21819 - User Researcher


Company:	Ministry of Justice
Salary:	£42,914 to £53,081 a year
Hours:	Full-time
Location:	National, NP10 8FZ
Working pattern:	Hybrid - 2 days remote
Job type:	Permanent
Posting date:	2 Sept 2026
Closing date:	19 Sept 2026

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Summary

Introduction:

HM Courts & Tribunals Service is an agency of the Ministry of Justice. We support the running of courts and tribunals and their administration to ensure that justice can be delivered. We work on crucial services across family, civil, tribunals and crime. Our work plays a vital role to the delivery of justice, and covers a wide range of users from staff, judges to vulnerable users going through life changing legal procedures.

We are looking for talented people to join our existing team of exceptional researchers with our challenging, important and rewarding work.

We are part of HMCTS Digital and Technology Services (DTS), a specialist technology directorate which provides support to HMCTS in the use of IT and Digital.

DTS is committed to being a great place to work and part of our offer is brilliant training opportunities and support from expert colleagues. As well as that you’ll find flexible working, an inclusive cultureand a place where your opinion is valued.

Please follow the link below for further information about HMCTS. www.gov.uk/government/organisations/hm-courts-and-tribunals-service

Job Description:

We are redesigning and rebuilding services around the needs of users. These changes cover digital services but also include the physical location and environment of courts and our telephony services.

The User Research team’s current focus is producing, through primary research, actionable insights that inform and then validate the organisation’s user experience design. The team also helps maintain fundamental design principles of being user led and adopts agile ways of working and continuous improvement in the delivery of transformed HMCTS services and products.

The team is made up of user researchers with a passion for driving the design and development of user experiences that fulfil HMCTS’s goal of being user-focused and evidence driven. Your research will touch on the lives of every type of citizen as well as a range of other users such as legal professionals and judges.

Key Responsibilities:

You will be responsible for planning and carrying out user research activities, embedded in a multidisciplinary team. This will include:

• Work independently on a multi-disciplinary team to design, plan and carry out research.

• Conduct user research using a range of research methods, selecting the appropriate method depending on the requirements of the programme.

• Source and procure participants and facilities to conduct user research activities, specifying requirements for user testing groups

• Test high level and specific aspects of a service, presenting research findings to help gain consensus and take action based on research findings.

• Generate new and useful insights related to HMCTS users for the project team and ensure where relevant that the insights influence design decisions.

• Communicate the insights gained from user research outputs to both the project team and wider stakeholders, helping to enhance organisational understanding of the users and drive decisions and actionable recommendations.

• Maintain and develop relationships across the product teams, guiding the team in understanding research findings and insights.

• Work within agile project teams, providing, to the team, a focus on user centred design.

• Be an advocate for research and user centred design within your team, using evidence drawn from data and research analysis to represent the user in product and design discussions

You will be required to work in a flexible way and undertake any other duties reasonably requested by line management which are commensurate with the grade and level of responsibility of this post.

Essential Criteria:

To be successful in this post you will need to demonstrate the following:

• Demonstrable experience of conducting primary public-facing qualitative research, gained through a research role (such as market, social or user research)

• Experience of using the appropriate research methods to generate specific insights into user behaviour and needs

• Strong research and analytical skills, the ability to analyse multiple sources of data to produce clear recommendations and actionable insights

• Understanding of user-centred design principles and tools

• Experience of building and reaching consensus with stakeholders and working to improve stakeholder relationships using evidence

The below criteria are desirable only. These will not be assessed throughout the recruitment process, but will be used in the event of tied scores between candidates

Desirable Criteria:

• Experience helping teams design and deliver accessible services that work for all users, and effectively including all kinds of users in research;

• Experience managing, executing and analysing usability test sessions

• Research experience in an agile development environment with user-centred design teams, designers and developers creating new digital products and services

• Experience of working with the courts and tribunals service, in the legal community or justice sector

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