In energy and industrial projects, skilled professionals move from one engagement to the next — and the gaps between projects are where careers stall. Candidates sat on a bench with no idea why they weren't being shortlisted: job boards showed hundreds of listings, none said how well a role fit, and nothing explained which skills were missing.
Learning lived somewhere else entirely, disconnected from the roles people were chasing. So downtime was spent guessing what to learn, and candidates came back to the market no more hire-worthy than when they left it. Recruiters, meanwhile, couldn't see who was actively improving.
Design challenge: turn a passive job board into a career-readiness platform, one that shows candidates the right jobs, makes their skill gaps visible, and turns time between projects into progress toward the next one.
As the only designer on the project, I ran a lean, end-to-end research loop:
Candidates scrolled past dozens of listings because nothing said which roles truly matched their skills, location and availability.
When applications went quiet, candidates had no idea whether the problem was a missing skill, a thin profile, or timing. They couldn't act on what they couldn't see.
People were willing to upskill between projects, but only if it was targeted to roles they wanted and rewarded along the way. Generic courses got ignored.
I designed TalentEngine around one loop: find the right job, see what's missing, close the gap, and get hired.
Every listing carries a match score and a status chip — Strong Match, Early Applicant, Closing Soon, New. Faceted filters for skills, employment type and seniority keep results tight, and a detail panel shows dates, rotation and responsibilities before applying.
The Visibility Score screen compares the candidate with the roles they target: "You're missing 3 of the top 10 in-demand skills," with the missing and trending skills listed and a one-tap "Add to Profile".
Reward points are earned for profile and learning activity and redeemed for courses, so downtime becomes a path to the next role. Rank badges — Skill Specialist, Active Seeker, Recruiter Magnet — recognise progress.
Recruiter interest, interview invites and salary conversations surface in one prioritised strip with a single "Take Action" button. A "Looking for a Job" toggle signals when the candidate is open to work.
A three-step flow starts with a resume upload to auto-fill skills and projects. Live profile-strength feedback and a verified badge show why a complete profile gets shortlisted more often.
Once on a project, the same workspace handles weekly hours, overtime and leave. Candidates stay in one product from the bench through placement and back again.
The legacy product had the right ingredients, but every panel carried the same visual weight. The redesign gives each screen one job and brings fit, status and next steps to the front.
High-fidelity screens from the TalentEngine Design 2.0 web experience — from job discovery and match scoring, to skill-gap analysis and upskilling, to profile building and weekly timekeeping.
By showing candidates which jobs fit, which skills are missing, and how to close the gap, TalentEngine turned downtime into progress. In usability testing, candidates found and applied to a relevant role with ease, and most acted on a skill gap in the same session. They described it as the first platform that told them what to do next, not just what was available.
