Labor2Day

Desktop App & Mobile Messaging App, 2015/16

Labor2Day is a text based messaging system paired with a Desktop app that connects local day laborers with employers in the city of Richmond. What this means is--1) no wifi required, no data plan required, 2) real time results for the people that need it most, 3) no waiting outside in the sun an entire day fora job that may never come.

Desktop landing page for employers looking to login or signup

Problem

On any given day, approximately 117,600 workers are either looking for day-labor jobs or working as day laborers. How might we alleviate the ‘harsh’ conditions that day laborers go through every day? And how might we make it easier for potential employers to directly contact day laborers for work? These are the questions we asked ourselves during a local hackathon in Richmond, CA. We had initially set out to build an online job information portal for the job seekers in Richmond. We found out through interviews and ethnographic research that internet was not easily accessible for day laborers and existing job portals were not utilized by locals. We quickly pivoted and what started as a hackathon turned into a year-long research and development project.

Picture at hackathon alongside project teammates and Richmond locals who were passionate and willing to contribute their knowledge

research

Having just finished the hackathon, our team was energetic and ready to bring this project into realization. Our first step was a three-month long research study to ultimately help guide the design of a user-friendly system. Our two overarching research goals were to: 1) Understand the needs and concerns of day laborers while they look for employment, and 2) Uncover the apprehensions and issues that employers face while looking to hire day laborers. Our primary user groups were day laborers and two types of employers (home owners and contractors).

Mapping of our three major personas across work criteria. Findings based on medley of interviews and focus group research studies.

KEY FINDINGS

Through interviews, focus groups, and field observations, we came away with key findings that would inform our product recommendations and phase 1 design work:

The negotiation process of hiring a day laborer is awkward for the employers and uncomfortable for the day laborers as it unfolds outside of a Home Depot/Lowes.
A lack of visibility into prevailing payment rates and day laborer’s skillset/expertise is a huge impediment on the employer's end while considering day laborers.
Arranging cash for payments is a hassle.
Legal status of the day laborers is less of a concern compared to skillset and quality of work.
Day laborers have access to mobile phones but not computers and WiFI/Internet.
Day laborers experience fraud and abuse.
Day laborers typically cannot converse in English.

Journey map of the five key phases in the current process of hiring a day laborers and the associated emotional experience and highlights/painpoints

design & system architecture

For the MVP of Labor2Day, we decided to build a phone based system for the day laborers to interact with the system to accommodate for their usual access to mobile phones that lacked wifi. There was a long debate around who we should afford the choice of reaching out to the other party. We decided to design a desktop application that would give employers' visibility into the laborer's skillset and preferred job. Employers would request work and day laborers were given the power to accept or decline. We expect to reduce fraud and abuse and incentivize fair work by holding employers accountable through our own tracking system,

Initial design of user flow (left) informed the information architecture and the relationship between the required attributes

solution

We successfully built a web application that worked realtime and supported the core interactions for both employer and laborer. We chose the Flask microframework because it is minimalistic and provides enough freedom to chose frontend and backend extensions based on our unique needs. We used a relational database model as our complex interaction model required clear relationships defined between the different entities. We found that Twilio’s REST API best supported our needs for developing the text messaging interface for the laborers. We used controlled vocabularies to design the message prompts i.e. Laborers could pick from a closed list of options. Using the controlled keyword choices, we programmed logic to respond to the message via Twilio.

Screenshots of employer desktop application screens along with a diagram of a our tech stack

Product recommendations

Of course, we wanted to build more and realize additional key features developed from our research. Here is a shortlist of system improvements and interactions that would lead to a more effective product and experience:

Build Reputation systems in the product to enable the employers get insights about skillset/expertise and quality of work.
Make visible the prevailing pay ranges and rates being offered by the day laborers for their services.
Build in payment mechanisms to avoid cash hassles.
Design stronger checks and balances to prevent abuse and fraud.
Explore and build features for professional development of the laborers.
Build in support for specialized transactions carried out by contractors.
Build support in the system to enable Spanish speakers to interact with the employers via the application.
Build features to systematically track the assignment from start till finish.
Build features to encourage review from people as that is crucial to the reputation system.