Gloria Osardu, Ph.D., is an industry-agnostic senior business executive with over 16 years of extensive experience driving business strategy with insights. She has successfully led UX/customer insights and analytics teams, providing the right research, data, insights, and opportunities to leaders. Gloria ensures that business decisions and product prioritizations are made with accurate information and customer insights. Throughout her career, Gloria has built, led, and scaled research and insights teams consisting of researchers, analysts, operations managers, and UX/CX insights experts. She has driven strategy at renowned global companies including Fortune 100 organizations, public sector entities, as well as startups. Currently serving as the head of global product experience research at Gusto, Gloria is responsible for setting and executing a compelling vision and strategy for customer and user insights. Her teams deliver insights and customer empathy programs which derisks and drive the design and build of best-in-class Payroll and HR solutions for small and medium-sized businesses. Before this role, Gloria also held leadership positions in global research teams across various industries such as SaaS, Education, Finance/Fintech, and Public Sector. Gloria firmly believes that durable business and customer insights derived from thorough research are crucial in today's era of big data decision-making processes and AI-driven innovation. This approach helps de-risk business decisions as well as expand perspectives around the user experience. Gloria is passionate about promoting fair, ethical, and accessible practices in the field of research and advocates for building technology innovation for ALL. Outside work, Gloria spends time exploring the world, building the next generation of researchers + creatives, and spending time with her family. In this insightful interview, Gloria O-B Osardu, Ph.D. shares her journey into the field of UX research and design. She discusses how she got started and provides valuable advice for those aspiring to leadership roles. Osardu defines strong UX research leadership, highlighting key principles like fostering collaboration, managing diverse perspectives, and building high-performing teams. She delves into her decision-making process for major research initiatives and strategies for upholding diversity and inclusion. Osardu also touches on balancing business objectives with user needs, and where she sees UX research heading with the rise of AI. Finally, she shares a glimpse into her daily life as a leader, how she continues learning and growing, and recommends books and people that inspire her in this space. Thank you for listening to this episode of Nodes of Design. We hope you enjoy the Nodes of Design Podcast on your favorite podcast platforms- Apple Podcast, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Amazon Music, and many more. If this episode helped you understand and learn something new, please share and join the knowledge-sharing community Spreadknowledge. This podcast aims to make design education accessible to all. Nodes of Design is a non-profit and self-sponsored initiative by Tejj.