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    • Growth

    Project Context

    • Background

      Growth is a powerful and intuitive career coaching app designed specifically for veterans. It helps veterans to learn about transitioning out of the military or looking to advance their civilian career. Growth’s primary target users include all the veterans who just got out of military would like to learn more about what they can do to achieve a successful career. Growth provides the resources and guidance to empowering veterans and helping them to reach theirs career goals.

    • It has been identified that a lack of knowledge about the civilian job market, and limited understanding about translating their military experience into relevant civilian skills are the crucial factors for veterans’ career failure.

    • Goal

      Design an app that will packed with tools and resources to help veteran to identify their skills and strengths, explore career options, and build a personalized career plan that will help them succeed in the civilian workforce.

    • See Prototype

    Role

    Conducting interviews, paper and digital wireframing, low and high-fidelity prototyping, conducting usability studies, accounting for accessibility, and iterating on designs.

    Time

    8 weeks

    Tool

    • Figma
    • Adobe Photoshop

    User Research

    • I conducted online and in-person interviews with a sample of military veterans across different branches and levels of experience. Most interview participants reported that transitioning from military to civilian careers is a significant challenge. The feedback received through research made it very clear that veterans would be successful in civilian career if they had access to personalized guidance and support from experienced career coaches who can help to navigate the transition process and identify career opportunities that match their skills and interests.

    • Problem Statement

      • Caleb is a veteran who needs career coaching tools like personalized guidance, support, and resources specifically for veterans because he wants to successfully navigate the transition to civilian careers and achieve his career aspirations.

    It is a real struggle to translate my military experience into relevant civilian skills and I’m very unsure how to navigate the job markets.

    My current job is not utilizing my full potential and is worried about being stuck in a dead-end career.

    I feel like it’s a constant pressure for me to find a well-paying job quickly.

    Voices from User Interviews

    Building Empathy

    • Caleb is a veteran who served in the Army for 10 years and currently working in a low-paying job in the retail industry.He is highly motivated and eager to learn new skills. He spends a lot of time researching job opportunities and reading about career development strategies online. John is comfortable using technology and prefers to access resources and support online. But majority of the time he gets frustrated because most of the online resources and career coaching are not veteran friendly.
      Goals:
      • Provide financial stability for his family
      • Find a fulfilling and well-paying career that utilizes his skills and military experience
      • Make use of the education benefits he received through the military

    I did a quick ideation exercise to come up with ideas. My focuses were find the coach in an efficient way and easy scheduling process.

    Starting the Design

    • Digital Wireframes

      After ideating and drafting some paper wireframes, I created the initial designs for the Food Saver app. These designs focused on delivering personalized guidance to users to help manage their career goals.

    • Lo Fi

    To prepare for usability testing, I created a low-fidelity prototype that connected the user flow. These were the main findings uncovered by the usability study:

    1

    People had hard time with smaller “sign up” button

    2

    People had difficulty knowing the upcoming events in account page

    3

    People preferred to go back to account after scheduling

    Final Design

    • Key Mockups

      Based on the insights from the usability studies, I applied design changes like providing a clear big button "Get Started" on home screen to create account and going further. Additional design changes included adding a section “Upcoming Events” on the account page, and providing a clearer indication of when is the next meeting with their coach. Here I am displaying some important mockups:

    • High-fidelity Prototype

      The high-fidelity prototype followed the same user flow as the low-fidelity prototype, including design changes made after the usability study.

    • flower it high fidelity prototype image

    Reflection

    • Impact

      Our target users shared that Growth app can be a game-changer in their transition to civilian careers by providing personalized guidance, support, and resources.

    • What I learned

      I learned that even though the problem I was trying to solve was a big one, diligently going through each step of the design process and aligning with specific user needs helped me come up with solutions that were both feasible and useful.