Career Compass
WEBSITE DESIGN
INTRODUCTION
Education and finances are barriers that prevent many from pursuing their dream job or leaving a career they no long have passion for. Career compass is a website that seeks to bring people closer to their ‘dream career’ through mentor matching, skills assessments, and curated courses.
MY ROLE
Project Manager
User Interface Designer
TEAM
1 UX Research Lead
1 UI Lead
TOOLS
Figma
Photoshop
Illustrator
TIMELINE
2023
OVERVIEW OF THE DESIGNED EXPERIENCE
Aptitude tests
Skills alignment test
Learning hub
BACKGROUND
The Vision
OCTO is a government organization in the city of DC. Their mission to manage and maintain the tech needs of the DC government, local schools, and the city's residents at large. They want to provide career resource to DC residents, in hope that residents will find new career path opportunities.
How might we create a user-friendly platform that empowers people to discover and pursue their dream jobs by overcoming barriers, identifying their skills and passions, and connecting them with previously unknown career paths?
BACKGROUND
My Role
As project manager, I led our daily stand-ups, ensuring that our designs connected to our ongoing research. Collaborating closely with my research and interface leads, I assisted in conducting user interviews, usability tests, and survey outreach.
RESEARCH
Competitive Analysis
We evaluated the offerings of 5 platforms that offer some (but not all) of the services that aligned with our concept.
RESEARCH
User Survey
We conducted a screener survey to learn more about perceptions about the current job market and digital career tools.
RESEARCH
User Interviews
With a low turnout of DC residents to interview, we opened our [something] to all those who have lived in big cities, as these same financial and education barriers are present in other metropolitan areas. We conducted 7 user interviews.
Have you faced any challenges/frustrations when trying to align your skills and passions for potential career paths?
How would you describe your level of knowledge about different career paths and job opportunities?
What would allow you to actively pursue education or training to acquire new skills for a career change?
RESEARCH
User Interview Insights
And after these 7 interviews, we highlighted themes from job seekers:
PROBLEM STATEMENT
The lack of efficient skill matching, inadequate interview preparation resources, and limited access to relevant learning opportunities hinder individuals seeking new careers, resulting in missed job matches, unprepared interviews, and restricted professional growth.
SYNTHESIS
Developing a Solution
To bring our solution into being, we had to decide which features we would prioritize. We handpicked features that our users needed and those that were favored in the screener survey and mentioned in interviews.
We decided our MVP, given the time constraints, would focus on the essential and low-effort quadrant of the graph.
IDEATION
Low-Fidelity
Here are some of our initial thought processes regarding the research and goals for the Career Compass website. The low-fidelity designs provided us with the first glimpse of how the platform could potentially work, with all the key functionalities implemented.
Landing Page
IDEATION
Mid-Fidelity
The wireframing stage was dedicated to ensuring that the UX of our website aligns with the users' needs in terms of usability and functionality. Here are some of the mid-fidelity frames:
Networking event registration
TEST
Usability Tests
We gathered feedback from 8 participants to identify usability issues of the mid-fidelity prototype. Our participants varied in background, from recent college graduates to those years into their careers.
Usability test results
SOLUTION
Final Designs
COMING SOON
REFLECTION
Next Steps
Conduct more user interviews, targeting those who do not have a college education
Refine aptitude test questions
Conduct card sorts to reorganize information architecture