UX Researcher for Defense Aviation Platforms

Society of Defense Financial Management; Vienna (VA); Hybrid; USD 115,000 - 135,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health insurance

Paid time off

Paid holidays

Disability coverage

Retirement savings

Professional development opportunities

Job summary

SteerBridge seeks a UX Researcher in Vienna, VA with hybrid work flexibility to support a defense aviation platform. You will study operational workflows in aviation readiness and translate insights into usable product experiences for federal customers.

You will collaborate with designers, engineers, data scientists, and domain experts to align user needs with system architecture, turning research into prototypes and product improvements throughout the lifecycle.

Qualifications

• 3+ years of professional UX research experience supporting software or digital product development.
• Ability to translate research into clear user insights and actionable product requirements.
• Experience with complex enterprise or government software systems.

Responsibilities

• Plan and conduct qualitative and quantitative UX research, including user interviews, contextual inquiries, surveys, workflow analysis, and observation of operational environments.
• Conduct usability testing on prototypes and production systems and synthesize findings into actionable insights that inform product and design decisions.
• Develop personas, journey maps, workflow models, and other research artifacts that capture user needs, behaviors, operational constraints, and decision-making patterns.
• Translate research findings into wireframes, prototypes, interaction models, and research-informed concepts that improve user workflows and experiences.
• Collaborate with product designers to refine concepts, support information architecture and interaction design decisions, and validate solutions through iterative usability testing.
• Partner with engineers, data teams, Product Owners, and subject matter experts to align user needs and operational workflows with system architecture and technical constraints.
• Participate in backlog refinement, design reviews, and design-to-development handoffs, providing clear research findings and documentation to support implementation.
• Conduct domain and competitive research on aviation logistics and sustainment systems, tools, and operational practices to inform product strategy and direction.

Skills

UX research

Interviews

Usability testing

Workflow analysis

Research synthesis

Written communication

Verbal communication

Tools

Figma

Job description

SteerBridge seeks a UX Researcher in Vienna, VA with hybrid work flexibility to support a defense aviation platform. You will study operational workflows in aviation readiness and translate insights into usable product experiences for federal customers.

You will collaborate with designers, engineers, data scientists, and domain experts to align user needs with system architecture, turning research into prototypes and product improvements throughout the lifecycle.