Careers Site Redesign Project

What's the challenge?

▸ CONTEXT

This innovative tech solutions company had a problem. They need to expand and strengthen their workforce to meet greater challenges. To do that, they need to attract the best talent in the marketplace.
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Although they have a passion for design and technology, their careers page told a different story. This site had clunky navigation patterns, inconsistent interactions, and outdated content in a format that didn't quite serve its purpose.

It was far from screaming that "tech innovation" that the company is known for. Ironic, isn't it?

▸ OUR CHALLENGE

How might we create a site that gets the best candidates excited about joining this company?

▸ WHO'S WE?

I lead the user research and design implementation phases for this project.

▸ PROJECT DURATION

February 2020 - May 2021 (1 year 3 month)

The process

Research, research and more research

First, I had to learn what our team was up against. We followed the clues of the existing design and previous work to find where the problem was (or should I say problems. Plural.).

That's how we first made evident to our stakeholders that this site needed a major overhaul, not just a new coat of paint.

1.1 Site Deconstruction - We ran a heuristic review to spot the main design problems in the portal. Through a content audit of the existing site, we understood the current structure and relationships in depth.

1.2 Quantitative data analysis - By processing Mouseflow analytics data from a 6-month period for the 23 countries that use this site, I uncovered interaction patterns and country-specific behaviors related to areas of the site. This information allowed us to further prioritize regions, areas, and features.

Attitudes, expectations and preferences

The data alone was revealing, but it was far from enough. We needed to hear it from the people to understand the intentions behind their behavior.
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So we crossed our data-driven assumptions with the voice of potential users and recruiters from around the world to find direction. We surveyed and interviewed both groups until it became clear where the value laid in the recruiting experience.

1.3 HR interviews and surveys - We contacted 40 participants in 23 sites to open up conversations about how different countries manage their recruitment processes and local adaptations.

1.4 New hire surveys - Over 100 new hire employees shared their experience with the site by answering close and open-eded questions in a survey.

We found that what potential candidates value most is understanding current employees’ day-to-day experience. This site needed to shift from what the company has to say to what the candidate needs to hear.

▸ PROBLEM STATEMENTS

How might we create a ‘window’ into the workplace, so that outsiders can see what it’s really like?
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How might we speak directly to all candidates’ professional dreams?
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How might we make candidates feel as if the company was waiting for them?

Our creative direction

After our research phase, we developed a creative strategy brief that combined our research findings, the company’s brand values and business requirements to provide direction for the upcoming design decisions.

1.5 We built our creative strategy on these four pillars: Coherence, Authenticity, Personalisation and Storytelling.

1.6 Employee profiling - We revisited a stalled proposal for a marketing strategy that targeted three employee profiles within the organization. After validating the concept through focus group sessions, the team interviewed employees to develop personas for our (now) seven candidate profiles.

The seven profiles represented the most significant change and became the centerpiece of the website refresh. In this way, we added an element of personalization that was content-driven instead of overwhelming the implementation process.

Ideas, ideas, ideas

1.7 Benchmark - We expanded our initial benchmarking throughout the various phases of the project, collecting features, components, tones, imagery, interactions and concepts for inspiration.
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Based on the survey’s responses, we analysed direct competitors and websites we could to look up to. We ran a competitive analysis to evaluate how they addressed the themes we had chosen for our creative brief.

1.8 Ideation workshops - I facilitated an ideation session using a method called Creative Matrix, which resulted in over 120 provoking ideas for content and features. We explored these ideas further through a series of quick sketches and early conceptualizations.

1.9 Contextual journeys - Although personas drove our messaging, we needed to make sense of user flows in relation to their context.
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We explored the different paths and entry points users might follow, based on their reason for visiting the site.

Bringing Careers to life

We could only dream so much before we had to return to reality. Our designs had to take into account the technical, time and brand constraints while pushing the creative boundaries.
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One challenge we faced in designing this site was the co-existence of multiple systems in the same workflows, which trumped functionality to an extent. However, we managed to work around the limitations and put a few things on hold without deviating from our vision.

2.0 Information architecture - Early version of the sitemap.

2.1 Lo-fi wireframing - I created an initial set of low-fidelity wireframes with mock content to provide a basis for copywriting.

Content was developed in parallel with the wireframes, which allowed for seamless co-creation.

Ready?

Here's the result

We delivered 10 pages for four different breakpoints: desktop, tablet landscape, tablet portrait and mobile.

We tailored the content for 6 different candidate profiles, alternating media components, imagery, and messaging to best fit the story they need to hear.

Using a click-through Invision prototype, I tested our design with users from all seven profiles to validate the architecture, visuals and content.
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From the quotes collected during testing, we can tell this is a significant improvement of the careers site experience for candidates as much as for employees. The results show our design vision has been accomplished (for now).

Quotes from our validation sessions

“I like seeing what the company can do for me and not just what can I do for the company.”

“Everything seems clean, easy to navigate, and I understand where I can and can’t click.”

“Hearing the words from real people that work there is very powerful.”

“This module for certifications and trainings is super important, I would’ve loved to know before joining.”

“I really like seeing people I know in the photos.”

My involvement with the high fidelity screens was complementary to the visual and UI design work. I took responsibility for quality assurance, content integration management, and documentation.
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I also created development annotations for all interactions in each device, as well as animation specifications for the desktop version. I worked closely everyday with the development team.

Outcomes + impact

The site is currently in production. Our redesigns extended the brand further into newer components that will set the pace for the rest of the website's refresh.

THE IMPACT

> Thanks to my documentation’s level of detail and the development team’s skills, the site was implemented exactly as designed.
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> Our modular design and its documentation will allow for the site to evolve aligned to the original design.
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> This site was announced and released in March 2021 as part of a major marketing strategy. The redesign has received recognition from users, stakeholders, and the client's top executives, including C-level positions.

Takeaways

▸ THINGS WE DID RIGHT

> Working hand in hand with the development team, so each detail was proof checked was key.

> Never losing our research outcomes from sight to stay on track of making data-driven decisions.

> Presenting a variety of visual styles to push the branding far enough for triggering a refresh for the rest of the site.

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▸ THINGS WE CAN IMPROVE

> Standardizing a cycle of feedback that integrated all viewpoints from the start would've been helpful.

> Animations were hard. Making sure that when someone adds animations, the team knows how to transfer that to dev.

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