L.A. County voters passed Measure H in 2017 to create a new sales tax to support homelessness prevention and support services. As a result, The Los Angeles County Homeless Initiative was born. This funding has created over 1,000 jobs both within the government and non-profit sector that support the same goal.


Cultivated within the weekly Meetup group called, Hack For LA, this project was about evaluating and improving the user experience for job seekers who are looking for job opportunities via Los Angeles County Homeless Initiative to combat homelessness.
Duration
4-8 weeks, every Tuesday

Project Type
Volunteer
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Responsibilities
UX Design
UI Design

​Team  Members
Bobby Araiza
April Monson
Tinnie Choi
Sery Lee
Nicole Doan
Other volunteers
Challenge
A job search portal was launched within the Los Angeles County Homeless Initiative website to help match job seekers with the right opportunities. Unfortunately, many job seekers were having trouble navigating the portal, leaving many of them abandoning the user journey before they can find the right jobs to apply. Thus, this design challenge was born. Introduced and managed by Nina Kin within Hack For LA, executed by fellow volunteers including myself

Project Summary 
Using UX methodology such as User Testing, Comparative and Competitive analysis, Feature Prioritization, we were able to identified the pain-points job seekers have to go through when they visit the website, hence a redesign was done on their user flow and Information Architecture within the job search portal. We revamped areas such as the Search Field, Search by, Filter, Landing and About page. The project has gained approval after our presentation at the LA County Office. It is currently being developed and continue to evolve with the help of volunteers. ​

our process

Inspect : what went wrong ?

where are the user painpoints?
 The site had usability issues that makes the task of finding a job difficult for job seekers. Upon arrival of the job board, users are forced to search by geographic areas such as, San Gabriel Valley, Metro, West, South, East, etc. Most of these geographic areas are  vaguely identified, and the result that shows on each area are not jobs but the names of organizations that are currently hiring. Finding a job on this site was almost like finding a job on a bulletin board back in the 50s, or on a Classified.

​See problems below:

key insights
Job seekers had trouble finding opportunities that fits their specific expertises. It takes a long time to dig through and search for potential openings.
Job seekers want freedom to set their filters within search results because individual job seeker may have different priority when searching. ​
Job seekers want to see the job listing itself as a priority, not the organizations. The name of separate organization doesn’t have meaning for them.
The usability issues of the site creates frustrations for job seeker when they were looking for the right job listing.
PROBLEM

Identify : what's working ?

what is everyone else doing?

Design thinking were applied in the process through C&C Analysis (Competitive and Comparative Analysis). It is important to observe and find the crucial components for job searchers when they approach various different job searching sites. In doing so, we began to notice what’s missing within Jobs for Hope, hence the key to the user problems.

what are the neccessities?

​Using UX methodoloy, the MOSCOW Method, we were able to group features into different level of importance. Crucial features such as the Search Bar, Filters, About Page, Overview of Jobs page, and Job Listings page were at the highest importance for this MVP(Minimal Viable Product).
We need to create a positive user experience for job seekers by providing simple yet identifiable features and aesthetic.
GOAL

Implement : our solution

what should it feel like?

We want to bring the feel of the site back to basic and no flares, with a sense of formality and sprinkle with some hints of the purpose of this job portal. With the combination of the trustworthyness of blue, the yellow was there to brighten the world up a bit like the warm California sun. We utilize that as the color of CTA.

​Check out some of the crucial feature decisions below.

Search Bar

An immediate CTA (Call-To-Action) to guide user on the purpose of the job search portal, hence knowingly assist their goal of visiting the site itself. 
​

Filter

Since every job searcher has their unique search criteria. A Filter is crucial for helping them tailor their search result. ​

Overview of Jobs section

An Overview of recent job posting allow user to jump to the newest available jobs.  

Organization page

A dedicated organization page for the user who's interested in finding openings via individual organizations.

Organization Detail page

Organization detail page to describe what the participating organization are like, and their philosophies, along with some practical information relates to them. 

About page

We consolidated the story of the "why" this project exist at the About page, so if user wants to know more about Measure H, they can go ahead and find out more. 

what's happening now?

Thank you for reading! This project has now being taken care of by other volunteers at Hack For LA.
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See progress here: http://jobs-for-hope.herokuapp.com/