Principal User Researcher

Hippo is a rapidly growing AI enabled digital consultancy passionate about building and delivering transformative digital solutions for a diverse range of Public and Private sector clients. We are recruiting for a Principal Consultant with a user research background to support our mission. We work at the intersection of strategy, design, and technology to solve complex problems and create lasting value. Our collaborative and agile culture empowers our teams to make a genuine impact.

As a Principal Consultant, you will be a strategic research and UCD leader and an experienced practitioner. Your scope extends beyond individual products, services or delivery teams; you will be responsible for shaping research strategy across programmes or organisations, defining research standards, and helping to drive the successful delivery of valuable, user-centred outcomes at scale. You will lead research in complex environments, influence organisational strategy, and ensure user-centred thinking is embedded across disciplines.

You will mentor and guide Senior and Lead research practitioners, contribute to the development and evolution of our research capability and profession, and act as a visible leader within both Hippo and our client organisations.

At this level, you will play a key role in strengthening and evolving our propositions, supporting business growth, and influencing senior stakeholders at executive level. You will bring clarity to complex problems, align teams around outcomes for users, and drive direction in challenging client environments.

We are in particular encouraging candidates with extensive experience of using AI within their research or UCD practice, and/or working on products or services that embed AI in how they operate. We are looking for someone to help lead our approach to evolving our research practice as the industry evolves and AI changes how we work, and the types of projects we work on.

What you'll do

• Be part of the leadership of our most complex and strategically important client engagements, driving a user centred approach across all projects and adding value across a programme or account
• Act as a trusted advisor to senior client stakeholders, including executive leadership, using data, insight and primary research to influence decision-making and shape long-term service strategy to support better outcomes for service users
• Lead teams to ensure that products and services meet the needs of all users and adhere to GDS (where appropriate), accessibility and other relevant standards.
• Be part of the leadership team of Hippo's research profession, leading substantive internal workstreams to us to grow the profession to support a period of rapid business growth
• Work with other research leaders to evolve our practices to ensure we retain our strong reputation for high quality user centred design and delivery as the market evolves with AI
• Recruit, lead and mentor Senior and Lead user researchers, strengthening capability within Hippo's research profession and fostering a culture of continuous learning and improvement
• Support business growth through pre-sales activity, shaping product propositions, contributing to bids, and helping clients understand the value of user-centred delivery
• Represent Hippo's research and UCD capability internally and externally, contributing to thought leadership, community engagement, and the ongoing evolution of our practices