2021 is definitely a memorable year for me. Although the process of finding an internship did not really go well for me, luckily, I ended up with a position that I had the most interest in. At the end of March, I left for Beijing, working as a user research intern in Kuaishou Technology.
To start with, Kuaishou Technology is a tech company based in Beijing, China. Just like most of the other technology companies in China, Kuaishou Technology has a vast scale, having over 16,000 employees. The company’s most famous product is Kuaishou, which is a short-video social platform for users to record and share their lives, with the core mission to “capture the world and embrace every kind of life”.
You may question, what is a user researcher and what does a user researcher do? As its name might have partly explained, the position is all about knowing and learning everything about the app users, answering questions like what are they, what characteristics do they have, how and why do they use the app. More importantly, user researchers strive to unearth the undiscovered needs of our users, even though users themselves might have not been aware of it yet. These gained insights can not only helpful in optimizing the app functions but also provide strategic implications for the company’s future direction. And it is one of the most interesting positions as it integrates scientific research methods into real-life businesses. Quantitative surveys and qualitative interviews are the most commonly used method in my team. Normally, we use surveys to constantly monitor our user’s satisfaction level and perform interviews to build insights regarding the topic we don’t really know about.
Overall, my working experience in Kuaishou was tiring yet fulfilling. It was tiring because the technology companies are always at a fast pace and you have got plenty of workloads, this was especially the case at the very first stage of my internship. I was unfamiliar with the company’s business and workflow at that time, and I have to rely on myself learning them most of the time as my colleagues seems too busy. I often see myself get home at 9 pm and keep learning those reports and powerpoints. But as the internship goes further, the situation gets better as I am more comfortable dealing with all those tasks. And I can really see myself learning new knowledge and skills every day, becoming a more self-driven person. Shortly after, I was lucky enough to go to other cities with my team for offline focus group research projects. Through the trips, I get to know what a focus group is like and how it was organized, and the fact that the participant’s recruitment is as important as conducting the focus group itself.
At last, I would say that the most important thing I learned from my internship is don’t be afraid of making mistakes. After all, we learn and grow through those mistakes. I still remember the day when I conduct an interview independently for the very first time. Just after 10 minutes of the start of the interview, I ended up speechless because I was too nervous to say a word. My supervisor had to manage the rest of the interview. I felt frustrated and awful after the interview, starting to lose confidence in myself. But my supervisor had a conversation with me, she told me that it is normal and totally acceptable for not doing well for the first time. The important thing is to reflect on our own performance. She walked me through the things that I didn’t do well in the interview and told me how to improve them the next time. That conversation helped me clear out my thoughts, I start to focused on the things that I can still work on but not on the failure itself. And the result was satisfying, I was more comfortable and fluent during the second interview. I just wanna say it is ok when we make mistakes or not doing well enough, it is not the end of the world. The more important thing is to reflect and improve.
I really appreciate this internship experience and I am happy if there are chances for me to work as a user research intern again in the future.
