify gaps in user experiences and determine what elements may help or harm these groups. Conducting such research can help companies identify and address harmful features, diversify user data, and benchmark current experiences. The document provides guidance on properly planning and conducting experience gap research, including forming clear questions, defining the target population, diversifying research teams, recognizing unconscious biases, and ensuring issues found are addressed.

5. Across all of our projects, we
practice inclusive recruiting to ensure
we’re including a diverse group of
participants in every study.
But this is only the first step.
We believe inclusive research
is a critical piece of every
product development
lifecycle
5

6. @AnswerLab I #ALevents
Do you know how
underrepresented groups
experience your product or service?
Does it help them?
Does it harm them?
6

7. @AnswerLab I #ALevents 7
Harmful Product
Experiences
An older woman is catfished on a
popular dating app. She feels so
much shame she tells no one, even
though there were no safeguards in
place in the app to protect her.
Black guests of a hospitality
company are refused
lodging because of racism.
Young women hide their
gender when gaming so they
don’t experience harassment
by the men on the platform.
Black students are not “seen”
by facial recognition AI in their
classroom’s meeting software.

8. 8
And recently...Slack’s DM feature
Source: Twitter
How it started How it’s going
Source: The Verge

9. @AnswerLab I #ALevents
Do you know how
underrepresented groups
experience your product or service?
Does it help them?
Does it harm them?
9

10. @AnswerLab I #ALevents
Experience Gap Research
10
Qualitative research with a specific, underrepresented
population to understand their user experience of your
product or service.
Benefits
● Identify gaps in your current product experience
to see what elements may harm or help a specific
underrepresented population
● Create compassion and generate ideas for the needs,
goals, and challenges of the underrepresented population
● Identify and address harmful or offensive features,
content, or imagery before launch
● Diversify your user data
● Benchmark the current experience of your product
for an underrepresented group

11. @AnswerLab I #ALevents
Our Recent Experience Gap
Research
11
People we spoke with
● Youth on the autism spectrum
● Low-technology populations
● Female gamers
● BIPOC employee experiences
● Black and Latinx small businesses owners
How might we…
● Determine if there’s an experience gap for first-
generation Latinx credit card applicants who want
to apply for a credit card?
● Understand if Black investors who identify as
women can build wealth using current investment
tools?
“What challenges might Black and Latinx
small business owners face when using
our product?"
“How might we understand the social gaming
experience for those who identify as women?"

12. @AnswerLab I #ALevents 12
Experience Gap Research Inclusive and Diverse Recruiting
Questions
● How does this population experience this product?
● What do they like about it?
● What concerns do they have?
● What impact does the current experience have
on their goals?
Any study
Research methods Qualitative methods- exploratory or validation
Product (Stimuli)
Live product or prototype of the experience - a specific task
flow with a clear start and end point.
Research participants
A study made up entirely of individuals that who are in the
target audience and who identify with one specific
underrepresented identity
Study Example:
● Target audience: First-Time Homebuyers
● Specific identity: Asian-Americans
A study that includes a mix of individuals who
are in the target audience and who identify
with one or more identities that are
Study Example:
● Target audience: First-Time Homebuyers
● Identities: 2 out of 6 are African-
American, 1 identify as LatinX, Half
identify are identities that are not male,
and half live in rural areas.
When
When you need to understand your users (exploration)
When you need to validate designs (validation)
Every study

13. @AnswerLab I #ALevents
Why DEI Research: U.S. dominant culture “centers”
specific identities so much that we all have biases that
promote and reinforce these identities over “others.”
13
Marginalized, underrepresented,
and de-centered “others:”
• People of color
• Feminine
• Non-Binary
• Transgender
• Differently-abled
• LGBTQIA+
• Non-Citizen
• Muslim, Hindu, Jewish, Sikh, and non-
Christian faiths
• Community-oriented
U.S. Dominant Culture:
● White
● Masculine
● Cis-gender
● Able-bodied
● Straight
● U.S. Citizen
● Christian
● Youthful
● Slim/fit
● Individualist

14. @AnswerLab I #ALevents 14

15. @AnswerLab I #ALevents 15
- Journalist Kara Swisher referring to heads of technology platforms
“The leaders of these companies have
never felt unsafe a day in their life.
“

16. @AnswerLab | #ALEvents
Diving into the
Experience Gap
16

17. @AnswerLab I #ALevents 17
Place Image here
How to
conduct experience
gap research
1 Do your homework
2 Formulate clear questions
3
Fully understand and define the
underrepresented target audience to recruit
4 Be intentional about diversifying your team
5 Learn to recognize unconscious bias
6
Ensure issues that are uncovered are added to
the backlog and addressed

18. @AnswerLab I #ALevents 18
Your participants are not there to educate you on who they are or how
the population experiences the dominant culture.
“Tell me what it’s like to be a person
who identifies as Trans? What are
your big challenges?”
✅ Google
“What is it like to be a Trans person?”
before you conduct research and begin
your OWN learning process before
speaking to anyone who identifies.
1. Do your homework

19. @AnswerLab I #ALevents 19
2. Formulate clear research questions
Define the product experience you’d like to
research.
An experience is an explicit set of steps with a clear
start and stop point that a user must go through to
complete a task.
Examples of product experiences:
● Sign-up/registration
● Onboarding
● Core tasks of playing, posting, searching, and finding
● Changing profile
● Seeking help
● Canceling service
Example research questions to identify and understand the Experience Gap
● How do members of the underrepresented group feel about the product experience?
● What do they find valuable? What do they find concerning?
● What assumptions are present in the product experience that this group’s understanding challenges?
● What is a better product experience to address their concerns?

20. @AnswerLab I #ALevents
3. Fully understand and
define the underrepresented
population to recruit
20
All research participants in one research cohort
(group) need to identify as one identity group.
All participants in the study identify as the
population who’s experience you are trying to
understand.
This recruit is intentionally different from a diverse
recruit that relies on a mix of identities so you can
understand individuals with one identities
experience.
The screener should reflect this definition and allow
a participant to choose how they identify.
Target Audience
Members of Specific
Underrepresented Pop
Who you speak with in
Experience Gap Research

21. @AnswerLab I #ALevents 21
Make sure the screener
language matches the
population’s identity
language
Example Racial/Ethnic Identity: Black
Is that Foundational
Black American?
Or
First generation
African-American immigrant?
Have VERY different
experiences and challenges
ETHNICITY: We are always trying to hear from many kinds of
people with different backgrounds and points of view. If
you are comfortable sharing, please tell me now which
race/ethnicity (if any) do you identify with?
❏ Caucasian or White (for example, German, Irish, Italian,
Polish, French, etc.)
❏ Hispanic / Latina/ Latino/ Latinx or South or Central American
(for example, Mexican, or Mexican American, Puerto Rican,
Cuban, Salvadoran, Dominican, Colombian, etc.)
❏ African American, African or Black (for example, African
American, Jamaican Haitian, Nigerian, Ethiopian,
Somalian, etc.)
❏ American Indian or Alaska Native (for example, Navajo Nation,
Blackfeet Tribe, Mayan, Aztec, Native Village or Barrow Inupiat
Traditional Government, Nome Eskimo Community, etc.)
❏ Asian (for example, Chinese, Filipino, Asian Indian,
Vietnamese, Korean, Japanese, etc.)
❏ Middle Eastern or North African (for example, Lebanese,
Iranian, Egyptian, Syrian, Moroccan, Algerian, etc.)
❏ Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander (for example, Native
Hawaiian, Samoan, Chamorro, Tongan, Fijian, Marshallese, etc.)
❏ Other race, ethnicity, or origin: ___________
❏ I identify with more than one of the above
❏ Prefer not to say

22. @AnswerLab I #ALevents
4. Be intentional about diversifying your team
22
Strong teams are made up of individuals with various backgrounds, perspectives and lived experiences. Creating an inclusive
product experience requires diversity of thought.
Simply put, your internal team should mirror the wide variety of customers you serve.
Seek out candidates whose experience differs from the majority:
● do not fall into the trap of there being “a pipeline problem”
● seek out and welcoming team members who identify differently
● expand where you look for new team members—and insist your recruiting partners do the same

23. @AnswerLab I #ALevents 23
5. Learn to recognize unconscious bias
Affinity bias
Make sure that you’re not agreeing with or showcasing a participant's feedback because they are like you or you like
them.
Focus on asking the same questions of everyone in the same tone and manner so you collect data regardless of your
opinion of them. Use caution with improvisation and don't share any harmful assumptions with the participant.
1
Confirmation bias
2
Don’t discount a participant’s response if they express themselves in a way you don’t like or prefer.
Attribution bias
3
Do not promote or hold any participant’s feedback and observations as “better” than others, especially those that provide
soundbites in the manner of the dominant culture, simply because you think they may be more acceptable to the team.
Halo bias
4
Do not downplay or dismiss feedback by participants who you may not like or may not be like you.
Horns effect
5

24. @AnswerLab I #ALevents 24
6. Ensure issues that are uncovered are
added to the backlog and addressed
Capture and highlight
participant feedback of how
the experience gap affects
them and makes them feel.
Don’t be afraid to share blue-
sky solutions or suggestions.
Ensure your team has
visibility into the experience
gap study results by adding
the issues found to the
backlog
Provide short-term,
actionable tasks to enable
product teams to make
small, but meaningful
changes.
Ask for accountability on
who will take on resolving
larger issues, track the
recommended changes
and next steps, and follow
up with the team regularly.
Make sure these users’
voices are heard.

25. @AnswerLab I #ALevents 25
How do I get my
stakeholders on board?

26. @AnswerLab I #ALevents
Start with your internal commitments
26

27. @AnswerLab I #ALevents
How to build a business case
27

28. @AnswerLab I #ALevents
Acknowledge the default
28

29. @AnswerLab I #ALevents
Outline the benefits
29
Gather unique perspectives from
users with varied backgrounds and
lived experiences
Uncover features that may
harm or unintentionally exclude
certain users
Avoid potentially launching a
product containing culturally
insensitive elements

30. @AnswerLab I #ALevents 30
Present the
options

31. @AnswerLab I #ALevents
Create an Implementation Plan
31
Clarify product goals Delve into your options
and create an outline
Determine resources needed Engage your stakeholders

32. @AnswerLab I #ALevents 32
Navigating fragility and resistance
The best way to approach resistance is to lean into it with inquiry. Ask questions to help address
this resistance and the why behind the research.
Encourage your stakeholders to have a dialogue around resistance will help all of you uncover
potential roadblocks and create a collective path forward.
Lean on your internal DEI staff and resources to work through instances of defensiveness or
denial that feel pervasive.