A New Hiring Process for Technologists

METHODS & ARTIFACTS

  • Future vision journey map

  • Near-term future process map

  • Near-term future service blueprints

  • Process flows

  • Milestone mapping 

  • Maps as artifacts/documentation

  • Maps as exercises/activities

  • Maps to facilitate collaboration

  • End-to-end (E2E) mapping

KEY OUTCOMES

Simplifying Complexity: Communication of complex processes in digestible ways for multiple types of audiences, including senior leadership and hands-on product teams

User-Centricity: Storytelling from a user-centric perspective rather than from a tech- or tool-focused view to evoke empathy stakeholders

Cross-Team Connectivity: Connecting the details across the different phases and the teams for each phase for E2E considerations

Future Reference Materials: Documentation that created lasting impact and value by setting the context for multiple future user research studies over 2 years later

CHALLENGE

This engagement started with a simple request to articulate and visualize the future vision of a new hiring process aimed at top technology talent (fig A), as well as visualizing the future vision of a larger technology talent initiative across HR (fig B).

As stakeholders saw the value of the shared visualizations and organization of information I created, the engagement evolved over time into a series of additional maps to serve many different purposes - including maps as artifacts and deliverables, and maps as dynamic tools for collaboration.

APPROACH

This ongoing case study has involved multiple cycles of engaging with stakeholders to visualize and communicate their ideas at different levels of detail and across different points in time.

After the initial future vision mapping, I stayed engaged as the team refined and finalized their MVP (minimum viable product) pilot process. In addition to creating additional maps as communication artifacts (fig D), I supported the team in mapping out the entire end-to-end process workflow to ensure that everything connected across phases and across all of the different end users (fig C).

Over time, I was brought back in for rounds of mapping to inform user research studies, including at the beginning of the pilot and 2+ years later for further process improvements (fig E, fig F).

OUTPUTS / DELIVERABLE

  • Creation of a single-slide journey map that was used to promote the future vision to leadership and adjacent product teams (fig A)

  • Facilitation of detailed process mapping working sessions that connected the experiences from start to finish across 8 different user groups to ensure all decision points were thoroughly thought through (fig C)

  • Creation of a set of 5 single-slide service blueprints to tell the story to leadership about what the pilot process will look like (1 high level view of the whole process, and 4 to break down the phases in more detail) (fig D) - these maps were also used 2+ later when improving the process (fig E)

  • Simplification of the process flow which was used in multiple communication materials, including a candidate-facing FAQ and public-facing job postings on LinkedIn

  • All of the above enabled a new hiring process to launch first in the US, and later globally

  • Additional journey maps for select user groups were created to inform the listening strategy during the pilot

  • 2+ years later, milestone mapping was used to document the now-current process to inform user research studies looking to gather insights about desired process improvements (fig F)