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Miguel Palau
Anthropologist, Ph.D.
Design Researcher & Cross-Cultural Strategist
Miguel
Palau
ORCID: 0009-0004-0608-5073 ·
miguelpalau.blogspot.com · 2026
"Human Centered Design
requires an emotional, symbolic, and cultural frame that creates coherence
between design and users — this alignment is the operative core of the
Dissonant Imagination framework."
— Miguel Palau, La Imaginación
Disonante (2025)
SECTION I
Professional Profile
Miguel
Palau is a Venezuelan anthropologist and Principal UX Research Strategist, Design Researcher with
extensive corporate research experience leading cross-cultural research for
global digital products across LATAM, APAC, MENA, and Europe. He combines
Psychoanalytic Anthropology and Human-Computer Interaction to guide product
strategy through mixed-methods research and original theoretical frameworks.
He
specializes in translating deep cultural and psychological insights into
strategic product decisions — helping teams align product values, features,
information architecture, and visual elements with the conscious and
unconscious preferences of users in diverse global markets.
His work
consistently exceeds standard UX methodologies. He develops and implements
behavioral, cross-cultural, and AI-assisted research models that help
organizations understand not only what users do, but why they behave as they do
— and how they adopt or reject product interactions. These models operate
longitudinally or tactically, directly supporting product designers, engineers,
and C-level executives with decision-making frameworks that influence roadmaps,
design systems, and business strategy.
SECTION II
Proprietary Frameworks
Dissonant
Imagination (La Imaginación Disonante)
The
Dissonant Imagination framework is a psycho-cultural model that studies the
symbolic genesis of design at the intersection of psyche and culture. It
enables early prediction of product acceptance, rejection, or retention by
identifying symbolic dissonances and ensuring emotional, symbolic, and cultural
coherence between design intent and user populations. Unlike surface-level
localization (language, color, iconography), it addresses deeper logics: trust
formation, risk perception in volatile economies, mythic and affective
structures that shape how users relate to products as objects of desire.
The
framework goes beyond usability and beyond HCD — it operates at the
pre-rational, symbolic layer where real adoption decisions are made, before
users can articulate why they accept or reject a design. Published via Zenodo
(DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.15549594) and registered under ORCID: 0009-0004-0608-5073.
MELS
— Multi-Layer Experience Logic for Strategic UX
MELS is a
decision-making framework that maps the multi-layer logic behind user
experience: behavioral, relational, cultural, and systemic. It helps product
and UX teams diagnose invisible friction, uncover deeper motivation patterns,
and align design choices with business strategy — strengthening strategic
clarity, reducing ambiguity in global environments, and improving
cross-functional alignment in complex products.
Rapid
Ethnography for Digital Product Development
A
practitioner methodology for accelerating ethnographic insight generation in
digital product contexts. Co-authored with Yilber Sisco (2016), cited as a
methodological foundation in Jangwa Pana (DOI: 10.21676/16574923.3359) — a
peer-reviewed Colombian anthropology journal. The methodology integrates
ethnographic depth with the temporal constraints of agile product development
cycles.
AI-Driven
Quantitative Persona Modeling
A
computational ethnography approach blending ethnographic thinking, cultural
data mining, and machine learning to build data-driven personas from digital
behavioral data. Developed using CRISP-DM and Naive Bayes classification, the
model achieved 76% accuracy across 60 case studies, identifying latent
psychological and cultural conditions — including Dissociative Absence patterns
— as primary persona variables. Published as Etnominería de Datos (Data
Ethnomining).
SECTION III
Professional Experience
His
corporate career progression from ethnographer to Principal spans Tech,
AgriTech, FMCG, and Financial Services at Colgate-Palmolive, PepsiCo, Yara
International / GammaUX, and Mashreq Bank (UAE). Consulting engagements include
Microsoft, Intel, Boeing, Nestlé, Pfizer, Mazda, and Coca-Cola across LATAM,
APAC, MENA, and Europe.
He has
operated within leading regional research and design firms, including Pacific
Ethnography (USA), Fjord/Insitum (Mexico), GfK (LATAM), Ipsos, and Gamma UX
(Spain). He has contributed research to more than 60 products worldwide,
driving double-digit growth in user acquisition (10–15%) across 50+ platforms
and delivering board-level strategic recommendations.
Selected
Achievement — TankMix / Yara International
As Senior
UX Researcher for Yara International's global AgriTech platform TankMix
(50,000+ installs across Europe and Asia), Miguel led hybrid mixed-methods
research that diagnosed structural UX failures in the original interface: high
cognitive load, weak visual hierarchy, ambiguous navigation, and unclear
mixability communication. His insights informed a major redesign delivering a
4-step behavioral task flow, improved search and contextual guidance, and
cross-regional segmentation. Results: 90% improvement in UI clarity and task
completion, validated through documented UI comparison between legacy and
redesigned versions. The new app version launched in 2024.
Selected
Achievement — Mashreq Bank, UAE
At Mashreq
Corporate & Investment Banking Group, classified and prioritized the
research scope across a portfolio of 50 digital products in the UAE and MENAP —
covering digital payment, retail banking, corporate investment, and wholesale —
and operationalized the research agenda across 11 cross-functional product
teams. Conceived and institutionalized the UX Research Roadmap presented to the
VP of Design in QPM 2023 C-suite planning sessions, establishing the first
structured research agenda across 21 digital products.
SECTION IV
Academic Background
Bachelor's
degree in Anthropology. Doctoral coursework in Psychoanalytic Anthropology from
the Universidad Central de Venezuela under Dr. Samuel Hurtado Salazar, creator
of the Matrisocialidad theory — one of the most influential frameworks in
Venezuelan social anthropology. Complementary Master's-level focus in Computer
Sciences and Human-Computer Interaction under Dr. Vanessa Leguizamo, a
recognized researcher specializing in software engineering and UX at UCV's
School of Computing. Additional studies at the University of Central Florida
(UCF), Orlando, United States of America. Bilingual professional — Spanish and English.
Contributing
founder of Anthropology of Design as a formal applied subdiscipline (2015) — an
interdisciplinary field integrating structural anthropology, psychoanalysis,
and HCI to study the symbolic genesis of products and their cultural adoption
dynamics.
SECTION V
Publications, Citations & Peer Review
Peer
Reviewer, EPIC Conference Proceedings 2018–2019 — the leading international
conference on ethnographic practice in industry, published by
Wiley/AnthroSource (ISSN: 1559-8918) with a 20–30% paper acceptance rate.
Selected by the EPIC Papers Committee Chair to evaluate submissions in Design
Research, Design Principles, and Ethnographic Research for Design — drawing on
extensive global practice and strategic acumen in framing ethnographic methods
for the private sector. Recognition letter issued by Jennifer Collier Jennings,
EPIC Executive Director, August 2025. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.20453205
Selected
Publications
Palau, M. (2025). La Imaginación Disonante. Contribuciones hacia la Antropología del Diseño. Zenodo. DOI:
10.5281/zenodo.15549594
· OSF: 10.17605/OSF.IO/4CKYS
Palau, M. (2025). Designing Across Cultures: A Hybrid UX Research Case for TankMix. Yara International / Miguel Palau.
Palau, M. & Sisco, Y. (2016). Rapid Ethnography (REAP) for Mobile Augmented Reality Development. [Cited in: Rodríguez-Ortiz &
Montoya-Trujillo, 2020, Jangwa Pana. DOI: 10.21676/16574923.3359
Peer Review: EPIC Conference Proceedings 2018–2019. Ethnographic Praxis in Industry Conference. Wiley/AnthroSource. ISSN:
1559-8918.
SECTION VI
Academic Identifier Network
The
following identifiers constitute a verified, cross-platform academic record
linking all published work, peer review activity, and original frameworks under
a single author profile indexed by Google Scholar, ResearchGate, and ORCID.
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ORCID |
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Zenodo DOI |
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OSF DOI |
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Google Scholar |
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ResearchGate |
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Academia.edu |
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LinkedIn |
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Blog & Cases |
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Portfolio |
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EPIC Profile |
© 2015–2026 Miguel Palau – Todos los
derechos reservados.
ORCID: 0009-0004-0608-5073
· miguelpalau.blogspot.com
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