Launching a Google product
Google Hire
Hire was a new Google product targeting the recruiting industry. The product’s goal was to streamline the recruitment process for hiring teams that use Google products for daily tasks and communications.
Challenges
Google acquired the external recruiting product but it had a brand and UI that was not aligned with Google standards. Hire was the first industry-specific product in Google Workspace and the first product targeting the recruiting field. The product was not recognized as a Google product and it had no credentials to the recruiting industry.
Insights
SMBs and budding entrepreneurs are already big fans of Google products to run their businesses. They love the ease of use and adoption by staff as their business grows. Also, the recruiting world as a whole looks to Google for best practices in hiring and finding talent.
Solutions
Using a culmination of UX and marketing research, I chose to focus on three key areas to create a holistic product experience:
01 Embrace Google's familiar brand.
02 Integrate the experience for speed.
03 Position Hire as the industry leader
01 BRAND designEstablish a familiar Google brand
The Google brand is very well established with many rules and guides to follow. Hire must reflect the Google brand and material design standards, yet be unique enough to stand on its own as a recognizable product.
At its core, Google Hire believes that jobs are equally important to employers and candidates. Google Hire is at the meeting place between employers and job seekers so our product logo implies collaboration and connection.
02 PRODUCT DESIGNAdd integrated capabilities
Poor communication and inefficient processes are major pain points in recruiting. We created a seamless hiring process that integrates with Google Workspace tools to help recruiters communicate with teammates and candidates more effectively and hire the best talent faster.
Product goals:Reduce app switching
Incorporating tools like Google Calendar and Tasks avoids app switching to view team schedules and personal tasks.
Add collaboration
Embedding Google Docs capabilities, speeds up the process of writing and approving job details for the entire team.
“With Hire, post-interview feedback from hiring managers is submitted over 60% faster...”
— Customer Research Participant
New icons and components contributed to the broader Google material system.
03 MARKETING DESIGNPosition Hire as the industry leader
Google’s hiring practice has long since placed it as a leader in the recruiting industry. Many companies large and small look to Google for insights and best practices.
In marketing the product we not only focused on the seamless integrations with other Google tools, but we also wanted to provide valuable hiring resources and highlight our customer’s successes. We produced materials about Google's approach to hiring and hosted video seminars with hiring experts from Google and across the industry.
Conclusion
The Hire product launched successfully in 2017 but was shuttered in 2019. Although leadership originally wanted to target large businesses, our market research highlighted the great opportunities that small businesses offered. Unfortunately, due to shifts in Google Cloud directions, cost to shift focus to small businesses and major updates to the Google material UI to align with; it was determined too costly to revamp the Hire experience so the product was discontinued.
My takeaway
This was a great experience in reimagining a product to launch within a larger ecosystem. I enjoyed connecting research, ideas and capabilities across engineering, UX and marketing to produce a product brand and experience that meets customer expectations.