ORT personas
Some sample personas:
👱🏾♀️ Aisha, the Community College Lecturer
Aisha teaches courses in adult education at her community college. She's particularly focused on helping students gain practical, job-ready skills, such as computer literacy and vocational skills.
Age: 32
Occupation: Lecturer in a community college
Goals:
- Encourage adult learners to complete courses and gain employable skills.
- Enhance the effectiveness of her teaching methods by integrating Open Recognition.
- Streamline the recognition process for students' practical skills and achievements.
Frictions:
- Limited resources and varying levels of tech-savviness among students, making it challenging to implement Open Recognition.
- Accustomed to a world of high-stakes testing and traditional credentials, making the shift to open recognition unfamiliar.
- Senior management at the college has set targets around employability rates, adding pressure to demonstrate the effectiveness of recognition efforts.
How the toolkit helps:
- ORT simplifies open recognition implementation, streamlines skill recognition for students, and aligns recognition efforts with employability targets.
🧔🏻 Oliver, the SME Owner
Oliver's SME, which specialises in software development, employs around 50 people. He's interested in recognising and rewarding employees for their contributions to project outcomes, innovation, and teamwork.
Age: 47
Occupation: Owner of a small-to-medium enterprise (SME) in the tech sector
Goals:
- Recognise and reward employees for their contributions to project outcomes, innovation, and teamwork.
- Improve employee satisfaction and retention by implementing effective recognition practices.
- Find a flexible and cost-effective solution to meet recognition needs within the SME's budget.
Frictions:
- Needs a recognition solution that is both flexible to accommodate various contributions and cost-effective to fit the SME's budget constraints.
- Identifying the right tools and platforms for recognition in the tech sector can be challenging.
- Ensuring that the recognition efforts align with the SME's business goals and values can be complex.
How the toolkit helps:
- ORT helps Oliver find affordable recognition solutions, provides clear implementation roadmaps, and improves employee satisfaction and retention.
🧕 Priya, the Career Changer
Priya recently transitioned from a career in traditional marketing to digital marketing. She's seeking recognition for her proficiency in areas like SEO, social media marketing, and content creation. Her prior career involved event planning and public relations.
Age: 29
Occupation: Recently transitioned into a career in digital marketing
Goals:
- Gain recognition for her new skill set in digital marketing to improve her job prospects.
- Establish herself as a credible professional in the field despite her transition from a different career.
- Showcase her proficiency in areas which do not usually have formal qualifications - e.g. content creation.
Frictions:
- Unsure how to validate her skills in a new field, as her previous career was in a different domain.
- Skepticism from potential employers who question her ability to excel in digital marketing due to her career change.
- Finding a way to demonstrate her practical skills and achievements in digital marketing is a challenge.
How the toolkit helps:
- ORT assists Priya in validating her skills, building credibility in digital marketing, and supports her career transition effectively.
👨🏼🦳 Carlos, the Charity Coordinator
Carlos works for a local charity that focuses on providing food and essential services to underserved communities. The charity relies heavily on volunteers for its operations, including meal distribution, community events, and fundraising.
Age: 38
Occupation: Volunteer Coordinator at a charity
Goals:
- Provide volunteers with credentials that can be used in their professional lives.
- Connect volunteers to opportunities based on specific skills and behaviours
- Ensure underserved communities are receiving the best services possible
Frictions:
- Limited budget and needs easy-to-use solutions.
- Strained time and ability due to stretched resources
- Needs more help to implement recognition amonst his community
How the toolkit helps:
- ORT offers Carlos cost-effective, community based solutions and step by step resources to implement Open Recognition.
🧓🏽Fatima, the Local Councillor
Fatima is a local councillor who is passionate about community development and engagement. She's particularly interested in using open recognition to incentivize volunteer participation in community improvement projects, such as park clean-ups and neighbourhood watch programs.
Age: 52
Occupation: Local Councillor focused on community development
Goals:
- Interested in using open recognition to encourage community engagement.
- Grow the community in a healthy, sustainable way
- Connect offline actions with online showcases and content
Frictions:
- Needs to consider data protection and ethical implications.
- Multiple staff members who help with content development, event management and citizen services
- Partner organisations that support her work in various ways
How the toolkit helps:
- ORT provides guidelines to Fatima on ethical considerations and data protection.
👱♂️ Jamie, the Gap Year Student
Jamie decided to take a gap year before starting university to gain diverse experiences. He volunteered in a wildlife conservation project, traveled to different countries, and developed skills in photography, wilderness survival, and intercultural communication. He's considering studying environmental science in the future.
Age: 18
Occupation: Taking a gap year to volunteer and travel
Goals:
- Wants to make his experiences and acquired skills visible to future educational institutions or employers.
- Is looking to showcase his stories, travels and experiences in an interesting way for friends and family
- Wants his experiences to be under his control, decentralised and accessible for people around the world
Frictions:
- Lacks a formal platform to showcase his non-academic achievements.
- Is turned off by corporate platforms that he has to join
- Has a complicated variety of stories to showcase
How the toolkit helps:
- ORT provides Jamie with user guides on how to receive, store, and display digital badges for various skills and experiences.
👩🏻🦰 Victoria, the "Couldn't Finish" Student
Victoria completes 80% of her degree, but drops out of college because of family health challenges requiring her assistance. After many years and despite all that she has learned and the skills she has gained, she has no degree and no effective way to communicate to others what skills she has. Her years of learning are largely wasted, and she resigns herself to not being able to work in her chosen career.
Age: 26
Occupation: student
Goals:
- Wants to make her experiences and acquired skills visible to future employers.
- Is looking for endorsement of her skills from her former teachers, friends and future colleagues, employers.
- Find new motivation for her work through open recognition.
Frictions:
- Has difficulties finding the right platform to display her aquired skills.
- So far there is no platform where you can invite people to endorse your displayed skills apart from LinkedIn profles.
- Stopped believing in her own skills due to the lack of recognition and not finishing her degree.
How the toolkit helps:
- ORT provides Victoria with a guide on how to find the right platform and receive digital badges to display skills for future employers.