One of the most valuable UX lessons I learned didn't come from a usability test, analytics dashboard, or stakeholder meetings. It came from working customer service jobs while I was in college.
Whenever there was a problem with a website, process, or product, customer service knew about it first. Customers called to complain. They called when they were confused. They called when they couldn't find information. They called when something didn't work.
By the time a problem reached management, customer service representatives had often heard about it hundreds of times.
Years later, while leading UX research for a statewide workers' compensation website redesign, I remembered that lesson.
As part of the research effort, I conducted stakeholder interviews, usability testing, and information architecture studies. But I also spent time talking with customer service representatives who answered calls from injured workers and employers every day.
I conducted much of my usability testing near the customer service team and often brought baked goods as a small thank-you for their time and insights. Those conversations proved to be some of the most valuable research activities of the entire project.
During one conversation, a representative told me something I have never forgotten: "No one has ever come out to talk to us before."
That comment stopped me.
These employees spoke with users every day. They heard the questions, frustrations, and recurring problems firsthand. Yet no one had previously asked them what they were learning from those interactions.
The experience reinforced something I had learned years earlier while working customer service jobs myself: the people answering the phones often know more about user pain points than anyone else in the organization.
The representatives immediately identified issues that weren't obvious from analytics or stakeholder discussions.
They knew which forms confused people. They knew which processes generated the most questions. They knew which website pages people couldn't find. Most importantly, they understood the real-world challenges users faced long before those issues appeared in reports or metrics.
One conversation has stayed with me for years: Several customer service representatives told me that injured workers would call after receiving official letters and ask the representative to read the letter to them and explain what it meant.
At first, I was surprised.
The letters had been written by professionals and contained all the required information. But the representatives explained that many callers struggled to understand the language, terminology, and process descriptions.
That insight changed how I thought about the project.
The challenge wasn't simply making information available.
The challenge was making information understandable.
As researchers and designers, we often assume that if content is accurate, users will be able to use it. But customer service representatives reminded me that understanding is just as important as accuracy.
Now, when starting a new UX project, one of the first groups I want to talk to is customer service:
And sometimes they uncover problems that no usability test, analytics dashboard, or stakeholder meeting would ever reveal on its own.
If your organization has a customer service team, don't wait until the end of a project to involve them. Talk to them early.
They may already know exactly what your users need.
And don't forget to bring donuts. It turns out they're a pretty good research tool.
Open to contract UX research opportunities.
Email: theresaw@columbus.rr.com
LinkedIn: theresa-wilkinson