Startwise is a startup whose mission is to makes work wonderful. I helped them build a manager support tool to accelerate workforce development. Currently, the JobOS platform helps leaders build, develop, and retain top-performing teams.

• Client: Startwise
• Project duration: Nov 2021-April 2022
• Roles I assumed: UX Designer, Visual Designer
• Project goal: Building a manager support tool that's helps sales and engineering leaders build and manage their teams
  

Objectives we are trying to solve

‍1. Hiring

A job designer sequence that guides hiring managers through the process of defining critical parts of the job and produces a superior job description, that can be used in posting and recruiting for the job.

‍2. Ramp-up

A Ramp Up Planner that uses scientifically designed learning loop to distribute onboarding and ramp up goals and content to new hires.

3. Performance management

This tool’s purpose is to identify opportunities to improve performance in specific job responsibilities and provide science-backed guidance to do so.

Solution

We decided to build a web application that helps place all the manager support and workforce development  tools into one software called JobOS platform.

Design Process

‍1. User Research

Startwise already had a bunch of Pilot users as they were working as a consulting firm for them. In order to better understand users motivations and difficulties. Here’s our results:

Job Stage = Hiring

• User Question = How do I hire great people quickly?
• User Needs = CONFIDENCE and SPEED in their hiring process. They need to know they are hiring the right people as fast as possible
• User Pain points = Bad job descriptions, the time it takes to make them, the copy paste approach results in poor communication with new hires, interviewers, and ultimately bad hiring decisions.

Job Stage = Ramp-up

• User Question = I've got X people starting in Y days... how do I get them up to speed?
• User Needs = EASY, EFFECTIVE ramp up plans. A good plan that reduces worry and time-on-task, one that new hires can easily follow to reach peak performance
• User Pain points = The "what am I supposed to do now" onboarding experience, the "onboard yourself" culture, the lack of progression from first few days to big 30-90 day wins

Job Stage = Performance management

• User Question = How are we doing? Are we doing good enough? Is there anything I can do to help?
• User Needs = CONTROL & POWER. The power to track, steer, and accelerate their team's performance
• User Pain points = How can I really know how my teammates are doing... on more than just metrics? How can I share feedback and evaluations in a constructive way?

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2. Information Architecture

Information Architecture is used to organize, manage, and label information on the system to be created.

3. Visual style

Created a design and component library- a guide to maintain design consistency

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4. Prototype

A prototype is an early form of a system that serves as a model for the final version of a complete system. This prototype was created with the Figma application.

This platform involves 3 modules and more than 16 sub modules within, I wont be able to show the prototyping process for all of them so here is an example of craeting the prototype for Upskills feature within the platform:

Step 1: Conceptualising

• Purpose is to;
  Identify opportunities to improve performance in specific job responsibilities and provide science-backed guidance to do so.
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• It is for;
  ‍Employees looking to get better at their job by developing their skills.

• Users can;
  1. Identify upskilling opportunities for yourself
  2. Identify upskilling opportunities for your direct reports
  3.Choose from a handful of science-backed methods for upskilling
  

• The not to do’s list‍
  1. Awkward, intermittent feedback conversations and performance reviews that often conflate performance with compensation
  2. Too much competition (leaderboards) or too little (race to the minimum)
  3. Avoiding performance concerns until things are “bad enough” to address
  4. Using learning and training as punitive measures or divorcing them from the everyday workflow (learning as a “doghouse” or “report to the principal”)
  5. Expensive trainings that require folks to leave or pause work for hours, days, or weeksSubscribing to video content that’s only loosely aligned to job skills and responsibilities
  6. Microl-earning content that focuses on information as opposed to know-how
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• The do’s list
  ‍1. It highlights high-priority skill development opportunities
  2. It’s an actionable, fast way to improve performance
  3. It reduces performance stigma, isolation, and shaming
  4. It serves as “preventative care” before performance issues become job-threatening
  5. It’s a constructive way to encourage teammates to develop their skills & responsibilities
  6. It invites teammates to request and offer help, stimulating engagement, collaboration, and intrinsic motivation in the workplace.
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Step 2: Customer Journey mapping

Step 3: Wireframing

Created a wireframes for every step and designed every page using elements from the design system. Once approved with the product owner, I started adding details gradually building up micro-interactions and smaller features.

Screens from the product

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Conclusion

At the end of the project, the final design has been showcased to the actual users to analyse the reaction and the overall user experience from the previous design. To our expectation, the users were very happy that they can perform the desired action in lesser interactions and also they like the way where only the valuable information was presented on the platform.

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