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By participating in the "Leaders of Tomorrow" programme, each team was given a problem statement to work on. My team and I were given the problem of Accenture's graduate onboarding programme, and how to make that process less intimidating and more enjoyable for future graduates. Our two main objectives during this project included:
1. How can we integrate new joiners into our company culture prior to setting foot in an Accenture office?
2. How do we prevent them from losing interest or accepting an offer from elsewhere?
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To conduct our research we first started by requesting some insights about onboarding with the internal Accenture HR team. We also conducted our own interviews with current graduates and asked them about their onboarding experience, to get a better understanding of their behaviour and pain points during that period. While doing that, we ran a survey within Accenture's graduates and asked them a few key questions about how they felt while onboarding and what were the blockers that they encountered. Overall our research process included:
1. Insight gathering (from internal Accenture resources)
2. Interviews with current graduates
3. Running a survey
After reviewing the data we had during the insights gathering process, it was time to analyse it and identify common themes that emerge from the research. Our framework for analysing the data included:
1. Empathy map: we had access to real users and were curious about their attitudes and behaviours which meant that an empathy map was an ideal framework.
2. User journey: as the onboarding process is chronologically linear and we had enough research data to map to the stages of the journey
3. Flow diagram: the user journey informed our ideation process for the app, so creating a flow diagram helped us develop the information architecture for the app
By utilising some of the above methods we were able to zoom into the pain points of the onboarding process and start working on the solutions. We also had to keep in mind that our solution needed to cater not only for graduates, but also for Accenture's business requirements, which added another complexity layer during the ideation process.
After crunching through the data, reading user feedback and developing a deeper understanding of what it means to be a graduate at Accenture, we realised that at the heart of a good onboarding process is Community. So we created a feature where future graduates can connect based on their mutual interests. The idea is replicate something similar to "Reddit" however with added security policies and guidelines to protect users.
Benefits: graduates will develop a connection based on mutual interests which might reduce their feelings of intimidation and disconnect.
Risks: risks might involve certain users not adhering to community guidelines which is why an administrator would be needed to monitor the activity in community
One of the main fears that graduates have when starting their first job is imposter syndrome, feeling like they will not have the skills they need to be successful at the workplace. For that reason, we introduced the "Learn" feature. It would contain courses from different sources, that might help graduates bridge the gap they need to feel ready for the work place.
Benefits: graduates will use the onboarding time to learn new relevant skills in the workplace.
Risks: they might feel peer pressure to use the onboarding process to learn instead of connect with users, which is why it needs to be clear that the courses are optional
The idea behind this feature was to utilise the power of AR to fully immerse graduates into their onboarding experience. AR games can be introduced with hidden gems in secret locations either within Accenture's offices or in the surrounding area. This feature can also be utilise to mark some of Accenture's favourite spots in the city, and therefore when new graduates arrive to Dublin (if they are coming from a different city) they can discover new locations that are verified by their peers in Accenture, and all while have some fun with the added AR experience.
Benefits: gamification creates more engagement and therefore graduates are more likely to stay in the company
Risks: any locations in the AR feature need to be checked for safety and convenience.
The seven weeks went by really quickly, and naturally, we felt like there was still so much we wanted to include in Futurum but never had the time to implement it! However the time limitation did mean we thought of some future recommendations the app might include, here are some of them:
1. Continue to build the application for mass market: look into the different regions of Accenture and where we could promote a feeling of working together even though we are apart
2. Explorethe realm of the Metaverse: to further develop the proposition ideally we aim to venture into the Metaverse with Futurum and funding is paramount for the success of a future launch
3. Phase two of testing for validation: further investigate this proposition and delve into a deeper insight into the features we offer and how they can promote engagement during the pre-boarding period
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I design meaningful experiences that work
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