Yes, there's a difference between a UX Researcher and a UX Designer

Becoming a UX Researcher and a designer are two different things, though one does often find individuals who exhibit both skill sets, or who through necessity must straddle both roles. But it's worth addressing them as two different, but complimentary, approaches.  This has been a big ask of me because of the amazing companies I've worked for: smaller start-ups that need to stretch resources.  I've love these challenges, in-turn producing more well-rounded problem solution methodologies in my career.

As a good User Experience Researcher, you will be able to:

• Formulate a good understanding of the problem set they are trying to understand. It's vital to distinguish between exploratory or formative research (where you are trying to understand what behaviors people exhibit as they go about trying to accomplish something), and analytical or evaluative research (where you are attempting to quantify how well a specific design solution works for a given group of people.)
• Design a research plan that pinpoints who you're going to include in the research, and how you're going to gather the information you need. You'll need to develop a good sense of what is and isn't reasonable to expect out of your research sessions - whether that's a day in the field observing a prospective customer, or 15 minutes in a coffee shop testing paper prototypes.
• Conduct (or observe) research sessions in a way which allows the data to emerge. In a usability lab environment this implies being able to facilitate a session objectively, not steering participants towards any one outcome. In the field, you'll need to develop the ability to disappear into the background, so that you are an observer of behaviors and not an influence on them.

As for the skills of a UX Designer, a lot of that depends on what you mean by the term. Of late, it has come to include everything from someone who does visual and motion design to information architecture, interaction design, user experience strategy... the list goes on. But let's focus on the skills that would allow you to formulate and describe the elements of an experience that a user should have (and which, presumably, someone else will build).

With that in mind, I think it's reasonable to expect a good UX Designer to be able to:

• Consume information about the needs of the end user, and determine if/how these needs can be met with a specific experience.
• Conceptualize the experience, whether this is a software interface or a physical environment, or a service, or something else, and articulate what elements - information sources, interaction methods, and outputs - need to be constructed and how they should fit together in order to create something which helps users accomplish their goals
• Communicate how this experience is to be constructed, and provide guidance and input into the development process.

Ideally, there is some degree of iteration involved, so that concepts are articulated in varying degrees of fidelity and typical users are exposed to those artifacts for the purpose of gathering feedback. It's in this process that the roles of UX Researcher and UX Designer are most likely to intersect, and where it makes sense for one person to have at least some of the skills of both.

As a designer, all these skills are very valuable for your client and must be embraced in some form.  But in the end, they are two different fields and companies that recognize and budget to include an experienced researcher reap the rewards of producing amazing products that convert.