Enhancing Digital Student Experience in Employability

Kylie Ebert, Director Student Life at Macquarie University.

Kylie Ebert, Director Student Life at Macquarie University.

In universities, digital strategies often focus on enterprise systems in the traditional areas of learning management, student administration, curriculum design and approval, human resources and finance. Systems or platforms in student support areas are usually considered lower priority, are sometimes neglected by IT specialists given stretched resources, and may be left to the business areas to manage with goodwill and good intentions. Such systems are rarely leveraged to their full functionality and offer a poor user experience for students.

In 2021, Macquarie University embarked on a strategic project to transform the students’ digital experience in careers and employability. Directly aligned with two of the six pillars of the institution’s Operating Plan 2022-2024 – namely, Students First and Digital Transformation – the high priority project was ambitious.

“Systems or platforms in student support areas are usually considered lower priority, are sometimes neglected by IT specialists given stretched resources, and may be left to the business areas to manage with goodwill and good intentions.”

The on-premise version of CareerHub, from Symplicity, was no longer effectively maintained and represented a significant security and business continuity risk, particularly after pivoting to online careers services during COVID-19. Careers staff knew the system basics but had limited technical capability to utilise workflows, and high-volume recruitment processes for student jobs were managed in Excel spreadsheets and Outlook. Eight years since implementation, the student interface was long overdue for a facelift and student usage of the platform was lower than at similar universities in the Australian sector.

A transformational scope of work

Collaboration between the Employability & Graduate Success portfolio, IT Services and Symplicity saw the transformational scope of work for CareerHub delivered in seven months from June to December 2021, including-

• cloud migration

• CareerHub systems upgrade

• a new student interface / portal, Employability Connect, for refreshed content, resources, and workflows

• a Talent module to manage recruitment processes for student jobs and related employability opportunities, and

• a new online portal for employers and industry partners called MQ Employer Connect.

One of the significant success factors in the project was that the scope of work was proposed and approved in manageable tranches. After successful delivery of early phases, latter phases were approved to maintain momentum of the project team and extend return on investment.

Key project challenges

Most IT projects will face some issues along the way – budget, deadlines, and variations of scope – but on this project, it was relatively smooth sailing on all those fronts thanks to the professionalism of IT Services and Symplicity.

The most challenging aspects related to fundamental business issues within the Employability & Graduate Success team. Firstly, the scale of effort required for redevelopment of content and resources was underestimated and difficult to progress whilst the team juggled everyday operations. Secondly, additional teams within the Employability & Graduate Success portfolio started utilising the Employability Connect platform to engage students and the rapid expansion of users required planning and consideration of user roles in a way that had not initially been considered. And thirdly, the decision to have a small project team had the unintended side effect that not everyone in the portfolio connected to the vision and strategy, giving rise to some change management issues during the project.

Rookie errors some would say!

However, clear communication within the project team meant that pragmatic decisions were made to keep on track. The importance of training and development was also recognised for the Employability & Graduate Success portfolio. And we now know that the effort to maintain, update and improve content is never-ending, just like painting the Sydney Harbour Bridge!

If you build it, will they actually come?

With the utmost respect for Kevin Costner in Field of Dreams, it’s a tough question to ask about an IT system in a student support area.

Yes, careers, jobs and employability will be on the minds of all university students at some point during their journey, but will students actually use the services and resources available to them? Will a new careers and employability platform be the answer to better student engagement? Can staff see evidence of their impact through the digital platform?

Almost a year down the track, we have asked ourselves these questions.

Year-to-date data to the end of October 2022 provides many positive indicators that “they” are in fact coming – both students and employers/ partners.

• Total logins have increased by 40 percent and there has been a 19 percent increase in distinct user logins compared to the same period last year.

• Monthly logins for current students have ranged from 10,400 to 15,100 in 2022 compared to a range of 3,000 and 9,800 in 2021.

• There has been a phenomenal increase in resource views – almost 20 times more in 2022 from 1,800 to 37,000.

• For employers, there has been a 20 percent increase in distinct organisation logins and a 33% increase in jobs posted compared to the same period last year.

• And for the Macquarie Student Employment team, they’d already exceeded the 2021 total number of applications (4,500) by the end of June 2022.

These are just a few examples of what has been achieved in the first year of Employability Connect at Macquarie University and with the enhanced reporting capability, we will continue to ask many more questions.

For 2023, our attention has turned to-

• refining the data model and service metrics

• aligning insights about students’ digital behaviours with feedback from more traditional sources such as student surveys

• exploring ways to further personalise the students’ experience across their career journey

• and making more agile changes to the delivery of careers and employability services to meet the needs of students at Macquarie University.