Jillian Wells

Staff UX Researcher

Vanta

Aug 2025 - Current (1 year 1 month)

Building the Research function at Vanta

Senior Staff UX Researcher & Strategist

Cohere

Dec 2023 - Jul 2025 (1 year 8 months)

Building the user research discipline from the ground up!

UX Research consultant

OpenAI

Feb 2023 - Aug 2023 (7 months)

I helped the ChatGPT org understand how people were using the product (across consumer, knowledge work, and education), helped shape ChatGPT's early personality across different use cases, and helped define a roadmap for ChatGPT's Data Analysis tool. I also helped establish UX Research foundations and best practices for non-researchers.

Staff UX Researcher

Stripe

Jul 2020 - Apr 2023 (2 years 10 months)

– Joined as the second researcher. Helped develop an interview framework and rubric that defined the research team’s hiring bar and was used to scale the team from 2 to 30. – Led org-wide research for developers, enterprise, and consumer products. Strategic research resulted in a patented integration experience, a reduction in enterprise support needs, and a 2x increase of monthly transacting consumers. – Built self-serve research resources for non-researchers. This increased the reliability of research done by non-researchers, and decreased time researchers spent on democratization by 60%. – Developed self-serve guides and programs to up-level the quality and consistency of researchers’ work, including survey best practices and research wo

Lead UX Researcher

Stripe

Sep 2018 - Jul 2020 (1 year 11 months)

Senior User Researcher

Intercom

Feb 2016 - Aug 2018 (2 years 7 months)

– Joined as the fourth researcher, and helped scale the team from 4 to 10. – Led company-wide research to define company strategy, set product roadmaps, and attract new audiences. This work significantly increased the target cohort and ARR. – Conducted mixed methods research and led workshops to help product teams develop innovative support and sales products, which furthered the company’s mission to “make internet business personal.”

U

UX Researcher

Jun 2015 - Nov 2015 (6 months)

– Advocated for and led in-field, consumer-based research to help the company redefine its strategy and pivot to digital products. Led concept and usability testing to refine new products. – Led ideation sessions and workshops to define the companies’ vision for the connected kitchen, including how to redesign and introduce new products. – Collaborated with the software team to create a unified experience between hardware and software offerings.

I

Industrial Designer + Design Researcher

Jun 2014 - Jun 2015 (1 year 1 month)

Adjunct Professor

California College of the Arts

Jan 2014 - May 2015 (1 year 5 months)

– Developed curriculum (from scratch) for a human centered, industrial design class for sophomore level college students. – Taught students user research and industrial design processes and techniques. Facilitated critiques between students and industry professionals. – Collaborated with local community centers for senior citizens, which allowed students to conduct research, identify opportunities for unmet needs, and develop a net-new products to help empower seniors.

UX Researcher

Intermedia Intelligent Communications

Dec 2013 - Jun 2014 (7 months)

– Led qualitative research to define the company’s target user, and identify areas for product improvement. Research decreased significantly decreased churn. – Acted as the company’s first user researcher and established processes and best practices to conduct research, increasing the design team’s operational efficiency. – Collaborated with product managers to introduce user research to the C-suite and advocate for data-driven and human-centered decision making.

Industrial Designer + Researcher

Design Partners

Sep 2012 - Nov 2013 (1 year 3 months)

– Advocated for and led in-field, strategic and tactical research. – Introduced the concept of human-centered design into design consultancy. – Created concept-level designs for various consumer products, including Logitech, ADT, and Cricut.

Industrial Design Consultant

The Clorox Company

Jun 2012 - Sep 2012 (4 months)

– Helped various projects with high-level ideation, strategic exploration, and on-site research assistance (e.g., participatory design, hardware concept evaluation). – Assisted on Industrial Design projects in a variety of phases, with a range of design tools (e.g., 2D/3D CAD, sketching, qualitative research).

Lead Instructor (Graphic Design)

Digital Media Academy

Jun 2012 - Aug 2012 (3 months)

– Taught classes of 7-12 year old children graphic design, animation, and game programming. – Planned activities and projects for classes.

Insights + Strategy Intern

Smart Design

Oct 2011 - Mar 2012 (6 months)

– Assisted with multiple design and research projects from beginning to end phases, for clients like Samsung and Oxo. – Recruited for and conducted field research and in-person consumer testing, and synthesized data into design actionable presentations and videos.

Industrial Design Intern

Ziba Design

Apr 2011 - Jun 2011 (3 months)

– Assisted on a range of design projects at different project phases. – Lead and participated in brainstorming activities, conducted secondary and trend research for strategic projects, created 3D CAD models for beauty and consumer electronic products.

D

Design Intern

Jan 2011 - Mar 2011 (3 months)

Uliko is a materials studio that connects suppliers with product decision makers at various companies. Worked in Rhino, Delta Tex, and Delta Gen, and InDesign to create 3D models, material renders, and presentations for clients.

Design Intern

Welch Allyn

Jul 2010 - Dec 2010 (6 months)

– Collaborated with cross-functional partners to apply a new wireless medical technology to Welch Allyn's line of products. – Defined and developed a workflow strategy for how products could successfully be implemented into medical environments. – Created storyboards that defined the user experience with the product in different scenarios. – Designed a USB dongle that will work with new line of products.

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