Triton Mentor

UX Design
UX Research
Usability Testing
role
UX Designer
duration
Jun 2022- Aug 2022
team
Personal project
SUMMARY
I am deeply passionate about this project because as someone who spent half of college during the pandemic, I’ve struggled for guidance and access to resources for design events and job opportunities, and I want to help make that easier for others! I designed Triton Mentor to facilitate mentor matching and resource sharing among students and alumni at UCSD.

I conducted user interviews and created end-to-end design of Triton Mentor. I also conducted usability testing to gather user feedback, which I then used to iteratively refine and enhance the product's design for optimal user experience.
Problem
Students in UC San Diego lacked accessible mentorship resources and struggled to explore career opportunities effectively.
User Research

Research Goal

Who Are The Users?

Gain an understanding of the user base, identifying their unique characteristics, needs, and behaviors.

Understanding Mentorship

Explore how students build mentorship relationships for career advice.

Identifying Pain Points

Uncover challenges and aspirations of both mentors and mentees in building sustainable mentorship.

Surveys & Interview

70% of students were not aware of mentoring platforms on campus.
90% of students don't have a mentor.

Affinity Diagram

Interview findings

Mentee's Pain Points
1. Lack of immediate feedback
2. Difficulty in finding the right mentor
3. Absence of a unified platform
Mentor's Pain Points
1. Time constraints
2. Overwhelming requests
3. Misalignment of expertise
How might we help students and their potential mentors to connect, share information and maintain a sustainable mentoring relationship effectively?
ideation
Proposed Solutions

1. Efficient Discovery

  • ‍Prompted Interests
    ‍    During signup, users select areas they seek/offer help in, refining initial matches and recommendations.
  • Personalized Feed
    ‍    Highlighted recommended mentors and topics based on user’s profile, reducing search time.
  • ‍Enhanced Filters
    ‍    Introduced refined search with filters and pre-generated results, allowing students to connect with the best fit mentors seamlessly.

2. Effective Connection

  • Written Prompt
    ‍    Added a section during signup for a brief introduction and expectations, facilitating informed and meaningful connections.
  • Best Match System
    Implemented an automated matching system to suggest the best matches, saving mentors' time in sorting requests.
  • Calendar Syncing
    Enabled easy scheduling through calendar syncing, minimizing scheduling hassles for both students and mentors.

3. Interaction Enhancement

  • Seek Help vs. Seek Mentorship
    Differentiates between seeking quick help and seeking mentorship, allowing for more targeted searches and offers.
  • Search Jobs and Events
    ‍    Centralized entry point for searching jobs and career events, allowing students to explore career opportunities effectively.
design system
In designing the user interface that is consistent with the UC San Diego brand color, I prioritized accessibility by selecting a color palette that passed the WCAG standards, ensuring high contrast and readability for users with visual impairments.
user testing
Usability Testing
Using my high fidelity prototype, I conducted an unmoderated usability testing with 5 users. I wanted to test out how effortless is it to find help, match mentors, and communicate to mentor and mentee pertaining to mentor and mentees.
User Feedback
final design
Design Solutions

Show yourself more than a résumé

  • Users can pick and answer a few written prompts questions from a pool of prompts to showcase the user’s passion and objectives.
  • But of course, there’s a place reserved for uploading the user’s resume.
  • Users can enter their Linkedin URL if they wish to share their Linkedin profile.

An organized home page

  • The session schedule is displayed on the home screen so users can have a clear visual reminder for events or mentoring session.
  • Recommended mentors is in the center for users to get started quickly.
  • Top articles based on the user’s area of interest.

Resources in one place

  • A search page that allows users to search events and job opportunities in one simple swipe.
  • Bookmark feature available for users to save events and job posts easily.
impact
Feedback from UCSD Career Center
I worked with the UCSD Career Center with the goal of making a practical and positive impact on the community. I had the opportunity to speak and interview with the associate directors of the Career Center and received valuable feedbacks on my application.

What’s working well?

  • The design is simple, organized, clean and crisp.
  • Effectively addressed a diverse user goals and user pain points.
  • Love the events and job postings page that other mentoring platforms are missing.
  • A wide range of filter choices help users to effectively search the right match.

What needs improvement?

  • Student access vs. Mentor access is a bit confusing.
  • Love the all-in-one concept but needs more tool tips throughout the app.
reflection & next steps
Reflection
1. There are no stupid questions.
By conducting surveys and user interviews, I was able to amplify the voices of users and validate hypotheses.
‍
2. Always goes back to the user research.
Reviewing my user research regularly helps me  keep the user needs centered during each stage of the designing process. It’s integral to go back to the user research regularly to be in touch with their needs.
‍
3. Designing for elders.
Many mentors are older in age and have fewer experience with technology, thus it's crucial to incorporate writings and symbols that are as universal as possible and embed tool tips throughout the application.  
Next steps
For the next step, I would continue to iterate my design and improve the Messages feature as well as demarcating student access and mentor access. In the future, I would like to explore the possibility of putting my design into practical use in UCSD Career Center and design a web version of Triton Mentor.

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