SUTD — Doing what it says on the box
As a workplace learning edtech platform, ArcLab collaborates with our Institutes of Higher Learning (“IHL”), who nurture industry-ready students, e.g. I previously wrote about Singapore Polytechnic.
Today I’ll share about one of Singapore’s newer IHLs— Singapore University of Technology & Design (“SUTD”). Here are 3 SUTD stories we’ve privileged to be a part of.
“The Intern” — starring SUTD student Sylvia (& ArcLab)
In the depths of last April’s COVID-19 lockdown, I received an email from Sylvia, a mechanical engineering student from SUTD’s Engineering Product Development Pillar. Sylvia had just returned from her exchange programme in Silicon Valley.
As ArcLab is a Mobile Learning SaaS platform… we wouldn’t have much (tbh zero) mechanical engineering work for Sylvia to do 😅 . But Sylvia’s CV showcased various interesting design projects, she had strong interest in technology design & development and aspires to be an entrepreneur that improves the lives of others. Sylvia also built & included an ArcLab module of herself in her email (talk about impressing a prospective employer!). We Zoom-terviewed , and took Sylvia on as a UX/UI Design + Business intern.
Sylvia worked on a variety of projects for ArcLab. To quote from her internship report: “(she) worked on many feature designs, created a marketing sales pack, designed public education modules, and came up a plan to increase product virality”.
We incorporated several of Sylvia’s UX/UI Designs, e.g.:
(i) Unscramble — ArcLab’s newest Assessment Screen, used to test learners as a question midway between MCQ & OEQ difficulty levels. Sylvia’s design was improved upon by Estee (more about her beneath) when she implemented it.
(ii) OEQ Auto-Grading— Saving L&D managers & trainers hours in grading time. ArcLab’s grading engine takes care of everything, with results displayed automatically in our Learner Analytics dashboard.
ArcLab’s vision is to Upskill the World’s Deskless Workforce through building the World’s Simplest Learning System.
In ArcLab, there is no room for complexity, as it would get in the way of learning. Hence, great design always needs to be weaved in with our tech — so it is fuss-free and seamless to ArcLab’s users and learners.
Sylvia’s education in engineering intersected well with her interest and learning in design — she is what SUTD says on the box.
“Hidden Figures” — starring SUTD graduate Estee (& ArcLab)
Estee is an SUTD Information Systems, Technology & Design Honours Graduate, who worked with ArcLab as a Software Engineer under the SGUnited Traineeship scheme.
Estee had impressive work ethic and quickly hit the ground running to build ArcLab features and fix challenging bugs. Ever thoughtful about good design to help the user adopt ArcLab, she took it upon herself to design and implement ArcLab features. Essentially she played the role of UX/UI designer AND developer, which made the features she built intuitively usable for ArcLab users & learners.
ArcLab features that Estee helped build and design included:
(i) Unscramble assessment screen described above.
(ii) An upgraded Form Screen which ArcLab customers used for visitor registration (very useful during COVID-19).
(iii) The ArcLab Learner Dashboard, built specially for Deskless Workers.
Estee augmented Sylvia’s original design by looking further into the unique requirements and problems faced by a Deskless Worker who would otherwise been forced to use a feature-rich but clunky alternative LMS made for desktop, on their phones.
So Estee designed the ArcLab Learner Dashboard from the ground up, taking into account the above, and making the UX seamless for the learner, as well as for the L&D Manager / Trainer building and assigning modules to staff.
Estee also applied her experience from working in larger teams at GovTech in her previous internships, and took great initiative to propose good product and project management processes for the ArcLab team which we had just started to build last year.
We lapped them up and eagerly took them on board, ever-learning as we build the ArcLab core team.
Estee’s education in (and love for) Tech & Design empowered her with a great toolkit as she put her skills to good use helping us build ArcLab — She is exactly what SUTD says on the box.
ArcLab is grateful for the opportunity to work with Sylvia and Estee. We credit them both in our alumni list, acknowledging their role in building (and imprinting SUTD’s DNA into) ArcLab’s early foundations. They were also pleasant young ladies whom the team enjoyed working with. We’re honoured they chose to spend time working with us.
“The Office” — starring SUTD OD & HR team (& ArcLab)
ArcLab also has the privilege to count SUTD as one of our platform’s customers. We first met the forward-thinking and energetic OD & HR team of Adeline & Sharon in late-2019, before COVID became a word.
Already thinking ahead of workplace trends of that time, the SUTD OD & HR team looked into ArcLab as a way to easily onboard new staff and educate them on different aspects of the excellent organisation that they were joining.
Adeline & Sharon pushed the boundaries of our platform (we love power users like them), and we listen to their feedback as we continue to build out the ArcLab platform.
Looking back at the early days of ArcLab in 2019, we are grateful for how Adeline & Sharon used ArcLab, and generously helped us on our early prototypes with feedback and suggestions (fun fact: we incorporated Folder Sharing into the ArcLab Learner Dashboard after a conversation with them).
I’m humbled to end this story by sharing Adeline’s review of ArcLab on G2. We’ll keep working to continue to earn her (and your) trust, by making ArcLab better and better.
We remain as always, in #Day1.
We’re grateful for the privilege to serve Singapore University of Technology & Design, one of Singapore’s youngest universities, and be part of their stories.
May SUTD continue to produce more Sylvias and more Estees — who are exactly what SUTD says on the box, and are instrumental in building impactful product that uplifts lives and livelihoods, as what ArcLab seeks to do — to Upskill the World’s Deskless Workforce.
- References: “The Intern”, “Hidden Figures”, “The Office”. Please take these movie references with a pinch of salt, and humour. 😊
