Key Takeaways

• Research budget sizes are spread across teams, but those with low maturity are more likely to have smaller budgets
• Budgets are staying the same or growing year over year. Only 17% of participants said that their research budget shrank.
• Headcount, tools, and participant recruitment eat up the majority (71%) of research budgets. Teams pay for an average of 2-5 tools with their research budget. 
• The minimum definition of a majority (51%) are satisfied with their budget, but participants were more likely to be very satisfied than very dissatisfied. 
• If participants were grading the relationship between budget amount and perceived impact on an academic scale, they’d give it a C (70%). 
• When Research sets the budget, teams are most satisfied—and believe they’re having the most impact, but the C-Suite still holds the purse strings for most.
• Budget allocation is incredibly close to the ideal, but navigating growing headcount across other opportunities is often a tricky balance.
• With double the budget, teams would try and increase research’s impact exponentially.
• Faced with budget cuts, teams would try to do more research with fewer resources.