User Archetype Research for Google.org
A solo generative research program of 28 in-depth interviews that gave Google.org a clear, evidence-based understanding of who they serve, resulting in three user archetypes and two additional research engagements.
The Challenge
Google.org, Google's philanthropic arm, needed a clearer, evidence-based understanding of who their users actually were. The organization's assumptions about its audience had developed organically over time and had not been systematically examined through primary research.
Without a shared, research-grounded picture of their users, product and strategy decisions were made against differing internal mental models of who Google.org was serving, creating alignment challenges across teams and functions.
Research Goals
- arrow_rightBuild an evidence-based understanding of who Google.org's users are
- arrow_rightUnderstand user motivations, mental models, and relationship with Google.org
- arrow_rightIdentify where the organization's assumptions about its audience diverged from reality
- arrow_rightDeliver a living framework, not a one-time report, that teams could use over time
Methodology
A generative qualitative research approach centered on in-depth interviews. As the sole researcher, I designed the study, recruited participants, conducted all 28 interviews, performed the analysis, and developed the archetype framework.
In-Depth Interviews
28 one-on-one qualitative interviews with a diverse cross-section of Google.org users. Interviews used a semi-structured protocol to explore participants' goals, motivations, mental models, and relationship with the organization, with room to follow unexpected threads.
Thematic Analysis
Systematic thematic coding across all 28 interviews to surface patterns in user behavior, motivation, and mental models. Applied an applied anthropology lens to understand users as whole people navigating real contexts, not just as users of a platform.
Archetype Development
Synthesized interview findings into three distinct user archetypes grounded in behavioral and attitudinal patterns observed consistently across the data. Each archetype was designed as a strategic tool, not a persona sketch, built to give teams shared language for product and strategy decisions.
Key Learning
Good foundational research doesn't just answer the question you started with. It surfaces the questions worth asking next.
This project is one of the clearest examples in my work of what rigorous generative research actually delivers.
The archetype that resonated most with the Google.org team was one they hadn't anticipated: people playing a hands-on, service-delivery role in the mission. These were practitioners doing direct work in the field, and the client team's existing mental model of their audience had essentially rendered them invisible. Surfacing that archetype through the data, rather than through assumption, was what won over the team and brought them back for two more projects.
The project also gave me a close look at the interesting friction between nonprofit culture and big tech assumptions. The Google.org team had some strong priors about how people work and use technology. What we found was more complicated. In some ways, the organizations we studied operated in deeply bootstrapped, resourced-constrained ways that looked nothing like the Google context the team was used to reasoning from. In others, things felt surprisingly familiar, including the interpersonal workplace dynamics that show up everywhere regardless of sector.
That tension between assumed and actual is exactly what good foundational research is for. Archetypes are most useful not when they confirm what a team already believes, but when they make visible what the team didn't know to look for.
Outcome
The three user archetypes gave Google.org a shared, evidence-based picture of their audience that aligned product and strategy teams around a common understanding of who they were serving. Google.org found the framework immediately actionable and returned for two additional research engagements, each one building on the foundation the archetypes established, demonstrating the durable value of research grounded in foundational user understanding.