by Embedding UX Research Across AI-Enhanced Design Systems
As UX evolves toward AI-enhanced, adaptive systems, embedding research directly into design has never been more critical. Ahead of the inaugural edition of UX360 North America 2026, Paige Maguire, Director of User Experience & Research at Fueled, shares how her team integrates evidence and empathy across every stage of product development—ensuring insights actively shape strategy, design, and launch.
UX360: Without giving too much away, what is the key focus of your talk, and what message do you want delegates to take away?
Paige: In many organizations, research still lives on the sidelines, treated as a gate or a handoff rather than a driver of design. This talk shares how I’ve worked to change that at Fueled. By embedding research directly into the product design practice, we’ve built a model where evidence and empathy shape every phase of design, from discovery and concept development to iteration and launch. I’ll talk about how we approached the challenge, created new ways of working without disrupting progress, and succeeded at delivering continuous insights throughout the project lifespan.
UX360: How would you describe the “state of UX” at present, and where do you see us heading over the next 1—2 years?
Paige: UX is no longer just about screens and menus, it’s about shaping adaptive, human-centered experiences in an AI-driven world. Designers no longer craft pixels first. They curate systems, contexts, and workflows that anticipate needs, respect autonomy, and express meaning.
Over the next couple of years, UX will evolve from designing interfaces to designing intelligent systems. As AI becomes embedded in everyday products, experiences will be less about static screens and more about adaptive flows that respond to user intent, context, and behavior in real time. Designers will increasingly shape how systems reason, explain themselves, and collaborate with people—focusing not just on usability, but on trust, transparency, and emotional clarity. UX will stretch across modalities (text, voice, visuals, automation) and across moments, orchestrating journeys that feel continuous rather than fragmented.
Over the next couple of years, UX will evolve from designing interfaces to designing intelligent systems.
At the same time, UX will become more overtly strategic. As digital experiences grow more complex, the discipline will move upstream into problem framing, business modeling, and systems thinking—defining what should exist before deciding how it looks. Accessibility, inclusivity, and ethical design will shift from best practices to baseline expectations, while personalization will demand stronger guardrails to avoid feeling invasive or unpredictable. The next era of UX won’t be about making things merely easier to use; it will be about making complex systems feel understandable, humane, and aligned with human goals in an increasingly automated world.
As digital experiences grow more complex, the discipline will move upstream into problem framing, business modeling, and systems thinking—defining what should exist before deciding how it looks.
UX360: Ok, let’s get a bit more personal. How did you get started in UX and how has your perception of the field changed since then?
Paige: My career began in content strategy and design, and when I transitioned to focus on product, I expanded into user experience more broadly. In some ways, the field has stayed the same, but in other ways, it feels wildly different from where I began. The biggest change, I think, is around screens vs systems.
A decade ago, UX was largely about improving usability at the interface level: clean layouts, intuitive navigation, clearer flows inside websites and apps. Today, UX spans entire ecosystems: cross-channel journeys, service design, personalization engines, content strategy, and increasingly, AI-driven behavior. Designers are no longer just shaping what users click; they’re shaping how decisions get made, how data flows, and how products adapt over time.
Just as important, UX has moved upstream. It’s no longer only execution after requirements are set; it now influences strategy, product direction, and business outcomes. Research, design, content, and technology are more intertwined, and UX is expected to prove impact, not just polish. In short, UX has grown from a craft focused on interaction into a discipline focused on orchestrating human experience across complex, living systems.
UX360: What is your UX pet peeve – and how do you deal with it?
Paige: Personas! They’re my UX pet peeve because they’re frequently treated as truth when they’re really just polished guesses. Teams latch onto a neatly named character (“Busy Brenda,” “Tech-Savvy Tom”) and start designing for the persona instead of for real people. Once that happens, the persona becomes a stand-in for evidence and opinions get framed as “what Sarah would want” instead of “what users actually told us,” and the work drifts away from reality.
Teams latch onto a neatly named character (“Busy Brenda,” “Tech-Savvy Tom”) and start designing for the persona instead of for real people.
They’re also static in a world that isn’t. Real user behavior changes by context, moment, and constraint, but personas freeze people into demographic or personality buckets. They hide needs inside traits (“millennial,” “power user,” “budget conscious”) instead of focusing on what actually matters: motivations, tradeoffs, and situations. So instead of clarifying decisions, they often oversimplify them and give teams a false sense of confidence that they’re being user-centered when they’re really just being story-centered.
I don’t hate empathy tools. I hate performative empathy dressed up as research.
UX360: This is potentially related to the above: What’s one thing you wish more non-researchers understood about the role of UX research?
Paige: This one is easy. I wish more people understood that research isn’t slow, and that teams don’t have to sit on their hands while research works. In the most mature organizations, research works continuously alongside cross-discipline partners.
I wish more people understood that research isn’t slow, and that teams don’t have to sit on their hands while research works.
UX360: Last but not least, we have been compiling a UX reading and podcast list for our readers, can you share some of your most coveted and inspiring resources?
Paige:
UX Podcasts:
- Lenny’s Podcast
- Hidden Brain
- Better Offline
- Pivot
Books & Blogs:
- Dirt.fyi
- The Intersection by Rei Inamoto
- Sidebar.io
- The Sociology of Business
UX360: Thank you so much, Paige. We look forward to hearing more from you at the event.
Discussions like this are exactly why UX360 North America exists.
As UX research evolves, the need for experience-focused dialogue has never been greater.
UX360 NA 2026 convenes practitioners to explore how to adapt to the change while keeping user needs and human experience at the center.
By featuring voices like Paige Maguire’s, UX360 highlights the real challenges facing UX teams today — from embedding research across organizations to translating insights into business decisions — and provides practical guidance for navigating them.
Join us at UX360 North America 2026 | Atlanta, Georgia, U.S.A | April 21–23 to gain hands-on methodologies from leading UX researchers, discover emerging techniques, and acquire skills needed for tomorrow.
Register today before conference seats sell out!
