Niranjan Krishnamurthi — User Research Leader

About

What I do

I'm a research leader and JTBD practitioner specialising in systematically grounding product teams to deliver solutions that precisely meet customer needs.

At Atlassian, I directed Trello's research function through a high-stakes product pivot — building a team from scratch, mapping 33 Jobs to Be Done across 50M+ users, and presenting findings to senior leadership when organizational decisions depended on credible evidence. At PayPal, I embedded across 10 product teams as the central research partner for the payments platform.

My methodology anchors product strategy around user goals — moving beyond mere task execution to enable true product success and innovation. I initiate every engagement by clarifying four core strategic vectors that define the foundation of any great product.

Whether through foundational goal mapping, quantitative prioritization, or continuous improvement loops, I ensure teams stay aligned around what customers actually need to achieve — the foundation of the JTBD (Jobs to be Done) approach.

Who are our users?

What essential goals must they achieve?

Which goals will our solution enable?

How does our current solution perform against these objectives?

Methodology

Product Improvement Cycle

The cycle is continuous — step 8 feeds back into step 1

Assess Knowledge Gaps

Identify critical research questions using the FOG (Facts, Observations, Guesses) exercise to secure team consensus on where knowledge is missing.

Develop Strategic Roadmap

Prioritize and align the research roadmap based on FOG outcomes, ensuring effort is directed at the highest-value unknowns.

Map Foundational Goals

Define user goals using the JTBD framework across the full customer journey to build a shared understanding of what success looks like.

Prioritize Quantitatively

Rank JTBDs using quantitative surveys, scoring each by importance and frequency to surface where to focus product effort.

Prioritize Focus Areas

Align JTBDs with business strategy by factoring in competitor positioning and experience gaps to identify the highest-impact focus areas.

Integrate Goals & Language

Establish common understanding through design thinking workshops, embedding JTBD language consistently across all product teams.

Validate Usability & Desirability

Test features for effectiveness using targeted recruiting by JTBD and SEQ scores to enable clear go/no-go decisions.

Improve Continuously

Survey live features and iterate the roadmap based on real-world JTBD performance — closing the loop and starting the cycle again.

Niranjan
Krishnamurthi