Association of Apprentices is a non profit organisation to support the UK's huge community of apprentices. They provide the social and broader elements often missing from apprenticeship programmes: access to advice and guidance, help with building a lifelong professional network, and create opportunities for professional development. This client’s current website is the basic information domain introducing the digital footprint. AoA hired us to propose a design on the basis of ux research and practices based on ideas they had in mind and some guidelines provided by their founding partners (BBC, Salesforce).

Our key activities were to: - provide a report proposing a UX design in both mobile and desktop environments, looking at navigation, intuitiveness, user journey and design schemes, - complete a specific test scenario – registration for a discussion forum sub-group, - prepare some example user journeys, - design proposed UX design as wireframes. AoA also requested us to create a prototype of the forum feature they plan to implement on their platform in the future.

1. Research (user personas, user journeys)

2. Sitemap, Low Fidelity Wireframes

3. High Fidelity Wireframes

We were told that AoA platform is for all apprentices regardless of age, gender or field. Therefore we had to focus on people in the 16 to 55 age group, living in the UK, who are current apprentices in all available disciplines. The list of areas was taken from the government's website - apprenticeships.gov. In the end we created six different people, each with different backgrounds and goals.

User journeys:

On the basis of user personas created by us, we developed their user journey, which portrayed our client the process of reaching the AoA platform and the desired result of using it.

Content:

We were asked to collect a list of images and key words that AoA should use and get inspired from. Although as asked we created a list of images found online that would suit their platform best, we advised them to discontinue using them once they launch their programme. People have developed a mistrust of obvious marketing materials, hence AoA should avoid using stock images. They should use pictures taken by them instead, pictures representing real people that use their platform.

Core features:

• public area / member area - client told us that their platform will be divided between public area, available for all internet users and member area, available for AoA members only. Public area contains all legal information about Association and membership, articles and key information about apprenticeships and contact information. Member area gives its user access to their profile, educational materials, forum and member exclusive offers.

• Public area:

1. articles & guides page - we added articles and guides page as a main content that could bring in outside users and generate traffic

2. about us page - we divided about us page to separately teach about creators of association, its mission, and its features

• Member area:

1. achievement badges - gamification technique, gives the user a sense of achievement of goals, which additionally drives his actions. Users receive special badges e.g. for: completing the course within the platform, becoming a group mentor in the forum, becoming an active member, recommending a friend etc.

2. forum - clients have asked us to visualize the concept of a user forum, available for members only, where they would be able to ask other members different questions regarding their apprentice. To create the mock-up we mainly applied the design solutions represented by the ReadIt platform.

Font and primary colours were provided by the client.

Challenges:

This was my first experience working with another UX designer on the same project. I had to learn to confront my ideas and knowledge with another person, share my work and communicate every little action and change. We both communicated with each other online every day, making a very good use of a Trello board to distribute tasks and Adobe Cloud to work on the same document simultaneously. All together it was a very good cooperation, which I will always remember, and Sheral and I complemented each other perfectly.

What can be improved?

From the given brief point of view, there is nothing I would like to improve, because in accordance with the agreement we have fulfilled all the tasks assigned to us. However, if I had the opportunity to continue working on this project, I would conduct user tests to improve the design based on feedback from actual members.

What’s next? 

Our design has been passed over to the web design agency partnering with Association and will be implemented into their CMS platform.

“Aleksandra did a 2-week placement designing UX and UI for my organisation's new website, together with another student. She was highly skilled, professional and calmly took on board our vague needs and ideas turning them into fantastic detailed sitemaps and wireframes. We passed her designs on to the professional web design agency we are using and they were extremely impressed. I wouldn't hesitate to recommend Aleksandra!” - Fiona Burford, Project Director at Association of Apprentices