Are you a research leader who turns user insight into meaningful business direction?

Do you want to shape how Podme understands its users, what they need, where things break, and how their everyday experiences can work better?

Then this might be the role for you.

As a part of our vision to enrich people’s lives through stories, we’re expanding our user research capabilities in Stockholm to help us continuously improve end-to-end user experiences, ensuring they are intuitive, valuable, and worth coming back to.

This is a great opportunity to grow your impact at a fast-moving company backed by Schibsted Media, and to work in a team that combines strong engineering with product thinking.

About this position

You will play a key role in shaping how Podme understands its users and turns that understanding into better product decisions and experiences.

This is not a traditional research role focused on tactical design validation.

As UX Research Lead, you will:

Help the organization see users more clearly
Lead proactive, strategic research initiatives that influence product direction
Identify the problems worth solving before solutions exist
Build a continuous learning system that identifies friction, unmet needs, and growth opportunities
Make research a driver of strategy
You will work closely with Product, Design, Data, and leadership – not as a service function, but as a decision partner

Key Responsibilities

1. Lead Strategic User Research

Define and drive a strategic research agenda aligned with Podme’s strategic direction
Identify and prioritize key knowledge gaps across the user lifecycle
Translate behavioral patterns into clear problem framing and opportunity spaces
Ensure research informs bet selection, not just evaluation

2. Build a Continuous Learning System

Establish proactive, ongoing research practices
Ensure continuous understanding of:
- Where users drop off
- What strengthens or breaks habits
- How discovery influences engagement
- What differentiates retained vs churned users

3. Drive Research-Led Product Development

Embed research into product leaderships planning cycles
Ensure every major initiative starts with a validated behavioral hypothesis
Strengthen the organization’s ability to:
- Frame problems before solutions
- Validate assumptions early
- Measure real behavior change

4. Elevate Insight Quality and Impact

Combine qualitative research, behavioral data, and AI-assisted synthesis to generate deep, actionable insights
Ensure insights are:
- Clear
- Prioritized
- Connected to desired business outcomes
Improve how insights are communicated and used across the organization

5. Develop Research Capability & Culture

Build and evolve research practices, frameworks, and standards
Coach designers, PMs, and teams in research thinking and user-centric decision making
Contribute to a culture where:
- Learning is continuous
- Assumptions are challenged
- User understanding drives strategy

6. Be the Voice of the User at Leadership Level

Represent user needs and insights in strategic discussions
Ensure trade-offs are evaluated against long-term user value and retention
Act as a key partner to Product, Design, and Data leadership

The UX Researcher Lead reports to the UX Manager at Podme.

What success looks like in this role

Research shapes what we build, not just how we validate it
Product decisions are grounded in clear behavioral insights
We identify growth constraints before they impact metrics
Learning velocity increases across teams
More of the roadmap is driven by validated user problems

Qualifications/Who you are

You have deep experience in user research, including exploratory and strategic work
You’ve influenced stakeholders product direction, not just usability improvements
You know how to turn messy human behavior into clear, actionable insights
You’re comfortable working across disciplines and challenging thinking when needed
You care about impact over output
You are fluent in Swedish and have a good understanding of Norwegian, enabling you to work effectively with user insights across our core markets

Bonus Skills

Experience in subscription products or retention-driven businesses
Experience working with AI-assisted research or data synthesis
Background in media, content platforms, or recommendation systems
Experience scaling research in multi-market environments

Who we are

Podme is the place for premium podcasts and audiobooks. With over 350,000 paying subscribers, we’re available in Sweden, Norway, and Finland, and part of Schibsted Media since 2021.

Our vision is to enrich people’s lives through stories, which embodies our core belief in the power of narratives to bring joy, meaning, and connection to individuals. We strive to create effortless and habit-forming audio and product experiences that resonate with the listener and add value in their everyday lives.

We’re a friendly and passionate team of +80 people, here to make listening effortless, inspiring, and part of everyday life. Backed by Schibsted Media, the largest media group in Scandinavia, we are now on a growth journey which requires us to strengthen (example: the data-driven excellence in our company.)