Manager, User Research

The Experience Research team at Asana is on a mission to deeply understand the dynamics of modern work—how individuals collaborate, how teams operate, and how organizations scale. We partner with Product, Design, Engineering, and Go-to-Market teams to ensure every decision is grounded in a rich understanding of our customers. As a manager in our New York office, you will build a strategic talent engine, ensuring every researcher on your team is an influential partner in the product-shaping process. You'll be embedded with leadership in these fast-moving, high-visibility spaces—owning the roadmap from first principles and serving as the voice of the customer throughout the lifecycle. Joining our newly formed NYC team, you will be a key architect for Asana’s next generation of persona-packaged products—our bet on what the next $100M+ line of business looks like. In this role, you will work from first principles to help define new primitives, not just features. You will scale your impact by mentoring a high-velocity team, fostering a culture of rigorous curiosity and helping them navigate the messy transition from raw insights to architectural mandates. You will explore how teams plan, sequence, and ship work in an AI-native world, turning ambiguous problem spaces into sharp, opinionated workflows that feel fast, minimal, and “obviously right” to high-performing teams. This is a ground-floor opportunity to shape a new product category. You'll direct foundational and evaluative research across the full surface while building and managing Design Partner Groups, translating their feedback into actionable insights that directly inform strategy. If you thrive in ambiguity, care deeply about craft, and want your work to have an outsized business impact, this is the role. This role is based in our New York City office with an office-centric hybrid schedule. The standard in-office days are Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday. Most Asanas have the option to work from home on Wednesdays. Working from home on Fridays depends on the type of work you do and the teams with which you partner. If you're interviewing for this role, your recruiter will share more about the in-office requirements. What you'll achieve: Own the end-to-end UXR roadmap for your area, identifying and prioritizing research needs in partnership with Product, Design, and Engineering leadership Lead foundational, generative, and evaluative research to ensure Asana is usable, desirable, and meets core user needs Build and manage a Design Partner Group (DPG): recruit members, plan and execute ongoing feedback sessions and studies, create insights reports, and maintain program operations, including incentive tracking and member rotation Drive future-looking research to understand the evolving developer landscape—including AI-native workflows, coding agents, role blending, and emerging tools—and translate those insights into strategic product recommendations Partner closely with cross-functional teammates to inform pre- and post-launch strategy, synthesizing qualitative and quantitative learnings to shape beta, V1, V2, and beyond Champion durable research frameworks as foundations for product thinking and innovation; elevate insights throughout the company to help teams understand impact and opportunity costs Contribute UXR expertise across the Align pillar, partnering with teams working on Strategic Planning, Reporting Foundations, Command Center & Goals, and Executive Dashboards to deliver discovery research, evaluative studies, and strategic insights that inform product direction in these cross-cutting areas Attend and contribute to design critiques and product reviews with a customer-empathy lens, rapidly applying learnings to identify issues and inform direction Coach cross-functional partners on high-quality research practices and help non-researchers self-serve on foundational insights Balance strategic, long-horizon research with tactical, just-in-time evaluative work in a fast-paced environment About you: 8+ years of experience practicing UX Research for digital products, with 2+ years of experience managing or mentoring a team of researchers in a fast-paced environment. You don’t just execute a roadmap; you build a strategic talent engine. You have a track record of ensuring your team is an influential partner in the product-shaping process, moving beyond "service" research to architectural partnership. You thrive in ambiguity and enjoy defining new product primitives from first principles. You are comfortable navigating the "messy" transition from raw foundational insights to sharp, opinionated product strategy. You have deep expertise in a wide range of qualitative and quantitative methods, but you aren’t precious about the process. You have the experience to be "scrappy and crafty" when needed—knowing exactly how to lean on your intuition to navigate constraints and get to the right answer responsibly without a formal script. You are deeply curious about how emerging technologies and AI are reshaping human mental models. You can translate complex shifts in user behavior into durable research frameworks that inform long-horizon innovation. You are a persuasive communicator who builds high-trust relationships with Product, Design, and Engineering leadership. You enjoy "role-blending" to ensure the voice of the customer is the heartbeat of the development lifecycle. You can connect the dots across disparate product areas, identifying cross-cutting themes that impact the broader business while maintaining a high bar for craft and rigor. Demonstrates curiosity about AI tools and emerging technologies, with a willingness to learn and leverage them to enhance productivity, collaboration, or decision-making. At Asana, we're committed to building teams with a variety of backgrounds, perspectives, and skills, as this is critical to achieving our mission. If you're interested in this role and don't meet all the listed requirements, we still encourage you to apply. What we'll offer: Our comprehensive compensation package plays a big part in how we recognize you for the impact you have on our path to achieving our mission. We believe that compensation should be reflective of the value you create relative to the market value of your role. To ensure pay is fair and not impacted by biases, we're committed to looking at market value which is why we check ourselves and conduct a yearly pay equity audit. For this role, the estimated base salary range is between $234,000 - $275,000. The actual base salary will vary based on various factors, including market and individual qualifications objectively assessed during the interview process. The listed range above is a guideline, and the base salary range for this role may be modified. In addition to base salary, your compensation package may include additional components such as equity, sales incentive pay (for most sales roles), and benefits. If you're interviewing for this role, speak with your recruiter to learn more about the total compensation and benefits for this role. We strive to provide equitable and competitive benefits packages that support our employees worldwide and include: Mental health, wellness & fitness benefits Career coaching & support Inclusive family building benefits Long-term savings or retirement plans In-office culinary options to cater to your dietary preferences These are just some of the benefits we offer, and benefits may vary based on role, country, and local regulations. If you're interviewing for this role, speak with your recruiter to learn more about the total compensation and benefits for this role. #LI-Hybrid About us Asana is a leading platform for human + AI collaboration. Millions of teams around the world rely on Asana to achieve their most important goals, faster. Asana has been named to Fortune's Best Workplaces for 7+ years and recognized by Fast Company, Forbes, and Gartner for excellence in workplace culture and innovation. We offer an exceptional office-centric culture while adopting the best elements of hybrid models to ensure that every one of our global team members can work together effortlessly. With 13+ offices all over the world, we are always looking for individuals who care about building technology that drives positive change in the world and a culture where everyone feels that they belong. Join Asana’s Talent Network to stay up to date on job opportunities and life at Asana.