Mercer | Mettl Community
Client
Mercer Mettl
Task
UX Design, Project Managment, UI Design
Time
2022-Present
Product Overview
Provide a brief overview of the product, including its purpose, target audience, and current state.
Mercer | Mettl Community is a user profile a digital resume to learn, grow and thrive alongside a supportive community of like-minded people. Its primary purpose is to streamline the registration process for hackathons, enhance collaboration among participants and provide a central hub for students to showcase their skills, projects, and achievements. By offering a user-friendly interface and robust features, Mercer | Mettl Community aims to empower the next generation of innovators and problem solvers.
Mercer | Mettl Community is tailored for high school, college students and people who are passionate about technology, coding and innovation. It caters to a diverse audience, including but not limited to computer science majors, engineering students and enthusiasts eager to participate in hackathons. By providing a platform that fosters collaboration, Mercer | Mettl Community is ideal for both beginners looking to gain experience and seasoned participants aiming to showcase their experience.
The platform continues to evolve based on user feedback, with regular updates introducing new features and improvements. Mercer | Mettl Community commitment to creating a thriving ecosystem for student innovators positions it is a key player in the field of hackathon registration and collaboration platforms.
In summary, this platform is a community-driven space where participants can connect, collaborate and showcase their skills on the journey to becoming the leaders of tomorrow.
Project Goals
State the specific goals and objectives of the redesign. These should be measurable and achievable.
These goals were developed after more than 45 days of extensive research and need-finding exercises. Each plan contributes to a specific aspect of a product and plays a vital role in providing a better user experience.
User-Centric Interface
Design an interface that prioritizes user needs, ensuring a straightforward and intuitive registeration process. Minimize cognitive load, streamline navigation, and employ clear visual cues to guide users through the platform effortlessly.
Visual Identity and Branding
Establish a cohesive visual identity for Mercer | Mettl Community that resonate with the target audience of tech-savvy participants. The designs should covey innovation, professionalism and a sense of community, fostering a strong brand presence.
Personalised Profile
Create a customisable and visually appealing profile layout that allows users to showcase their skills, projects and achievements.
Collaboration Spaces Design
Develop visually cohesive and functional collaboration spaces, ensuring a seamless experience for users working on projects or engaging in discussion. Prioritize ease of communication and integration of collaborative tools to enhance teamwork.
Accessibility
The platform should comply with W3C AA accessibility standards and include enhanced user features.
Responsive Design
Ensure the platform’s design in responsive, providing a seamless experience across various devices and screen size. Prioritize mobile responsiveness to cater to the on-the-go nature of students, allowing them to access Mercer | Mettl Community anytime, anywhere.
Problems
Identify the problem that the redesign was intended to solve. This could be a usability issue, a business goal, or a user need.
The current state of our hackathon participation lacks a unified solution that address the following pain points:
Registration Friction – Students encounter time-consuming and convoluted registration processes across various hackathon events. Navigating multiple website, filling out redundant forms and managing
Limited Visibility and Networking – The absence of a dedicated platform for participants to showcase their projects and skills diminishes their visibility within the community. As a result, potential collaborators, sponsor and recruiters struggle to identify and connect with talented individuals.
Inefficient Collaboration – Team foundation and collaboration during hackathons are often ad-hoc, leading to challenges in finding like-minded peers or individuals with complementary skills. This inefficiency can hinder the overall quality and success of the projects undertaken during these events.
Lack of Information Consolidation – Participants frequently miss out on valuable opportunities due to the absence of a centralised information hub. The current landscape lacks a comprehensive event calendar, leaving students uniformed about incoming hackathons, coding competitions and related activities.
Addressing these challenges is crucial to foresting a vibrant and collaborative environment for participation in hackathons. The introduction of a dedicated platform like Mercer | Mettl Community aims to streamline the registeration process, enhance visibility, facilitate efficient collaboration, and consolidate essential information, ultimately empowering participants to fully realise their potential in the world of technology and innovation.
Research and discovery
User research
Describe the user research conducted to understand the problem and the target audience. This could include interviews, surveys, or usability testing.
Planning UX Research
The goal of the research plan was to understand two broad segments:
The hackathon platform
The users that are using the hackathon platform
A thorough research plan was created using a mixed-methods approach, with each method aiming to provide us with a comprehensive understanding of the product, users, problem, and user needs.
Naturalistic & Participant Observations
Goal: To observe how users experience and use the platform in a hackathons.
Naturalistic Observation
With the assistance of the Operations team, we conducted community hackathons on our hackathon platform. The participants has to go through our Mercer | Mettl Community for the registrations process . With the help of these community hackathons, we observe that Mercer | Mettl Community serves a central hub for hackathon participants, facilitating registration, collaboration, networking, and project showcase. The platform seamless integrates into participants’ workflow, enhancing the overall hackathon experience and fostering a vibrant and engaged community of innovators.
We only took consolidated notes and did not record or take pictures of the entire naturalistic observation activity.ctivity.
Short:
The registration process of these community hackathons were observed with the help of our operations team. This helped me understand the user’s perspective, testing environment, and UX.
Notes were taken instead of recording or taking pictures.
Participant Observation
By seamlessly integrating registration, collaboration, and project showcasing functionalities, Mercer | Mettl Community has emerged as a vital tool for participants, fostering connectivity, collaboration, and networking within the tech community. The platform’s role extends beyond the hackathon event, serving as a catalyst for ongoing collaboration and professional opportunities among participants innovators.
User Interviews
Goal: To confirm the insights we have already gained and to discover any additional insights that users can provide.
We continued with user interviews to analyse the user’s needs further. We partnered with users who had never used the Mercer test platform to gain fresh insights.
We segregated the user base into three categories
Novice: Users with no experience with online hackathons/events
Intermediate: Users who have participate in hackathons once or twice within one year
Expert: Users who engage with hackathons or any other online events.
We interviewed at least two users per group for 1.5 hours each. We set up tasks for them to complete on the platform and asked them to think aloud.
We collected feedback on the functionalities, interface, and overall experience at the end.
Plaform / Heuristic Evaluation
Goal: To get an expert panel of users to assess the platform's usability issues based on defined characteristics.
We created a review process in which a group of experienced designers, product managers, and tech leads were asked to evaluate the system using Jakob Nielsen's heuristics.
To quantify the metrics from this analysis, we also identified a few key metrics more relevant to our product type than other heuristics.
The list of heuristics we used for analysis:
Usability Issues
Identified usability issues and violations are documented, categorised and prioritised based on severity, frequency and impact on user experience.Root Cause
The underlying reasons for usability issues are analysed to understand the factors contributing to design flaws or functionality problem with Mercer | Mettl Community.Heuristic Violations
Usability experts examine how Mercer | Mettl Community design and functionality deviate from established usability heuristics, identifying specific areas where improvements are needed.User Feedback
Participant’s feedback from post-task questionaries is analysed to gain insights into their perceptions, preferences and satisfaction with Mercer | Mettl Community usability.
Data analysis:
Summarise the key findings from the user research. This should include insights into user needs, pain points, and preferences.
A multitude of data was compiled, which was gathered from all the mentioned activities, highlighting various issues, lack of features and other UX issues. Since the research data is confidential, I will provide a general overview of the insights we gained from each research method.
Naturalistic / Participant Observations
We clearly understand how the test platform is used in the given context.
We clearly analyse frequency and duration of participants accessing Mercer | Mettl Community during observed period. This provides insights into the platform’s utility and perceived importance among hackathon participants.We found workarounds that users are creating to mark questions for later review.
We categorize observed integrations related to Mercer | Mettl Community, such as registration, profile creation, project showcase, collaboration space usage and event calendar browsing. This helps identify the primary ways in which participants engage with the platform.
We assess the level of user engagement with different features of Mercer | Mettl Community. Determine whether participants actively utilize collaboration spaces, update their profile, or browse event calendar, indicating the platform’s effectiveness in meeting their needs.
We examine instances of networking facilitated by Mercer | Mettl Community, including exchange of contact information, discussion about projects showcased on the platform and connections made between participants. This shed light on the platform’s role in foresting community building and professional networking.
·We evaluate the extent to which recruiters and sponsors utilize Mercer | Mettl Community to identify potential talent among hackathon participants. Measures their interactions with participants profile and the frequency of engagement with platform’s features
User Interviews
Platform Usability – Assess user’s perceptions of Mercer | Mettl Community usability and user interface. Look for feedback regarding navigation, layout, clarity of information and ease of use.
Impact of User Experience – Explore whether the platform has enhanced their ability to register for events, collaborate with teammates, showcase their projects or network with peers and recruiters.80% of the users highlighted the length of the pre-test flow.
User Demographics – Consider user’s demographic information, such as age, academic background, level of experience, and familiarity with technology.
Actionable Insights – Prioritize key areas for improvement based on feedbacks and identify opportunities to enhance the platform’s functionality, usability, and overall experience.
Heuristic Evaluation
The findings of the platforms and heuristics evaluation are compiled into a comprehensive report which includes
Summary of evaluation methodology and procedures.
Overview of participant demographics and recruitment process.
Description of task scenarios and observed behaviours.
Analysis of usability issues, heuristic violations, and root causes.
Synthesis of user feedback and recommendations for improvements.
Visual aids such as screenshots, task flows diagrams, and usability heatmaps may be included to illustrate key findings and support recommendations.
The evaluation report serves as a valuable resource for informing design decisions, prioritizing usability improvements, and optimizing the user experience of Mercer Mettl Community.
Design Process
After gathering user data and solidifying project requirements, we started designing alternatives to the highlighted issues.
The design process needed to cater to three significant aspects of the flow.
Pre-Login
Post-Login
My Hackathon Tabs
Ideation
Describe the brainstorming process used to generate design ideas. This could include sketching, wireframing, or prototyping.
Flows Tackled
The community platform was divided into three flows catering to essential user journeys.
Pre-login flow
Landing Page
Login CTA
Sign Up CTA
3 quick questions to derive the user profile
2. Post-Login flow
Hackathon Listing Page
Profile setup
Test Setting
Test Taker Instructions & Actions
Prevent Unfair Practices
Test Taker Tools
Report Setting
Test Taker Registeration Fields
Coding Question Settings
Database Question Settings
Finalise or Overview
Overall Summary
Section Details
Setting Enabled
Each flow we tackled provided new opportunities to rethink the existing approach and formulate a better solution. Multiple product teams were involved in each aspect of the flow, so the major challenge was identifying all the available micro-flows.
Testing and Feedback
User testing
Describe the process of user testing the prototypes. This could involve testing with real users or with a panel of experts.
We employed usability testing to test the design flows and the new UI. We procured people from Operations teams and Interns for the testing.
We created a series of tasks that each user has to go through, which can provide us with insights, and we encouraged think-aloud protocols to get the user’s motivation and expectations during an interaction.
We also conducted structured interviews after the testing to get more insights and feedback on the overall design of the platform.
Feedback
Summarise the feedback that was received from user testing. This should include both positive and negative feedback.
We had eight interviews with objective reviews and insights from each session.
Few Insights from sessions
The new platform was widely praised for its design and appearance.
The user flow was logically divided and demonstrated the user's journey.
The new navigation was easier to understand and more defined. The touchpoints were clear and indicated the next action.
The microcopies were clear and concise, and were placed in the correct locations.
The test platform highlighted essential elements without cluttering the interface.
However, there were a few issues:
Users needed help finding the end test button after answering questions..
There was no overall summary of the test progress.
The question state indicators in the navigation tab needed to be clarified.
The feedback form at the end of the test should have been shorter.
These issues should be addressed in the next iteration of designs to improve the user experience.
Testing and Feedback
User testing
Describe the process of user testing the prototypes. This could involve testing with real users or with a panel of experts.
We employed usability testing to test the design flows and the new UI. We procured people from Operations teams and Interns for the testing.
We created a series of tasks that each user has to go through, which can provide us with insights, and we encouraged think-aloud protocols to get the user’s motivation and expectations during an interaction.
We also conducted structured interviews after the testing to get more insights and feedback on the overall design of the platform.
User testing
Describe the process of user testing the prototypes. This could involve testing with real users or with a panel of experts.
We employed usability testing to test the design flows and the new UI. We procured people from Operations teams and Interns for the testing.
We created a series of tasks that each user has to go through, which can provide us with insights, and we encouraged think-aloud protocols to get the user’s motivation and expectations during an interaction.
We also conducted structured interviews after the testing to get more insights and feedback on the overall design of the platform.