Job Platform for the Previously Incarcerated
By: Laura Meng
Tags: UX, Social Impact, Design, Mobile, Case Study

My Roles:

Market and user research

Sketching

Wireframing

Prototyping

User testing

Visual design

Background

U.S. spends $87 billion a year imprisoning more than two million people, the largest official prison population in the world. Among the 620,000+ individuals released from prison each year, one third will return to prison at some point. While there are a number of predictors for recidivism, finding employment is one of the most important steps to assimilating back into society.

Aiming to help people break the cycle of incarceration by leveraging the power of technology and community, I decided to design an app to help the previously incarcerated obtain employment.

Research

Job platforms serve as a bridge between two distinct groups of users that interact with one another through a barricade of subjective experiences and perceptions. The challenge here is to dismantle this barricade, so we can build an environment that fosters authentic connections and objective assessment. For this reason, the research phase for this project is dedicated to understanding the motivation and behaviors of both job seekers and employers.

Research Goals

Who are the job seekers?

How do job seekers with criminal records currently look for a job? What do they like and dislike about the current process?

How do job seekers address the challenges they face in the current process?

Who are the employers?

How do employers currently think about hiring people with criminal records? What factors contribute to this point of view?

How do we define success?

Research Methods

Market Research. To gain a basic understanding of the current narrative, trends and policies around hiring the previously incarcerated

To gain a basic understanding of the current narrative, trends and policies around hiring the previously incarcerated Competitive Analysis. To understand how primary and secondary competitors position themselves (value propositions), how they are received by both groups of users and what features are required

To understand how primary and secondary competitors position themselves (value propositions), how they are received by both groups of users and what features are required One-on-one Interviews. To deep-dive into the needs, pain points, motivations and behaviors of both groups of users (given my limited time and resources, I reached out to support programs, placement agencies and other intermediary players in the field that can provide crucial insights on both groups of users)

Define

Affinity Map

By recording interview observations on sticky notes and organizing them based on common themes, I discovered that, even when inherent barriers such as habitual behaviors and lack of qualifications don’t exist, an external barrier persists in the form of employers’ unwavering prejudice, which is constantly fueled by a lifeless record from the past instead of the ever-evolving reality beyond it.

Despite my time in prison, I considered myself trustworthy and responsible — the type of guy who would get the job done. I figured that desire — the willingness to work hard — would earn me a job, but failed to account for the discrimination ex-cons face…All people saw was that criminal record. (Source)

Using criminal records as a proxy indicator of these job seekers’ motivations and behaviors, we create a subjective social reality that often deviates from its objective counterpart in the following ways:

Story Board

To better understand the interaction between these subjective and objective realities, as well as the former’s impact on job seekers, I created a storyboard by mapping out the emotional journeys of both the job seeker and employer. This process forced me to not only think about what the user is thinking or feeling, but also anticipate their needs and pain points. For example, I found myself asking questions like: what was the job seeker’s experience in prison; how did that affect his/her mindset upon release; and what other factors may have influenced his/her thinking.

POV

One thing became clear through the story board: having no insight into Doug’s thoughts, feelings and experiences, the manager naturally fabricated Doug’s identity in his own mind based on the one thing that seemingly provides a peep into Doug’s inner world — his criminal record.

Due to our social construct of crime (e.g., portrayal of criminals in true crime documentaries), this fabricated identity typically takes on qualities that strip away one’s humanity and categorizes them as “others”, making it easy for us to dissociate ourselves from them and withhold empathy. As illustrated, when the manager called back to rescind the job offer, he reacted out of his fears without considering what it looks like on the other side of his reaction.

This leads to the problem statement below:

Job seekers need a way to demonstrate their true selves and shared humanity because employers dehumanize them based on their criminal record.

Ideate

How Might We Statements

I reframed the above POV into opportunities through HMW statements to jumpstart the brainstorming session.

I narrowed it down to three statements (bolded below) based on scope, impact and relevance. Each of the bolded HMWs explores a different player in the problem — job applicants, employers and the wider cultural influences.

Help job applicants demonstrate their humanity?

Help employers become more compassionate towards these job applicants?

Disassociate criminal records from negative definition / Associate criminal records with positive definition?

Present the job candidates as next-door neighbors instead of past criminals?

Prevent employers from seeing their criminal records?

Remove the job searching process?

Brainstorming

I decided to use the rapid ideation technique because I believe operating within a time limit can maximize productivity and results. Also, it is easy to get side-tracked and forget your main goal when you are working alone, so I appreciate the pressure that comes with the time limit because it keeps me tunnel-visioned throughout.

Feature Roadmap

I then organized the ideas above into a feature roadmap and prioritized them based on impact vs. effort.

Site Map

I used a site map to organize the high priority product features shown above.

Wireframing

After getting a better understanding of the screens and features required, I then sketched out ideas on how to organize the features on each screen.