Guidance library

Guidance and advice about how we plan and deliver user research in DfE.

These guidance articles have been written by experts across the DfE user research community, or by the Research Operations team.

We encourage and welcome feedback on any of this content: we want to add to and improve it over time. We're also actively looking for feedback on any article marked as 'beta'. Any article marked as 'in development' is still being produced, and may significantly change over time. Any article marked as 'coming soon' is currently being produced.

Any DfE user researcher can get involved in creating guidance content to support the community. Join a community initiative working group or interest group, or speak to your lead user researcher or the head of user research.

Ethical research and safeguarding

Guidance	Details	Status
Gaining informed consent	How to ensure fully informed consent from participants when our standard methods are not appropriate	Beta
Participant safeguarding	Advice on keeping particpants safe during research, and what to do if you have a safeguarding concern	Beta
Psychological safety and researcher self-care	Keeping yourself and your colleagues psychologically safe during and after research	Beta
Reducing burden on DfE's users	Ensuring we always use our users' time well, and don't create a burden	In development
Research with children and young people	Guidance and ideas to help you plan and conduct research with children and young people successfully, safely and ethically	Beta
Researching with internal users	Ethical risks and considerations when researching with colleagues and other internal staff	Published
Using social media in user research	Ethical considerations and constraints when using social media for user research	In development
Get further advice on research ethics questions	How to get answers to questions not covered on this website, from experienced DfE user researchers	Published

How to manage participants' personal data in user research

Guidance	Details	Status
Introduction to managing personal data in user research	How we meet UK GDPR law and high ethical standards when handling the personal data in user research	Published
What to do when planning a project or phase	Setting up file storage, risk assessing your data collection, and other activities to do before you begin research	Published
Collecting personal data during your research	What to do as you collect personal data in research sessions	Published
Using lists of people for participant recruitment	Building and managing lists of people, and using other data in the department, to recruit participants	Published
Anonymising UR personal data	Understanding anonymisation and pseudonymisation in user research, and guidance and tips for doing this	Published
After your research is finished	Knowing how to continue to manage personal data correctly after the end of a project or phase	Published

Inclusive research

Guidance	Details	Status
Inclusivity in user research	Why it is important to include all types of people in our research, and tips for doing this	Beta
Research with users with access needs	Planning and delivering research with people with access needs	Beta
Research with people who speak limited or no English and sign language users	Considerations and practical advice to plan and conduct user research with people who speak limited or no English, including sign language users.	Published

Planning user research

Guidance	Details	Status
Writing a user research plan	How to create an effective user research plan	Beta

Recruiting particpants for research

Guidance	Details	Status
Recruiting participants yourself (self-recruitment)	Rules and guidance for when doing your own participant recruitment	Beta
Using a commercial agency to recruit participants	How to access DfE's contracted commercial supplier, and other suppliers	Published
Using or building a recruitment panel to recruit participants	Rules and guidance for building and using participant recruitment panels in DfE	Beta
Paying incentives	How to decide whether to pay incentives to DfE particpants, and how to buy them	Beta

Recruiting user researchers into DfE (civil servants and contractors)

Guidance	Details	Status
Recruiting a user researcher for your team	Rules, support and templates for planning a recruitment campaign for a civil servant UR	Published
Managed service contractors and statements of work	Planning for success when bringing in managed service user researchers	In development

Surveys, survey tool and survey champions

Guidance	Details	Status
Surveys, survey tool and survey champions	Rules, support and templates for planning a recruitment campaign for a civil servant UR	Published

User research in the civil service

Guidance	Details	Status
Doing user research under the Civil Service code	Constraints and considerations that you must consider while delivering research in the civil service	Published
Researching in pre-election periods	What you must consider when conducting research in the weeks before an election	Beta

Working with a user researcher in your team

Guidance for delivery managers, and other team members working with a user researcher.

Guidance	Details	Status
What user researchers do	Understanding what user researchers do in DfE, and what they will bring to your team	Published