Navigating the Future From the Starting Line
Overview:
Career Compass is a web platform designed to help University of Washington students, particularly first-generation and international students, discover career resources and make informed major decisions. The project addressed critical equity gaps in resource access while navigating significant team resistance to user research findings.
Challenge:
The University of Washington serves a diverse student population, but career resources weren't reaching those who needed them most. When the Greater Seattle Chinese Chamber of Commerce asked our team to create a career guidance platform, I expected the usual challenges—information architecture, user engagement, resource organization.
What I didn't expect was fighting my own teammates over what students actually needed.
Through extensive user research with 30+ alumni and 20 current students, I discovered that first-generation and international students faced a fundamental "unknown unknowns" problem.
As one graduate told me: "I didn't know what I didn't know so I couldn't look for it to make my university experience better. By the time I had to graduate, it was already too late."
Another alumnus revealed: "I just blindly followed my friends until I realized post-grad that I hated my career."
But when I presented these findings to my team, they dismissed them as "edge cases" and insisted we build generic career tools for "typical students." This set up a classic tension between evidence-based design and team assumptions.
Understanding the Real Problem
My research with 50+ participants revealed:
74% of first-gen and international students were unaware of key career resources available to them
Resource discovery happened too late: Students found valuable opportunities only after graduation
Social capital gaps: Students without family university experience lacked informal knowledge networks
Uninformed peer influence: Students made life-changing decisions by "blindly following friends"
Cultural navigation barriers: International students struggled with US professional norms
Team Resistance Reality
Despite presenting clear research data, my teammates insisted:
First-generation and international students were "edge cases" (they represented 47% of UW's population)
We should build for "typical students" with standard career exploration tools
Specialized support for underserved populations was "overcomplicating" the solution
The Central Challenge:
How do you advocate for equity-focused design when your own team resists evidence that challenges their assumptions?
Research and Observations:
Presented data showing 47% of UW students were first-generation or international
Quantified the business impact: students who missed opportunities had 23% lower post-graduation satisfaction
Brought teammates to user testing sessions where they could see the struggles firsthand
Organized stakeholder presentations where students shared their experiences directly
The Compromise: After seeing users struggle with "typical student" approaches, the team agreed to incorporate equity-focused features while maintaining some of their preferred generic tools.
Solution: Career Compass Platform
Instead of fighting every constraint, I designed a comprehensive web platform that addressed both individual exploration and systemic equity gaps:
Core Features
1. Inclusive Career Quiz System
Cultural context considerations accounting for different family career expectations
Individual values assessment helping students make personal decisions beyond peer influence
Progressive profiling allowing comprehensive exploration over time
2. Structured Peer Messaging System
Alumni integration enabling graduated students to mentor current students
Cultural affinity groups helping students find peers who understood their challenges
Conversation prompts facilitating meaningful career discussions beyond casual influence
3. Proactive Resource Discovery
Opportunity alerts based on student profiles and academic stage
Plain-language descriptions removing institutional jargon barriers
Mobile-optimized design ensuring accessibility across economic situations
Solution: Career Compass Platform
Instead of fighting every constraint, I designed a comprehensive web platform that addressed both individual exploration and systemic equity gaps:
Core Features
1. Inclusive Career Quiz System
Cultural context considerations accounting for different family career expectations
Individual values assessment helping students make personal decisions beyond peer influence
Progressive profiling allowing comprehensive exploration over time
2. Structured Peer Messaging System
Alumni integration enabling graduated students to mentor current students
Cultural affinity groups helping students find peers who understood their challenges
Conversation prompts facilitating meaningful career discussions beyond casual influence
3. Proactive Resource Discovery
Opportunity alerts based on student profiles and academic stage
Plain-language descriptions removing institutional jargon barriers
Mobile-optimized design ensuring accessibility across economic situations
Solution: Career Compass Platform
Instead of fighting every constraint, I designed a comprehensive web platform that addressed both individual exploration and systemic equity gaps:
Core Features
1. Inclusive Career Quiz System
Cultural context considerations accounting for different family career expectations
Individual values assessment helping students make personal decisions beyond peer influence
Progressive profiling allowing comprehensive exploration over time
2. Structured Peer Messaging System
Alumni integration enabling graduated students to mentor current students
Cultural affinity groups helping students find peers who understood their challenges
Conversation prompts facilitating meaningful career discussions beyond casual influence
3. Proactive Resource Discovery
Opportunity alerts based on student profiles and academic stage
Plain-language descriptions removing institutional jargon barriers
Mobile-optimized design ensuring accessibility across economic situations
Design Solutions Within Constraints
Since my team wanted simpler features, I had to prove that equity-focused design actually simplified the user experience:
Smart Defaults: Platform anticipated user needs based on profile, reducing cognitive load
Unified Experience: All students used the same platform, but saw personalized, relevant content
Collaborative Problem-Solving: Treated team resistance as a design challenge, not an obstacle
Education Through Data: Showed user struggle user interviews rather than just citing statistics
Incremental Trust-Building: Started with small wins before proposing bigger equity-focused changes
User Testing Results
Comparative Testing: Generic vs. Equity-Focused Features
8 participants: Mix of first-generation, international, and continuing-generation students
Tasks:
Discover relevant career resources for their background
Connect with peers for major/career advice
Use career quiz to explore options
Generic Approach Feedback:
"This feels like every other career site"
"I still don't know what I don't know"
"The advice seems written for students whose parents went to college"
Equity-Focused Approach Feedback:
"This really takes the pressure off of going to career centers"
"I found opportunities I never knew existed"
"The peer connections actually help instead of just confusing me more"
Key Insight: Students from all backgrounds preferred the equity-focused design, saying it felt "more thoughtful and complete" even when they didn't need the specialized features.
Stakeholder Management Outcomes
What Worked:
User-Centered Coalition Building: Brought stakeholders and teammates to user sessions where they could see equity gaps firsthand
Impact Quantification: Showed how serving underserved populations expanded overall platform value
Progressive Enhancement Framing: Demonstrated that equity features improved usability for all users, not just specific populations
Evidence-Based Advocacy: Consistently returned to research data when team discussions became opinion-based
Final Team Feedback:
"I was wrong about the edge case thing. Watching that first-generation student struggle to find internship resources made me realize we were designing for our assumptions, not actual users." - Lead Developer
"The peer messaging system ended up being way more sophisticated than I thought. It's not just chat—it's actually helping students make better decisions." - Project Manager
What I Learned
1. Data alone doesn't change minds—human stories do. Showing teammates actual students struggling was more persuasive than any statistic about equity gaps.
2. Resistance often masks valid concerns. My teammates weren't against serving underserved populations—they were worried about complexity and project scope. Addressing underlying concerns enabled better collaboration.
3. Equity-focused design benefits everyone. The features we built for first-generation students (clearer language, proactive alerts, structured peer support) improved the experience for all users.
4. User advocacy requires strategic thinking. Persistent evidence presentation, stakeholder coalition building, and compromise solutions were just as important as good research and design.
5. Team dynamics shape user outcomes. Some of my most important UX work happened in team meetings, not in design tools. Building internal consensus was essential for delivering user value.
Reflection
This project taught me that advocating for underserved users often means advocating against internal bias and assumptions. The biggest design challenge wasn't technical—it was convincing my own team that equity gaps were real problems worth solving.
By treating team resistance as a stakeholder management problem rather than a personal conflict, I was able to build consensus around evidence-based design decisions. The equity-focused features we initially fought over became the platform's most valued components.
Most importantly, I learned that user research provides objective grounding when team opinions conflict with user needs. Data doesn't eliminate disagreement, but it creates a shared foundation for making decisions based on evidence rather than assumptions.
The Career Compass platform ultimately succeeded because we moved past our internal debates to focus on what students actually needed. That shift from team preferences to user evidence made all the difference in creating meaningful impact for underserved populations.
