Research Strategist

We believe in the power and joy of learning

At Cengage, our employees have a direct impact in helping students around the world discover the power and joy of learning. We are bonded by our shared purpose – driving innovation that helps millions of learners improve their lives and achieve their dreams through education.  

Cengage's portfolio of businesses supports student choice by providing a range of pathways that help learners achieve their goals and lead a choice-filled life.  

Our culture values inclusion, engagement, and discovery

Our business is driven by our strong culture, and we know that creating an inclusive workplace is absolutely essential to the success of our company and our learners, as well as our individual well-being. We recognize the value of diverse perspectives in everything we do, and strive to ensure employees of all levels and backgrounds feel empowered to voice their ideas and bring their authentic selves to work. We achieve these priorities through programs, benefits, and initiatives that are integrated into the fabric of how we work every day. To learn more, please see https://www.cengagegroup.com/about/inclusion-and-belonging/.  

At Cengage, we prioritize building products advised by deep customer understanding, continuous learning, and positive relationships with our customers. This position plays a significant role in enabling product teams. It focuses on crafting, scaling, and sustaining research using multiple methods for market and product development.  

This role focuses on building engaged research communities that strengthen customer rapport, enable continuous discovery, and provide trusted feedback loops. The Research Strategist will collaborate with cross-functional partners to identify the most efficient ways to conduct research. They will apply innovative ways to increase the speed, scale, and efficiency of insight generation while maintaining high research quality and participant experience.  

What you'll do here:

Research Community Development & Customer Engagement

• Design, launch, and lead research communities (e.g., customer panels, advisory groups, insight forums) that support ongoing product discovery and validation

• Build long-term relationships with customers to cultivate trust, engagement, and sustained participation in research

• Actively engage community members to gather feedback across the product lifecycle, including discovery, concept testing, validation, and post-launch learning

• Support market development efforts by using research communities to understand customer needs, behaviors, and market dynamics

• Surface insights that advise product positioning, messaging, and go-to-market strategies

• Collaborate with product, marketing, and strategy teams to align community insights with broader business objectives  

Research Consulting & Methodology Guidance

• In consultation with product teams, recommend the most effective research methodologies based on goals, timelines, and strategies

• Educate and enable teams on protocols for community-based research and customer engagement

• Design and operationalize scalable research frameworks and playbooks tailored to product team needs

• Leverage the latest tools and methods to accelerate research workflows, including participant segmentation, thematic analysis, insight synthesis, and reporting

• Balance efficiency with human judgment to ensure insights are accurate, ethical, and actionable

• Track and report on community health, engagement, and research impact for product teams  

Skills you will need here:

• Proven experience in user research, research operations, community management, or related fields

• Demonstrated experience building and managing research communities, panels, or customer engagement programs

• Strong understanding of qualitative and quantitative research methodologies used in product development

• Experience collaborating with teams on research approaches and methodology selection

• Familiarity with AI-enabled research or analysis tools to scale insight generation

• Excellent communication, facilitation, and stakeholder-management skills

Skills You’ll Bring (Preferred)

• Experience supporting product, UX, or market research teams

• Background in market development, customer engagement, or go-to-market research

• Experience applying AI tools for qualitative synthesis, tagging, sentiment analysis, or insight generation

• Excitement working across multiple teams and influencing without direct authority

• Experience developing research governance, consent, and data-management practices  

Cengage is committed to working with broad talent pools to attract and hire strong and most qualified individuals. Our job applicants are considered regardless of any classification protected by applicable federal, state, provincial or local laws.  

Cengage is also committed to providing reasonable accommodations for qualified individuals with disabilities including during our job application process. If you are an applicant with a disability and require reasonable accommodation in our job application process, please contact us at [email protected].  

About Cengage

Cengage, a global education technology company serving millions of learners, provides affordable, quality digital products and services that equip students with the skills and competencies needed to be job ready. For more than 100 years, we have enabled the power and joy of learning with trusted, engaging content, and now, integrated digital platforms. We serve the higher education, workforce skills, secondary education, English language teaching and research markets worldwide. Through our scalable technology, including MindTap and Cengage Unlimited, we support all learners who seek to improve their lives and achieve their dreams through education.  

Compensation

At Cengage Group, we take great pride in our commitment to providing a comprehensive and rewarding Total Rewards package designed to support and empower our employees. Click here to learn more about our Total Rewards Philosophy.

The full base pay range has been provided for this position. Individual base pay will vary based on work schedule, qualifications, experience, internal equity, and geographic location.  Sales roles often incorporate a significant incentive compensation program beyond this base pay range.

In this position,  you will be eligible to participate in the company’s discretionary incentive bonus program.  This position's bonus target amount, which is not guaranteed and is dependent on individual performance and overall company results among other factors, is provided below.