The Research Operations Program Manager will oversee UX research systems, manage stakeholder alignment, handle participant recruitment, and ensure research data compliance, while building scalable processes for effective insight activation.
We are looking for a Research Operations Program Manager to build and scale the systems that enable UX Research to operate with speed, quality, compliance, and product impact. This role sits at the intersection of research, product, data, legal, operations, IT, and vendor ecosystems.
The right person will be a strong cross-functional operator who can manage complex stakeholder relationships, understand how research moves through the organization, and turn fragmented workflows into durable systems. They will own the operational backbone of research: participant recruitment, vendor programs, research data governance, feedback pipelines, insight systems, and the mechanisms that help research drive product action.
In this role, you will...
- Build and maintain the core systems, workflows, dashboards, documentation, and playbooks that support UX Research at scale.
- Identify operational gaps across study intake, participant recruiting, data handling, feedback triage, and insight activation.
- Create repeatable processes that help researchers work faster, more consistently, and with less operational friction.
- Partner closely with Research, Product, Design, Legal, Ops, IT, BizApps, Data, Support, and external vendors.
- Manage stakeholder alignment, resource coordination, communication of process changes, ownership transitions, and operational risk.
- Build strong working knowledge of partner team workflows and use that understanding to connect people, systems, and decisions across the organization.
- Own participant recruitment operations across internal and external participant pools.
- Manage research vendors, recruitment platforms, fieldwork partners, participant databases, scheduling workflows, and self-service recruiting processes.
- Improve recruitment speed, quality, reliability, and compliance while ensuring researchers can access the right participants for the right studies.
- Build and manage the systems that convert customer feedback and research findings into structured, visible, and actionable product signals.
- Support feedback pipelines, dashboards, tagging taxonomies, AI-enabled classification, research repositories, and insight tracking workflows.
- Help ensure that insights do not remain passive documentation, but are connected to owners, decisions, follow-up actions, or product calls to action.
- Manage workflows for PII, restricted research data, consent artifacts, NDAs, access control, and data retention.
- Partner with Legal, Privacy, IT, Security, BizApps, and research stakeholders to ensure research data is handled responsibly.
- Maintain clear documentation for data ownership, system access, compliance expectations, and operational handoffs.
1. Research Operations Infrastructure
2. Cross-Functional Program Management
3. Participant Recruitment, Vendor, and Panel Operations
4. Customer Feedback and Insight Operations
5. Research Data Governance and Compliance
Qualifications
- 4+ years of experience in program management, research operations, UX operations, product operations, technical program management, or a related field.
- Experience managing cross-functional programs across research, product, data, legal, operations, IT, or external vendor teams.
- Working knowledge of UX Research workflows, including participant recruitment, study operations, data handling, and insight delivery.
- Experience building scalable processes, tools, dashboards, documentation, or operational systems.
- Strong stakeholder management, communication, and organizational skills.
- Sound judgment in handling sensitive data, participant information, privacy, and compliance-related workflows.
Bonus Qualifications
- Experience working in a UX Research, Human Factors, Product Experience, or Product Research organization.
- Experience with research vendors, participant panels, research repositories, feedback systems, or insight operations.
- Familiarity with tools such as Looker, Salesforce Data Cloud, Jira, Confluence, Figma, UserInterviews, Fieldwork, or similar systems.
- Experience with AI-enabled feedback classification, tagging taxonomies, dashboards, or customer feedback pipelines.
- Experience in autonomous vehicles, robotics, mobility, AI products, or other complex technical product environments.
- Ability to “speak research, product, and systems” — connecting researcher needs, product decisions, and operational infrastructure.
About Zoox
Zoox is developing the first ground-up, fully autonomous vehicle fleet and the supporting ecosystem required to bring this technology to market. Sitting at the intersection of robotics, machine learning, and design, Zoox aims to provide the next generation of mobility-as-a-service in urban environments. We’re looking for top talent that shares our passion and wants to be part of a fast-moving and highly execution-oriented team.
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Accommodations
If you need an accommodation to participate in the application or interview process please reach out to [email protected] or your assigned recruiter.
A Final Note:
You do not need to match every listed expectation to apply for this position. Here at Zoox, we know that diverse perspectives foster the innovation we need to be successful, and we are committed to building a team that encompasses a variety of backgrounds, experiences, and skills.
Zoox Foster City, California, USA Office
4000 E 3rd Ave, Foster City, CA, United States, 94404
Zoox Foster City, California, USA Office
1149 Chess Drive, Foster City, CA, United States, 94404
Zoox Fremont, California, USA Office
47540 Kato Road, Fremont, CA, United States, 94538
Zoox San Francisco, California, USA Office
60 Broadway St, San Francisco, CA, United States, 94111
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