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Curious about what our Product Teams get up to on the job? Scroll down to read our project delivery stories and find out for yourself...
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– TalentLink
– UCL Profiles
– Inside UCL
TalentLink
The challenge
Back in 2023, the system UCL had in place for recruitment – ROME – was notoriously difficult to use.
As Angela Clark, Head of Recruitment at UCL, recalls, “We had this recruitment system that… wasn't integrated with any of our other systems… the user interface was outdated, and it wasn't very good from an accessibility perspective.”
Crucially, the system’s complexity risked UCL losing out on key talent – as well as valuable onboarding time.
Looking to deliver a transformative solution, Information Services Division (ISD) and Human Resources (HR) joined forces in what would prove to be one of the most significant innovations in UCL’s recruitment process in recent years.
The Product Team
Collaboration was a guiding principle of the project; “We created the solution together” remembers Senior Enterprise Architect Sharvari Andhare, who notes that the trust both departments had in each other’s expertise was central to their successful partnership.
“Everyone felt valued on what they were bringing to the table… we worked together to come up with the right answers”.
ISD’s technical teams worked at record speed to deliver the end result – with a large testing effort implemented throughout the creation process.
“A lot of investment was done on the experience journey from an end user point of view”, recalls Sharvari.
The feedback
The teams’ perseverance and hard work ultimately paid off, with the final product – TalentLink – bringing a significant increase in efficiency to UCL’s recruitment efforts.
The institution's time-to-hire, which had averaged a staggering 127 days, was reduced to 48 days.
And while staff were initially uncertain about switching to a new system, enthusiasm has grown with use.
“The system is quite intuitive” notes Teneta Darko, a Senior Recruiter.
“We’re sending things out more professionally” agrees Deputy HR, Payroll and Staffing Manager Sarah Barry; “It’s good for UCL”.
The involvement of user feedback was essential to the project’s success and will continue to guide it for many years to come. HR and IT product teams are currently working on further improvements within TalentLink – with more updates coming soon!
UCL Profiles
The challenge
Information Services Division (ISD)’s Research Outputs Product Team were facing a key issue in 2022: the legacy system used for UCL staff profiles, IRIS, had become something of a relic.
Cumbersome and unengaging, IRIS was failing to capture the dynamic essence of UCL's academic community, leaving many users disempowered to update their personal details within the system.
Staff feedback had provided the team with a clear mission: a transformative solution to IRIS’s shortfalls was needed.
The Product Team
In collaboration with colleagues from Research, Innovation & Global Engagement (RIGE), Library and Culture, Collections & Open Science (LCCOS) the Research Outputs team at ISD embarked on an ambitious replacement for IRIS.
Governance and collaboration were guiding principles of the project, and the team enlisted a user group that spanned the academic and professional services spectrum to ensure that the new system – UCL Profiles – would resonate across faculties.
This collective effort was instrumental in enabling the team to deliver a platform that empowered users to showcase their achievements seamlessly – as well as facilitating research discovery through keyword searching capabilities within the new system.
The feedback
The launch of UCL Profiles in September 2023 was met with optimism by users, departments, and faculties. "It's a significant leap forward from the previous system”, says Professor Courtenay Norbury, Vice Dean Research for the Faculty of Brain Sciences.
“Profiles has streamlined the process of showcasing our faculty's talent, research activities, and industry interactions – all in one place."
Feedback has been the linchpin of Profiles’ evolution. The system's initial success has set the stage for ongoing refinement, with the team committed to aligning future improvements to users' evolving needs.
With the platform offering users increased potential to attract partnerships and be discovered by journalists, policy makers and potential collaborators, increased adoption of Profiles may have significant ramifications for positioning UCL research on the global stage.
Inside UCL
The challenge
Staff were struggling on a day-to-day basis with the burden of carrying out routine admin tasks such as booking leave, registering sickness and keeping up to date with mandatory training, often having to use a range of web services to achieve their goals.
The ISD Digital team behind Inside UCL set out to work on the app with the clear aim to address theses challenges.
User feedback fed into the creation of the app, which enables staff to get a range of processes completed quickly – using a single simple interface and optimised for mobile viewing.
The app is one of the clearest demonstrations within digital delivery at UCL of creating a 'minimum viable product' with limited functionality, and then adding new features over time – constantly iterating improvements and scope to meet user needs.
The team
Originally developed by the digital experience team, as well as colleagues from the Office of the Vice-President External Engagement (VPEE) and the ISD Staff Experience Product Team, Inside UCL is a testament to the power of teamwork.
Multiple colleagues and teams from across the university came together to ensure that it addressed a wide array of staff needs – as well as improved overall efficiency.
The future
Looking ahead, the product team is committed to further improving and expanding the app, which has won a number of accolades – including a British Interactive Media Association (BIMA) award for transforming UCL's employee experience.
The roadmap for new features is accesible from the app, with new versions being released every few weeks.
Inside UCL’s ongoing development reflects its teams’ dedication to making Inside UCL a universally-adopted tool within our diverse community – one with its users' needs and preferences at the heart. Keep checking back for further developments!