NYU Link: Service Case Study
To wrap up our semester in Service Design Innovation, we were able to take a problem and design a service from start to finish with a team. It was a wonderful way to bring together everything that we learned throughout the semester and to bring a real service to life!
Our Team
Before getting started, our team got to know each other and established our goals, values, and expectations for the project. Doing this ahead of time ensured that we established clear communication and commitment to our project and team. It allowed us to highlight the way our individual strengths contribute to the team’s success and the creation of our service. Here is an image of our Team Charter below:
How The Idea Came to Us
When given the opportunity to create a service of our own, my group and I began by brainstorming our various areas of interest individually. We convened after our individual brainstorming sessions to bring together our ideas. We build off of each other’s ideas, while also seeing how we could combine our ideas together. Our main areas of interest included Education, Healthcare (Mental Health), and Preparation for Future Careers. We streamlined our topics of interest into two main themes: education and mental health. More specifically, mental health within the domain of education. This gave us the direction for our service.
The Design Thinking Process: Discover, Define, Develop, and Deliver
Throughout the entire project and the creation of our service, we immersed ourselves through all stages of the Design Thinking process: Discover, Define, Develop, and Deliver
Step 1: Discover & Research
Surveys
To begin the discovery stage, we began by diving deeper into our central theme of mental health within the domain of education. We began with research on various aspects of student wellness, particularly in universities. We investigated the services such as the Friendship Bench, Learning Modules, and Life Coaching to see their impact on students. Understanding these services gave us a better understanding of student needs, pain points, and how faculty works to solve them.
For students, there seemed to be a lot of services concentrating on creating “safe spaces” that allowed students to talk to someone and open up. For faculty, there seemed to be an emphasis on learning how to manage, interact, and support students on their journeys. Using these findings and reflecting back on our own NYU experience, we evaluated the student-advisor relationship at NYU to see how NYU was handling the issues of student advisement and mentorship. From there, we determined our goal for the project: create a service that helps students gain support and guidance from advisors in college. We identified our target group/audience as college students and college advisors at NYU.
To better understand our target audience and their pain points and needs, we first started by creating 2 different surveys, one for advisors and the other for students. We created the set of questions that we wanted to ask both students and advisors.
Click on the links below to see the survey questions developed:
Student Survey Link: https://s5xg2asa0by.typeform.com/to/fppkB3lq
Advisor Survey Link: https://s5xg2asa0by.typeform.com/to/sHGwQEc2
Interviews
In addition to these surveys, we conducted 1:1 interviews with 2 NYU advisors: Anne-Laure Fayard, a professor and advisor at Tandon as well as Richard Toth, an ECE academic advisor at Tandon.
The main takeaway from the interview with Richard Toth was that there are too many students per advisor (~300 students/advisor). This makes it difficult for advisors to have the time to invest deeper in their relationship with their students. Richard expressed that it was especially tough when students approached him with mental health concerns. He refers them to the NYU Wellness Center but wishes that he could do more to help. In the interview, he emphasized that there is a high need for a broader network of advisors that could help students in a variety of subject areas (mental health, academics, and more).
In the other interview with Anne-Laure Fayard, we learned about the faculty advising experience as well as recommendations that she thought could improve the current service.
The first takeaway from Anne-Laure was that in an improved service it would be helpful to have information consistent and easy to access, especially when there are many advisors and many students. Additionally, since the problems that students approach advisors with are quite complex and interconnected, it could be helpful to have advisors available in different categories. Finally, another insight was creating an incentive for students and advisors to use the new service and to reward advisors with a recognition of their work. This interview was essential for grasping the advisor's perspective and determining how we can improve the service in the future.
Based on our surveys and 1:1 interviews, we reached key insights from our advisors, students, and their relationship overall. In terms of advisors, we learned that advisors avoid discussing non-school-related topics with their students. We also found that advisors are unaware of how to help in certain areas. The biggest insight was that advisors have too many students to meet, which weakens the relationship they have with their students.
From the perspective of students, they don’t feel comfortable opening up to their advisors and therefore, don’t reach out to them for non-academic advice. Through our survey questions, we found that students would appreciate having advisors in a variety of different fields that could be helpful to their various needs.
When looking at the relationship between advisors and students, we found that there is currently a very surface-level connection between the two. There are communication barriers with scheduling appointments and staying in touch as well. The most interesting realization we came to as a group was that advisors view the relationship with their students positively, but when compared to the student survey results, we found that students don’t view the relationship the same way.
User Personas
We used these key takeaways from our research to create user personas for both students and advisors. These user personas highlighted the pain points, needs, and motivations for each of them.
Looking at the student persona, you can see that the student’s pain points are feeling like they receive surface-level guidance from their advisors and a sense of discomfort opening up to them. Their main motivations are to prepare for their future career, build new connections within the NYU community, and receive thoughtful advice and solutions.
“I am looking for an advisor who gives me advice. Someone who gives me resources. But most importantly, someone who cares about my well-being”.
Next, looking at the advisor persona, you can see that the teacher’s main pain points are the challenges that come with handling over 300 students alone, which makes them unable to give equal and adequate time to their students. Their motivations are to help students graduate and to work at developing deeper relationships with their students.
Step 2: Define
Following our surveys and interviews, we were able to jump into our next stage of the design thinking process: the Define stage. In this stage, we took the insights from our research to define the problem statement.
With ~300 students per advisor, advisors don’t have the time to build in-depth relationships with their students.
On the student side, only 29% of students felt comfortable going to their advisor for non-school-related topics.
The Problem Statement
The ratio of students to advisors is too high, which results in a surface-level relationship between advisors and their students.
Keeping all of this in mind and identifying the problem allowed us to realize the areas of opportunity for our service. We wanted to create a service that could reduce the load on advisors through the creation of a larger network of available advisors and mentors. Another service goal was that there would be multiple advisors who were experts in a variety of different fields (health/wellness, career, academics, etc.). This would ensure that students could find advisors and mentors that could guide them with anything they need support in.
Defining the Solution
To begin the brainstorming process and to open our minds to uncovering potential solutions, we created a “How Might We” question. Writing a “How Might We” question frames the problem as an opportunity to create a solution.
How might we create a collaborative service that allows students and advisors to broaden their network and deepen their connections?
Throughout our brainstorming sessions, we built off of each other’s ideas in an iterative process.
We established our final service proposition and solution as a:
Website directory that allows students to find and connect with advisors in the NYU community who can guide and support them in their specific areas of need such as stress, test anxiety, sleep management, or anything else.
Journey Maps
We created two journey maps for both advisors and students to highlight the entire journey that users take while using our product.
Our journey maps for students focused on making the process accessible, adaptable, and empowering. We focused on a search-based system that allowed easy access to a database of relevant mentors, faculty, advisors, and other resources. We wanted to make sure that the entire journey would remain short and enjoyable for the student. You search for the area you need advice and support on, choose your faculty member, and schedule an appointment with them.
Our journey map for faculty focused on signing up as an advisor and mentor in a way that respects their schedules and obligations. Advisors can create an account at the start, set their availability, and match with students! This removes a lot of pressure for faculty members and students from having to constantly check their schedules. In our journey map, we demonstrated that through our service, setting up meetings is easy! Through our service, advisors and faculty members can network with other students and faculty members.
Service Blueprints
We went several steps deeper in our journey map and created service blueprints for both advisors and students. These blueprints highlighted the various touchpoints of the service and made the invisible elements of the service visible.
This is the blueprint of the student service journey that we created. After being disappointed with their current relationship with their advisor and other traditional networking platforms such as LinkedIn. She finds an advisor who gives her useful insights and resources that guide her through her specific career goals. At the end of the experience, she is left feeling that her needs are met and more secure in her future path. The main touchpoints include scanning and evaluating advisor profiles on NYU Link, scheduling appointments with the chosen mentor, and meeting with them.
Here is the blueprint we created for the advisors. Essentially, the advisor creates an account and logs into the platform knowing that they want to help guide other students in their areas of expertise. The advisor waits to see any messages for appointment requests and then chooses to confirm or deny them. They meet with the student and are able to offer resources and advice, while also staying interested in the student’s well-being. The main touch points include setting up their profiles on NYU Link along with their meeting availability and then eventually meeting the student.
In the final deliverable for our define stage, we created a Stakeholder Map. In our class, we learned about how Stakeholder Maps are useful for getting a visual understanding of all the people and connections that influence the service project.
Stakeholder Map
We created three tiers of stakeholders: users, internal, and external. At the center are our main users, which consist of NYU students, faculty, alumni, and advisors. Our internal stakeholders include the people managing the product including the NYU IT team, software engineers, product designers, NYU financial operations, the Wellness Exchange, and the Wasserman Center to name a few. The external stakeholders outside of the system include FERPA, external providers, and scheduling platforms such as Google Calendar.
Step 3: Develop
Low Fidelity Wireframes
To begin the develop stage, we began translating the journey maps and scenarios into low-fidelity wireframes. These were sketches that gave a general sense of the features and touchpoints that we wanted to include in our service.
We used these low-fidelity wireframes to run user-testing sessions with students and advisors. These user-testing sessions gave us an idea of what we needed to improve on and fix for our next higher-fidelity prototype.
Through these testing sessions, we found that users were looking for a more user-friendly and modern design. The biggest insight we gained in this stage was when students expressed interest in being able to see their entire network of advisors. This became a new feature that we implemented in the next round of high-fidelity wireframes. This shows the power of user-testing and iteration!
High Fidelity Wireframes
Based off our insights on our low-fidelity wireframes, we then began creating our high-fidelity wireframes in Figma. This was a clickable prototype that users could interact with to get a real sense of how it works to use the product. We implemented the changes that were needed in this next round and especially focused on establishing our design.
Step 4: Deliver
In the final stage, we created an interactive prototype service and MVP that can be shared with NYU students and advisors. Through our class presentation, we were able to present our final solution and product! Through this process, we also gained newer insights and feedback that is helpful as we develop this project further. This process highlights the value of design thinking and iteration. Going through this project really allowed us to experience and master all stages of creating and designing a service.
Taking a look at our project overall, I will share the challenges we faced as a team, lessons learned, and future goals.
Challenges Faced
As a team, there were a few challenges we faced that we were able to overcome. First of all, we were tackling a complex problem. As we learned in our interview with Anne-Laure Fayard, there seems to be a large stigma around mental health and a resistance for students to reach out for help in general and especially for wellness related issues. As a result, we had to consider ways to frame the solution and service that was welcoming to students and encouraged them to reach out for help. Secondly, the ecosystem of NYU that we want to establish our service solution in, is quite a complex system. NYU already has a multitude of resources and rules that it is following internally, which can be hard to overrule with our service. As a group we had to consider new ways that we could introduce the service and embed it into the NYU advisement ecosystem.
As a group, we considered these challenges and instead of avoiding them, we had open discussions about them. Through these open discussions, we were able to break down the challenge, consider new solutions, and tackle the challenge.
Lessons Learned
From feedback that we gained throughout the project and especially after sharing our service solutions with the class, we learned some lessons that are valuable if we choose to take this project further and even in future service projects we take on. Here is a list of some of the lessons we learned:
- User-friendly comes first. A product must be simple and easy to navigate. In our feedback session, some users reported that launching the website with a search engine can be quite daunting and would prefer to be guided through the user journey.
- Make it desirable and unique. We learned how essential it is to create a product with a competitive advantage or a unique feature that separates it from the rest. This motivates people to use the product, especially in already established complex systems, like that of NYU.
- Create an overall positive journey — in all stages of the service. This was the biggest learning and something that we have been mastering in our Service Design Innovation class over the semester. When creating a service, we learned that is important for all touchpoints of the user to be user-friendly and enjoyable!
Next Steps
Looking forward, our group has taken the challenges we faced in combination with the lessons learned to establish our next steps. If we take this project further, we want to take on the following tasks:
- Find new ways to motivate students and advisors to use our product. We think that having advisors and faculty members transfer to using this service can be very beneficial. By using the product themselves, they can then encourage, or even require their students to use the same product.
- Expand our network and stakeholders. We hope to expand the stakeholders of our product to create new connections and include advisement, support, and mentorship from other resources such as life coaches and financial advisors.
Thanks to the class of Service Design Innovation and this hands-on project, we are now prepared to tackle big problems by using service design principles and the design thinking process to create successful service solutions!
