The research problem was understanding individuals' thought-processes and values towards programs and communities.
Interview and survey questions were developed around three core research objectives:
⊹ Accessibility: Understand what conveniences/
accommodations individuals look for/need from programs, communities, mentors, or instructors.
⊹ Approachability: Understand what makes individuals feel welcome and interested in an organization and their programs.
⊹ Value: Understand how individuals determine the long-term value of a company, community, or program.
Discovering user experiences around these three core objectives would give us a well-rounded understanding of how to prioritize, design, and frame organization's content in user-centric manner.
We screened for two user groups of interest: mentees and mentors. We conducted a total of six remote, moderated, semi-structured interviews via Zoom - three interviews of each user type.
Participants who qualified as "mentors" were individuals who had experience volunteering or working as a mentor and guided and/or supported one or multiple individual(s) towards personal, career, health, etc. development.
Participants who qualified as "mentees" were individuals who had experience being a mentee and had a mentor support and/or guide them towards their personal, career health, etc. goals.
Surveys were also distributed to gather qualitative and quantitative data. The survey included open-ended questions asking participants what their mentorship/menteeship experience was like, and if they didn't have any, what prevented them. We asked several multi-select questions to gather data on how to optimize outreach efforts.