Powered by Generative AI & advanced Machine Learning technology, Andela Client Portal enables clients to source, assess, hire, manage, and pay global technical talent from one unified self-service platform. The Client Portal enables Andela to scale business operations by taking on new clients, in a fully autonomous/automated manner, with minimal need for, and cost of, additional sales and support personnel.
When I landed at Andela, the public website was a messy conglomeration of page types managed in a broken implementation of WordPress. New landing pages took 3-4+ weeks to launch. Even basic content changes or updates took weeks to execute. I selected the Webflow platform/CMS, in order to enhance the stability, velocity, and scalability of Andela's public website. Additionally, it served as the initial testing ground for Andela's Epic Design System.
In order to organize, streamline, and scale Andela's approach to product development, I established a comprehensive DesignOps practice, & developed Epic Design System to solve the core organizational problems I encountered as I worked to globally scale the Design Organization, & our product offerings.
1. Clear career growth paths. Throughout my career as a design leader, I learned the importance of fostering a design culture that promotes both personal and career growth. To kickstart the reimagined employee experience, I established a formalized, clear career growth path for every functional role, and incorporated consistent checkpoints with each employee to ensure they were consistently on track to achieve their desired growth goals.
2. Continued/ongoing education. In order to foster a culture of individualized/personal growth, I created a program to reimburse employees for all book purchases & led a monthly UX Book Club meeting; created a formal budget to pay for employees to obtain leading industry certifications; created a substantial per-employee budget for training programs, industry conferences, & other educational opportunities.
3. Industry leading compensation package. I engaged a firm to conduct market research on our compensation packages. With the research data in-hand, I overhauled the compensation plans to ensure they are industry-leading.
4. Cultivating a collaborative community. I established monthly virtual events for employees to gather and talk about topics important to them, like emerging technology, design & product trends, innovation, and anything else they'd like to share with the team. Additionally, I created special activities, outings, and collaboration sessions when we gather together in person, making sure we have the opportunity to do-so at least twice per year, or more. I also developed special hack days every month, where team members can collaborate together on special innovation projects.
5. Creating consistent opportunities for recognition & rewards. I engaged executive HR stakeholders, and established a comprehensive recognition and rewards program, which was eventually adopted company-wide.
6. Flexible staffing plan. I enacted a flexible staffing program that allowed my directors and senior managers to utilize our talent network, at-will, when staff augmentation was needed to achieve business or product goals/milestones/timelines. This significantly cut down on team members feeling overwhelmed & overworked, and helped contribute to a positive work/life balance, while increasing overall team morale. Additionally, I ensured there was a path for long-term contractors to become full-time employees. Finally, I created a streamlined process to assess, plan, & budget for permanent, full-time employees.
7. Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion. I ensured both design and product teams were organizational leaders in Andela's DEI initiatives.
I design products & experiences that create outcomes & influence user behavior.
