Company Briefing
NetEase Games Montréal, ThunderFire Group of NetEase Games - is one of the leading developers and publishers in the gaming industry. Focused on delivering the best quality gaming experience on console, PC and mobile to international markets, we warmly seek collaboration with talents around the world to produce masterpieces through innovation and inspiration.

Job description 
The role of the Principal User Researcher will be to own all user research efforts for an unannounced project and be a key player in defining the research strategy. Reporting to the User Research Director, you are responsible for advocating for the player experience and assisting developers to make informed decisions, based on user research methods, tools, and data.

The ideal candidate for this role will need to be a strong performer in user research methods, have a proven track record of shipping games, and be a consistent advocate for user-centered approaches to game development. Your role is meant to complement production strategy, to inform direction, and to help deliver the best gaming experiences possible. Being passionate about gaming and advocating for users’ needs is essential to success, in addition to being able to work cross-functionally with multi-disciplinary teams. You will need to be able to explain complex data to non-data people and to be able to create a convincing data-driven story that will help shed light on the best approaches to take. You will also need to have an excellent understanding of the production process and how your user research strategy fits into that pipeline. 

The Principal User Researcher will work closely with the rest of the User Research team. You will need to help define and implement the best tools and methods to validate the player experience. You will also need to mentor more junior members of team, reviewing deliverables, and coaching them on methods and user research practices.

What will you be doing: 
•    Own and conduct user research studies, from conception all the way to live and post-launch.
•    Translate design and production goals into research opportunities.
•    Budget, plan, and supervise studies starting from pre-conception all the way to ship and post-launch.
•    Act as an expert in terms of user research inside the development team.
•    Propose user research methods and tools to provide guidance to production teams in terms of the player experience.
•    Evangelize the principles and benefits of user research and user centered design.
•    Take the role of user experience leader on the project by helping production teams prioritize fixes and changes to issues according to project priorities, status, and findings from user test sessions.
•    Collaborate with brand and marketing teams associated with the project.
•    Support user test recruitment efforts by emailing, calling, and screening potential participants.
•    Oversee the work of other user researchers, assigning and reviewing tasks across areas of the project and with user tests.
•    Act as a coach and mentor, as well as leading other researchers towards innovative and creative thinking when approaching research challenges. 
•    Collaborate with analytics team to ensure collection of relevant data, it’s quality, and support the group with preparation and coordination of data collection tools for user test efforts.
•    Keep up with new technologies, techniques, and best practices in user research.

The skills we’re looking for: 
•    Minimum BA/BS degree in HCI, Human Factors, Ergonomics, Psychology, UX Design, or any other relevant training or experience.
•    7+ years’ experience in user research in a game production environment.
•    Experience within the video game industry is a must.
•    Must have extremely strong knowledge of the video game industry and production cycles.
•    Strong communication skills and an ability to manage a variety of stakeholders in different levels of the organization.
•    Strong knowledge of user testing methodologies and tools.
•    Team leadership & mentoring.
•    Organized & process oriented (and able to impart that to the team).
•    High standards for quality.
•    Motivated with a desire to drive change.
•    Proactive and autonomous.
•    Able to work under pressure.

Why could we be the perfect place for you: 
We offer the unique experience of being part of the foundation of a new international game team right in the heart of Montreal, which benefits from the rich diversity of its members and the cultural exchange with our partners in Hangzhou.