meco
Service Design | Education
How can we make it possible for young people to make a simple and practical career choice, taking into account individual interests, equality and transparency?
Year & Context
Apr – Jul 2020
Social Design: Neighborhood
M.A. HAWK Hildesheim
Prof. Dr. Sabine Foraita
Prof. Stefan Wölwer
Team Members
Paula Doyé, Graphic Design
Marilen Fischer, Graphic Design
My Role
Research
Insights, Elevator Pitch
User Journey
Concept Development/Digital
Project coordination
Idea
The Meetup event series "meco" gives young people a personal and authentic exchange with people during their career choice phase. Employed people, students, trainees and founders lecture about their everyday business life, so that young people can purposefully inform themselves and establish long-term contacts. Technically the concept is based on the existing web platform called "Meetup" for community management. An additional meco website allows a speaker sign up and a redirection to Meetup.
Landing Page for students and speakers
In my opinion, the whole concept "meco" is very well done! It is very appealing and the possibility to choose a career direction is very nicely designed. All in all I would use the whole concept and recommend it! /Moritz, 16, student
How meco works
Student's View
#1 The student Felix becomes aware of the meco event series
#2 He can participate by adding and choosing an interest
#3 Felix joins the Meetup and exchanges contacts with speakers via QR
Speaker's View: Sign-Up
The meco landing page is the entry point for the speaker sign-up.
The speaker scrolls through the months and selects a time at the appropriate date and place. To ensure that no topic appears twice, the confirmed speakers are displayed.
In the form we mandatory ask for age and sex so we ensure equal rights among the speakers.
After registration the speaker gets feedback about the current state of the progress and information on further questions.
Process & Methods
With the double diamond approach our group collaborated in research and concept development so everyone is aligned and in charge of the problem, HMW and idea. Since we had graphic design and interaction design competencies in our team it was insightful to learn from each other, especially when it came to UX methods. We met twice a week to discuss ideas, concepts and feedback on Zoom. Due to the pandemic, we collaborated online and organized the project with Kanban and Miro.
Methods: Desk Research, Explorative Interviews, Pain Points, Insights, Ecosystem Map, Explore & Create Template, Vision, Brainstorming, User Journey, Interface Requirements, Wireframing, Use Cases, USP, Elevator Pitch
Project playground in Miro
Project Kanban board
01 – Task & Research
The task was to create a social design concept for our neighborhood. Our idea is to make use of the professional skills and experience of local people to enable a more authentic career choice and exchange with young people. Locals visit schools and share personal experiences form daily business in a presentation format. A digital interface connects students, schools and locals.
We researched various sources such as online articles, statistics, Instagram, WhatsApp groups of students and asked teachers about their experiences in schools. We interviewed eight students and three teachers. The interviews were conducted via phone and WhatsApp and provided us feedback on assumptions and questions. Based on the Explore Template from the "Digital Innovation Playbook" we identified competitives, user needs, touchpoints, HMW and the vision.
Everything [concerning the choice of a profession] is mostly totally unclear, not informative and uninteresting.
/Felix, 16, student
I am never sure what I enjoy exactly, because my interests often change.
/Lea, 16, student
It should definitely be the school's task to support the children.
/Karin, 54, teacher
Some insights from our research:
We learned…
Internships as well as individual experience reports and advice from others are seen by the students as desirable support.
Therefore we should…
Make direct and personal exchange between individuals and companies attractive
We learned…
Education policy is also a matter for the federal states
Therefore we should…
Looking for a solution that is independent and scalable throughout Germany
We learned…
The exchange with parents plays a major role in the choice of career
Therefore we should…
Consider parents as stakeholders and offer transparency
02 – Concept Development
Ecosystem Map
Requirements for digital concept
The young people need or are looking for more practical experience, interesting school activities, self-reflection and personal exchange. These are the areas where we started with meco in order to offer the young people a better career orientation.
Vision
We ensure a practical and authentic choice of profession so that young people find their vocation.
Meetup
Meetup is the base of our concept. It is known as a platform for finding and building local communities. Since our use case requirements for a community web platform have met the Meetup features we decided to go with it. It was also a more sustainable way to set up on an excisting platform.
Holistic user journey including dicsovery phase, usage and after event actions
USP
— Regular and personal exchange
— Integration of local schools and communities
— Young people can participate in the holistic process
— Opportunity for long-term contacts
— Sustainable analogue and digital concept
03 – Visual Design
The user journey was a good base to go on with wireframing and visual design. Paula and Marilen were in charge of the logo and poster as well as different mockups for Meetup, YouTube and Instagram. In the meantime, I was designing the meco landing page and speaker interface. It was important for us to have a consistent visual language throughout all analogue and digital interfaces.
Reflection
What was going well?
— Everybody was able to contribute its own competence and talents
— Learning drom each other in graphic design and UX approach
— Good project planning and in-time delivery
— Positive feedback from students
What was challenging?
— No prototype event testing due to Corona
— Hardly any feedback from teachers
Upcoming...
We are happy to announce, that our project was chosen for the Social Design exhibition in the Landesmuseum Braunschweig. It is part of the exhibition until Feb 14th in 2021.
Additionally it's nominated for the ADC Talent Award 2021 in the category Service Design and for the iF Talent award.
It's also planned to present our concept to local schools so we are able to inspire and possibly bring this idea into the real world. So stay tuned ;-)
"Social design is working with people rather than for them."
Sommer, 1983
Contact
Marielle Lexow
UX Designer B.A.
Say hi: marielle.lexow@gmail.com
Happy to connect on LinkedIn
© Marielle Lexow 2020
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