Empowering people to make the switch no matter where they are in their careers.
Timeline: February 2022 to June 2022
Role: UX/UI Designer, UX Researcher, Web Designer, Product Manager
Tools: Figma, Adobe Illustrator, Lucidchart, Miro, Editor X
Key learnings: Responsive design, UX and UI design, UX research, Gridlines, Prototype, CMS, HTML
This project was exhibited in the Victoria University Student Exhibition in 2022.
Background
A recent study conducted by Employment Hero showed that employees aged 25 to 34 were the most likely to change roles, with 67% indicating that they plan on finding a new job in the next 12 months (Bell, 2021). Their reasons ranged from lack of payrise, lack of opportunities and lack of recognition. From this dataset, I set out to look at how we can improve the experience of a user that is looking to change careers, while being mindful that for some people, this requires retraining and building new connections.
Problem
People who are looking for a career change don't know where to start and are inundated with information from researching online.
Goal
To help users find the information and support they need to successfully transition into a new career.
Target audience
People who are established in a career but are wanting to transition into a new career.
DISCOVER
As part of my research, I created an empathy map using the fictional character, Bridget Jones, as an example. Bridget is a Publicist but wants to be a TV journalist with no industry experience. The empathy map highlights Bridget’s desire to change careers with lack of industry experience and being motivated by personal emotions and a desire to achieve her new year’s resolutions and goals.
Using this information, designers and engineers can create a shared understanding of Bridget’s current state, user needs and it can aid in the decision making process for her future state.
My analysis also includes research conducted by Employment Hero which showed that 39% of Kiwis plan to move into a new role in the next six months, and 15% of Kiwis are looking to change careers into a different industry entirely (Venuto, 2021). Further research indicates that in order to successfully move careers, users need to be willing to do the following: be willing to learn, have the money to get through, have support and consider the future (Edmunds, 2019).
DEFINE
I created a venn diagram so I can have a visual representation of user and designer goals and their shared goals. This helps both designers and engineers gain more empathy and understanding for both users and designer needs.
Based on the venn diagram presented, we can agree that both sides want a successful career change and an environment where they can get information but also form connections with recruiters and industry leaders. They also want a clear flow of communication and call-to-action and a smooth user journey, ensuring both follows accessibility and usability guidelines for all devices.
The product I decided to create that satisfies the users needs and goals is a website that offers the following:
✨ Support and information on career change, including pathway options
✨ Job listings and CV writing/portfolio presentation support
✨ Networking events
✨ Recruiter access to profiles and users can access recruitment company information
To ensure the website meets accessibility and usability guidelines, I will create a sitemap which will give me a complete overview of the logical structure of the site and include all of the major sections and links in a serialised format. This will help me make important decisions when deciding on a clear and consistent navigation system. I will also test the website on different platforms to ensure it is functional and maintains these guidelines.
USER FLOW
I created a user flow of the current user journey, including a user journey map. I explored the current journey a user would take if they’re looking to change careers. A lot of the actions taken during the process involves researching into the industry, what skills are in demand and what they need to do to get their foot in the door. Pew Research found that 46% of people rely on the internet when gathering information before making a big decision (Turner and Rainie, 2020). When it comes to applying for the job, it really comes down to whether or not the user feels confident in their own abilities.
Another pathway is if they need to retrain in order to get into the industry they want to - this then opens the question of whether they can afford to leave work and study full-time or whether they have the time and drive to continue in their current role while studying part-time.
I’ve identified that the best course of action would be to consolidate the research a user needs to do into one place so they can rely on the website as being the ‘one source of information’ for them. This is important for users as research can be a very laborious and time-consuming task which can be frustrating. Being able to link up with recruiters and industry leaders is also a huge bonus rather than looking people up. Another aspect is to provide users with support and advice on their CV and cover letters so they’re less intimidated by the job market. We know waiting for a response can take its toll mentally for the user so having a tracker would be beneficial to them. Finally, we can try and make their experience less negative if they’re unsuccessful in a role by giving them more pointers and recommendations for similar roles.
Making a career change can be a stressful and mentally exhausting task for users, and requires them to make a lot of difficult decisions. By ensuring the experience is as simple and seamless as possible, it will make a huge difference to the user’s overall experience.
DEFINE
Vision and plan
From the research conducted in the discovery phase, I created a website and app called Job Switch. Job Switch helps users change careers into a completely different field from the one they’re currently in. It gives them:
• Support and information on career change, including pathway options which are generated when the user completes a questionnaire
• Job listings, CV writing/portfolio presentation and interview support
• Networking events
User flow - future state
I created a user flow of what the ideal user journey would be. If compared to the current user journey, the ideal solution is to have a single platform for the user to get all the information they need to successfully switch careers. The current user journey flow shows that a lot of their time is spent on individual research, which can be off putting as most would struggle to find a starting point.
Hand drawn wireframes
I started the wireframing process by hand-drawing them on my iPad. I wrote out different versions of the information architecture and key elements and tried out different layouts for the landing/home page. What I wanted to achieve by doing this is to look at different ways of sharing the same information and working out which way is best without any restrictions. I did a similar exercise with the other pages that I thought should exist on the website. For mobile, I considered how the layout would affect a different screen and if it was feasible. There were no refinements in this process, it was really just to get everything down on paper.
With the low-fi wireframes, I looked at the hierarchical structure of each page and the layout. I wireframed every hand drawn frame just to see what it would look like. I found some templates online for placeholder header and footer so it would make the process faster and easier. The whole idea here was to test without any limitations to work out which structure works best for our user needs.
Following Jakob’s Law (meaning users prefer the site to work the same way as all the other sites they know), I researched recruitment and job sites in New Zealand like Student Job Search and Summer in Tech and followed some similar elements to make it recognisable for the user.
It was through this process and going back through the user flow that I decided to cut back on some pages. Initially, I wanted there to be an employer element to the website but I decided that it should focus entirely on the job switchers so I removed the employer registration and the employer pages. This significantly cut back on the number of pages and I think it really helped with simplifying the website and overall user flow.
DESIGN SYSTEM
Before I developed the hi-fi wireframes, I started planning the design system and branding. I created a primary logo and logomark for Job Switch, along with deciding on the colour palette and font. After doing some research, I decided on the colours red and yellow and a secondary colour of blue. Red symbolises strength, power and desire which I thought were important emotions for the user especially with them wanting to do a career change. Yellow was selected because it represents happiness, confidence, warmth and positivity - all things that I felt users should feel when deciding to undergo a career change. I also wanted to incorporate different opacity of the primary colours so that the colour palette is varied, but without straying too far from the actual colours.
In terms of the font, I chose Raleway as the display header and Poppins as the paragraph text. Raleway has an elegance to it, without being too serious. I wanted a font that was clean but also had an edge to it. I liked the overlapping lines in the letter ‘w’ and the subtle curves. For the paragraph font, I wanted a clear sans-serif font that was easy to read to aid in accessibility and that looked geometric and clean on screen. I felt Raleway and Poppins complemented each other and in terms of font hierarchy, it was easy for the viewer to distinguish between the two.
When deciding on the appropriate weight, I tested how small the font would go before it stops being legible and decided that the lowest header should be 26px and lowest paragraph is 16px.
Once I had a clear idea of the design system, I started putting together my hi-fi wireframes. I created two separate files on Figma so when it comes to prototyping, it will show on the correct device type.
I considered the UX Laws that I wanted to incorporate into my final design and added the following:
Goal-Gradient Effect, which states that when people see that they’re getting closer to the reward, they speed up their behaviour to get to their goal. People are motivated by how much time is left to reach their target. This is extremely important with the design of the questionnaire because i felt that if a user knew how far along they were in completing it, the more likely they are to follow through rather than abandon the questionnaire. Completion of the questionnaire is really important for the goals of the website.
I also considered Fitts’s Law so making sure that the CTA buttons are large and clear to the user.
Law of Uniformed Connectedness so users that see elements that are visually connected will perceive them as related so you see it here in the testimonials, the blogs and the events.
Following Jakob’s Law (meaning users prefer the site to work the same way as all the other sites they know), I researched recruitment and job sites in New Zealand like Student Job Search and Summer in Tech and followed some similar elements to make it recognisable for the user.
At this stage, I started looking at other visual elements for the design system, such as icons and the header and footer. I wanted to make sure there was a balance in colours and use of the icons to ensure that the entire design is cohesive and makes sense. I also used commercial-free images and icons from Envato Elements to bring the website to life.
USER FEEDBACK
I tested my website on four people aged between 27 and 41 - three were working full-time, one was unemployed and only two were looking for a career change.
I asked them to go through the website and asked for feedback on whether it was easy to use, easy to read, thoughts on colour scheme, whether the CTA was clear.
I collated their responses in Miro. Overall, the responses were positive surrounding the ease of usability and accessibility of information. They noted it was easy to locate the CTA buttons and they liked how the questionnaire was split into parts. Feedback on improvement I received included consistency of image sizes, the logomark looking like a devil’s tail with the S and wishing they could see what the final results of the questionnaire are.
REFLECTION
I think what I’ve done well is understanding the user and simplifying the website as much as possible to try and achieve the shared goals. I’m happy with some of the design decisions of how the website presents information. My favourite page is the resources and contact us page - I think because to me it looks clean and the negative space works. One thing that I feel I should’ve spent more time on is consistency of the images and gutter sizes in both the blog and events pages. I feel like I should’ve added into the design system information on image sizes and box and gutter sizing. These are all details I think are quite important for a website to ensure consistency. I also feel like maybe I should’ve opted for a serif font for the headline/display type to make it really stand out. I also would’ve also liked to have added more interactive elements to the prototype and have done more accessibility checks on the website.