Jobcase AI Career Coach

The problem to solve

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In today's dynamic workplaces, employees face numerous challenges, such as managing time effectively to search for jobs and enhancing their skills, often leading to inefficiency and burnout. Additionally, they struggle with tasks like crafting resumes, writing cover letters, and preparing for interviews. How might we create an experience for our Jobcase members that alleviates these challenges and supports their professional growth?

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Design goals

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1. Develop a sentient AI capable of effectively addressing diverse worker issues.

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2. Empower users with control over the personality and coaching style of the AI coach they interact with.

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3. Utilize AI technology to design and implement the visual styling of the coach, enhancing user engagement and experience.

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Hypothesis

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Leveraging ChatGPT as the underlying technology, our AI coach provides personalized guidance to everyday workers. By utilizing this technology, Jobcase can offer a tailored experience that helps workers alleviate stress related to resume writing, interview preparation, and career coaching. By allowing users to personalize their AI coach, we enhance their attachment to the coach, fostering a more supportive and effective relationship.

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The people we set out to help

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At Jobcase, we've identified three key worker personas we aim to support. The "Connected and Confident" are young workers in retail or customer service seeking less stressful jobs. "Experienced and In Demand" are older professionals in construction or IT looking for growth and a good team. "Overworked and Over It" are mid-career workers in IT or hospitality prioritizing job flexibility to balance family and work. By understanding their unique needs, we provide tailored support to help them succeed.

Wireframe exploration

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I developed three distinct strategies for creating a personalized coaching experience: being matched with a coach based on individual preferences, customizing and building one's own coach, and personalizing a coach directly through chat interactions. The decision to empower members with complete control over their coach's personality and coaching style was made with the goal of fostering a deeper connection. This approach allows individuals to design their coach's attributes themselves, enhancing the personalization of the coaching experience.

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Coach creation flow

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This is a breakdown of the user flow our members experienced when downloading the app for the first time. Each user was required to sign in or create an account, design their coach's personality and name it, choose a coaching style, meet their coach, and enable push notifications.

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Midjourney creations

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Our brand team created AI job coaches using MidJourney, a cutting-edge AI image generation tool. We meticulously designed a reusable prompt to ensure each coach maintains a consistent look and feel, blending a half-cartoon, half-human appearance. This unique design choice helps users easily recognize the AI nature of the coaches while engaging with them in a friendly and approachable manner. The entire process, from conceptualization to execution, was managed by our brand team, ensuring alignment with our visual and functional standards.

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Onboarding screens

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users first encounter a preboarding section that provides an overview of the app's features. They then proceed to create an account, followed by a welcome screen that introduces them to the app's functionality. Next, users have the exciting task of building their own AI job coach, customizing its appearance to suit their preferences. Once their coach is created, users are seamlessly brought into the coach interface, where they can start engaging with their personalized job coaching experience.

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Prototype

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Solving real world pain points for users

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We focused on key use cases to support our users in their career journeys. First, we assist users in building their resumes from scratch, ensuring they present their skills effectively. Second, we help users find their next job by initiating the search and guiding them through the process. Third, we offer interview practice by providing common questions to prepare users for what to expect. Additionally, we give personalized work advice, helping users navigate specific situations they encounter. Finally, we review and improve existing resumes, identifying areas for enhancement to increase job prospects. These services are designed to address the primary needs of our members, helping them achieve their career goals.

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Conversations starters in context

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User Engagement and Feedback Analysis via Focus Groups

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This research aimed to comprehensively understand user preferences, behaviors, pain points, and overall satisfaction related to the native beta app's key features: the coach feature, job listings, community engagement, and the network tab. The primary focus was to gather nuanced insights into how these features resonate with and address the specific needs of members from the Urban League of Massachusetts (ULEM) in their job search efforts.I conducted a 1-hour virtual focus group session with two groups: 7 members from the Urban League of Massachusetts (new to Jobcase) and 7 SMEs (power users). Participants were asked to interact with and explore specific areas of the app over a multi-week period. ULEM members were selected for their active involvement in job-seeking activities and their unique perspectives within the local job market landscape. They engaged in tasks such as job searching, using the coach feature, participating in community discussions, and utilizing the network tab. To validate initial findings and measure overall satisfaction metrics, a post-engagement survey was conducted.

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Key Findings from Focus Group Sessions

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Bugs

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The feedback from the testers highlighted several issues: The resume dropdown menu activates the keyboard instead of showing options, and there is no option for remote roles or locations in the job and program listings. Testers noted that the AI chat feature cannot update the resume with new information and that the resume preview appears distorted, with a Jobcase link causing a two-column layout that affects formatting. The community tab was also problematic, as it lacks a back button, requiring a page refresh to navigate, which disrupts the user experience. Other issues include the skills input field losing focus after submission, difficulties with editing job description content from imported resumes, bullet points in uploaded resumes being displayed as ASCII code, and resume dates not appearing in chronological order.

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General feedback

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The feedback from testers indicated several areas for improvement regarding the coach’s functionality. The coach needs better discernment between aspirational goals and immediate job needs, and this capability should be reflected in the user profile. Additionally, the coach should have the ability to search the web to assist members with educational needs and help chart a path to their next steps. It was suggested that the coach be trained to follow up for additional feedback, and after three attempts, advise members to update their profiles for better understanding. Alternatively, users should be able to provide feedback directly in the UX regarding their job experience. To retain users, coaches should dig deeper and ask follow-up questions. They should also network and make connection recommendations with clear reasons, and possibly consider removing less effective surfaces. Furthermore, the coach should assist users with resume editing and offer personalized recommendations.

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For a full recap of the Focus Group click here.

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Integrating AI in a Comprehensive Job Search Ecosystem

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In my portfolio, I present UX and UI screens featuring an AI coach, a small part of a larger ecosystem including Onboarding, Community Feed, Network, Notification, Profile, and Settings. The AI coach enhances the user experience by offering personalized job search assistance and real-time support. The Beta release integrates this new AI feature with existing functionalities. The thesis for Jobcase is that to get ahead, users need a network, AI assistance, a profile to store their progress, and connections with people they don't know. The project’s vision involved developing both web and native experiences to ensure a cohesive and efficient user journey.

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