MentorMe
A mentor platform that offers personalised support to job seekers who want to enhance their career
My role
Sole UX/UI designer & researcher
Tools
Figma, Optimal Workflow, Usabilityhub, Survey Monkey
Client
Student project at CareerFoundry
Timeline
08/22 - 12/22 (4 mos)
Introduction
This project was designed while participating in Career Foundry’s UX/UI Design programme, learning the end to end user-centred design processes, while actively working on a project. Human-centred design thinking was used in this process, with a double diamond strategy approach, which balanced the priority between the user research and the ideation stage.
Challenge
Job seekers desire to bring their career to new heights, but this journey can be challenging and stressful. Empowering job seekers to excel in their career pursuits by facilitating seamless connections with industry experts for guidance and preparation during challenging recruitment processes can help users to gain valuable career advice, enhance their skills, and navigate the complexities of the job market with confidence and success.
Proposed Solution
Create a mobile-first app that would seamlessly connect job seekers with mentors who could offer relevant expertise and insights, facilitating effective communication and collaboration between mentors and mentees and
Design process
Discover
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Discover 〰️
In initiating an explorative user research period, Empathy was key in connecting and understanding people’s thoughts, behaviour and pain points with their job seek.
Competitive analysis
I completed a SWOT analysis with a potential competitor called Exponent, a learning platform that helps tech industry job seekers prepare for interviews in product management, engineering and more, and Mentorcam, a marketplace where people get access to high-profile experts for personalized 1:1 advice on topics related to business and professional growth.
Insights
Free content will engage more the users
Both apps are specialised by sectors, entrepreneurship and tech-industry, excluding job seekers from different sectors
High mentorship rates exclude low income job seekers
Filters and customisable content of TryExponent improves user navigation
Opportunity
MentorMe will provide users with access to a diverse pool of mentors from various backgrounds through a customizable app, enabling them to apply search filters and choose from an affordable range of session costs
User stories
Surveys
Goal
Quantify how important is career in people’s life and which resources or methods do they use to prepare job interviews
Tool
30 survey questions via Survey Monkey completed by 25 people.
Insights
During various stages of their career, 80% of respondents sought feedback on their resumes, whereas a mere 36% sought mentorship during recruitment processes.
92 % of participants would contact a mentor to prepare for a specific type of interview, 84% to prepare interviews for specific companies and 75% for resume feedback.
Interviews
Goal
Better understand user pain points facing job interviews and what will be a positive experience choosing and interacting with a mentor.
Tool
5 interviews via Zoom and affinity mapping interview data presented design opportunities
What I learned
Preparing for user interviews gave me the opportunity to develop my question literacy, using insights gained from the survey to compile non-leading refined questions.
Affinity map
Insights
People would contact a mentor if they are facing a challenging recruitment process, either because it is a company they really want to be hired by, a more difficult role, a completely new role or if they haven’t been hired for a certain number of job interviews.
Previous mentor experience and users reviews will be key to choose a mentor.
Users prefer face to face communication with their mentor.
Users need to trust the mentor.
Filters to narrow down the mentor search is requested by users.
Preferred payment method is PayPal and credit card.
Ideate
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Ideate 〰️
The app is ideated from the perspective of a job seeker and 2 personas were created to empathise and ideate solutions that met the needs and goals of users.
Persona
User journey
Journey maps were created to further understand the experience and requirements of each user as they performed the primary tasks of their goals. These deliverables required iterations to ensure quick readability when scanning personas and refine the needs and task flows.
User flows
User story #1
As a user that has scheduled a call with a mentor, I want to successfully login on the call on time with all the call setting ready, so I don’t waste the call time.
User story #2
As a user I want to practise some interview questions with my favourite mentor, so that I can be prepared for my upcoming job interview.
User story #3
As a user I want to narrow down my search and determine my search criteria, so that I am recommended mentors most relevant to me.
Site map
Conducting a remote hybrid card sort study with Usability Hub allowed me to use participants’ results to create a refined site map.
Initially, I contemplated treating "Profile" and "Settings" as distinct categories in my approach. However, prior to conducting card sorting, I opted to merge them into a unified category labeled "My Profile." This decision was motivated by the potential confusion that could arise when classifying certain topics. During the evaluation, approximately 80-100% of participants appropriately classified all the topics within the "My Account" section, thus validating my initial assumptions about user behavior and supporting my decision.
Wireframes
Using a mobile-first approach, I used pencil and paper to sketch wireframes that allowed the personas to complete their task flows.
Feedback on my initial wireframes from stakeholders showed confusion in the initial design of the landing page, so I decided to change the design on next iteration.
Figma was used to increase the fidelity of wireframes and design a prototype, giving me the opportunity to improve my technical skills and learn the opportunities and constraints of web applications.
A/B Test
73% of participants preferred turquoise colour rather than red on main CTAs, red colour inspired them mistakes or failures.
78% of participants preferred the colourful version of the onboarding screens, a significant result. Suggests me users will prefer a fresh and lively design rather than restrained.
Test
〰️
Test 〰️
I conducted 6 moderated remote usability test in which they were asked to complete 3 tasks (login on a scheduled call, apply filters to narrow down the search and schedule a call with a mentor) within the app. Input was classified as observations, negative and positive quotes and errors on a Rainbow Spreadsheet. The errors were rated according to Jakob Nielsen’s 5 Components of Usability. The top 5 issues are taken as the starting point of the next iteration.
Usability test
Results
Insights
I realised male users tended to pay less attention to the screen, they want to go straight away to the task they want to complete or the goal they want to achieve while female users tended to read carefully paying attention to the details, thinking their decisions.
1 tester didn’t understand the value proposition of MentorMe after seeing the landing page, is a high risk for the app viability.
The way scenarios are explained to the users must be clear, otherwise a bias to the test can be introduced by not giving clear instructions on what is the ask. I had to change the explanation of task 1 after second tester because they felt confused with my indications and didn’t successfully completed it.
Refine
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Refine 〰️
In preparation for a handover, Stye guide document was created to ensure a consistent design pattern for the next stages of the project and future iterations. UI design following Material Design guidelines.
Designing an accessible and inclusive product is a key aspect of MentorMe. Colour palette passed VCAG AA test for normal and large text, graphical objects and user interface components for visual impaired users. Subtitles will be added on videos.
Style guides
Design collaboration
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Design collaboration 〰️
Peers feedback
Receiving feedback is one of the most important steps in developing MentorMe. Developing design networks gives the opportunity to share methods, ideas and current trends and exchange feedback.
Utilising my design network, three designers offered feedback on my prototype.
Vanda
Adam
Sophia
The application has undergone significant enhancements following a comprehensive review by my colleagues, as it allowed me to evaluate my own work from different perspectives. Huge improvements in term of UI, navigation, UX writing and design consistency.
Simultaneously, providing feedback to my colleagues has been a valuable experience because it fosters effective collaboration and communication within the design team and promotes continuous improvement by encouraging critical evaluation and identification of areas for enhancement.
Vanda about filter #2- “Seems like there would be more than these 4. Maybe a drop down menu here where you can select as many as you like?”
Sophia about filter #4- “This sounds a bit ambiguous. I guess what is meant is how the users rated the mentor, but clearer would be maybe "Mentor rating"
Sophia about filter #5- “Consider taking out the numbers for each section here. Maybe add a divider or other way to make it clear they are separate. But with the numbers, it kind of looks like this section is talking about people who charge 5 dollars an hour, and below that it looks a bit like someone with 6 years of experience.”
Adam about “I don’t want to apply filters” link- “I'm not sure about the function of this button. Is this the first screen a user sees when they are browsing for mentors? Or does it only open when they click on filters? If they clicked on filters but don't want to use any they could just click on the back button on top. What is also always a good idea when offering filters is the option to reset the filters to default values.”
Before
After
Test
〰️
Test 〰️
I conducted 3 moderated remote usability test in which they were asked to complete 3 tasks (login on a scheduled call, apply filters to narrow down the search and schedule a call with a mentor) within the app and they were also required to explain the value proposition of the app by observing the new landing page design, because in the previous test, one of the users didn't grasp the app's objective. Input was classified as observations, negative and positive quotes and errors on a Rainbow Spreadsheet. The errors were rated according to Jakob Nielsen’s 5 Components of Usability. The top 5 issues are taken as the starting point of the next iteration.
Usability test
Results
Insights
Different ways to visually the mentor card confused the users, I needed to standardize the element.
Elements that are just decorative not adding value or are not needed shouldn’t be on the screen as are creating noise.
Search a mentor by rates would exclude a lot of them on the search results, as people naturally will filter for high rates. However, users would want to filter by mentor language.
Navigation bar was inconsistent across the screens and was confusing for users.
None of the errors or negative feedback from first usability test were replicated and all testers understood the value proposition of the app after seeing the landing page.
Design iterations
〰️
Design iterations 〰️
The iteration process was based in users feedback, visual design standards, Gestalt principles, Human Interface guidelines and WCAG helping to improve the usability and accessibility of the product.
Rate a mentor after the call
The initial design was asking the user to do too much tasks! On the last iteration only one task is required to rate a mentor. The CTA to confirm the user rating is inactive until the user selects a score and the optional tasks are clearly identified as optional. A disclaimer informing that the review won’t be shared with the mentor prevent users to decide if they want to share the review with the mentor (like happened in previous designs)
Landing page
The landing page is great example of design iterations and how important is a user centered design! The first design is my first approach to the landing page and the last iteration is what MentorMe users wanted to see. The landing page will show to a potential user the value proposition of the app, is very important they find the answer to any question they may have about MentorMe.
The CTA to browse mentors and access to the app is at the top and the bottom of the screen, information of how the app works, its value, what type of mentors and companies they work with, testimonials from previous users and FAQ’s are included on the last iteration.
My personal space
Based on users feedback the design has evolved in having the primary actions more visible to users, providing key information to users like active/inactive CTAs or mentor connexion status, removing noise from the screen (on first designs were too much different shapes and colours) and having a list of suggested mentors
Final product
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Final product 〰️
A curious potential user is evaluating the worth of the app prior to creating an account, booking a call, or engaging with a mentor
Existing users log in to a scheduled call and rate the mentor after the call concludes, thereby aiding other users in their selection of a mentor
Key takeaways
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Key takeaways 〰️
This project was really fun to learn the end-to-end process of user-centred design, it was the result of a do-as-you-learn approach on the CareerFoundry UX programme, which made for lots of learning curves along the way with multiple iterations in accessibility, readability and usability of designs and deliverables. Using my skills in communication and effective feedback I quickly built good relationships with my mentors and colleagues to fully benefit from their expertise and knowledge.
Meet Pepito, utterly astonished seeing the remarkable final mockups resulting from my dedication and hard work
What I enjoyed the most about this project was interacting with people during interviews and user testing. It was amazing to discover the various ways in which people react and behave in response to the same scenario. Their feedback helped me realize that I had my own assumptions, prompting me to question them and enabling me to further develop the app.
During interviews in the Discover phase I experienced a challenging situation when a participant was heavily focused on sharing her personal anecdotes without directly addressing the questions. I tried to address it rephrasing my questions and providing clear and concise guidance but couldn’t succeed. I decided to set aside the interview and enlist a different participant instead.
If given the opportunity to enhance the app further, my primary focus would be to introduce a mentor perspective menu. Additionally, I aspire to provide subscribers with valuable content, including resume and presentation templates, articles, and tutorial videos. Achieving this would entail conducting further research and engaging in iterative improvements.