Why do some staff use University profiles more than others? Understanding perspectives of different staff groups
Hearing from 40 academic and professional services staff across various Schools and business units revealed why some groups of staff underused profiles compared to others and provided insights into the relative needs and preferences of different groups of staff.
Analysis of UUN data associated with staff profiles published on EdWeb as part of the Role of Profiles project showed there were some groups of staff who used profiles less than others, in particular:
- Professional services staff compared to academic staff
- Staff from the College of Science and Engineering (CSE) compared to staff from the other Colleges
- Younger staff and staff on lower-grade roles (compared to the University population)
Read more about this research and the project in the related blog posts:
Current usage of University staff profiles – initial insights from The Role of Profiles project
The Role of Profiles: our new project researching needs and potential for online profiles
Through interviews with staff, the UX team behind the project sought to understand reasons behind this disparate use, and in the process to identify factors that may help shape an improved profile provision to appeal to more staff.
Read more about the interview process in the related blog post:
Use of profiles by professional services staff compared to academic staff
To understand why fewer professional services published profiles than academics, the UX team sought interviews with as wide a range of professional services staff as possible to gain a representative understanding of their needs and circumstances. In total, 19 professional services staff were interviewed, compared to 20 academics.
Professional services staff spoke about profiles of academic colleagues rather than their own
Interviews typically began by engaging staff to talk about profiles that belonged to them, adopting the profile-owner perspective. Most professional services staff had little to say about their own profiles, however, instead they shared details about coordinating the profiles of colleagues or searching others’ profiles for information. When encouraged to talk about profiles from the owner perspective, many said they paid minimal attention to their own profiles.
I don’t use my own profile but I look through other people’s profiles a lot. That’s what I am interested in” – professional services staff member, CSG
They said profile sections in EdWeb were geared towards academic profile content
Several of the professional services staff who did have a profile talked about struggling to fit the content about themselves and their work under the labelled sections available in EdWeb. Aside from the section labelled ‘Biography’ professional services staff said they did not feel they had any relevant content to put in sections like ‘Publications’ or ‘Research’. Not knowing how to make best use of the sections had prevented some staff adding any content to their profile, as they weren’t sure how to structure and present it.
I’m not quite sure, from a professional services point of view, what the best thing to do is…in theory, we have College recognition awards we have teaching awards and I think maybe professional service staff profiles need to consider picking that up a bit” – professional services staff member, CSE
Some thought a page with details of their team was more relevant than individual profiles
Several professional services staff recognised the value of profiles to enable them to be found by colleagues, so they could handle service requests or enquiries. Some felt this need would have been better met by a page with team information, however, as this would have enabled enquirers to obtain a holistic view of the services of a team, rather than having to find individual staff members.
We want colleagues to know about our department and the work that we do, what each of our teams does and who are in those teams. That’s where we’ve got contact cards, on our teams page” – professional service staff member, USG
Some felt they did not need a public-facing profile but others did
Being mindful that the audience of their profile was likely to be predominately internal, several staff did not have a profile University website because they did not need to reach external audiences. Other staff felt the contrary, and wanted a profile for visibility.
I don’t have one because I’m internal. I’m internal comms, so nobody wants to talk to me. I mean, my colleagues want to talk to me, but we only list the outward facing people [on the website]” – professional services staff member, USG
As a professional services staff member, I have a profile as I manage a team and I like to build my professional network. I like to be findable” – professional services staff member, CAHSS
Some updated social channels with profile information instead of their University profile
Most of the professional services staff interviewed had a presence on social media, and several said they would post career and jobs updates on those channels rather than on their profiles.
I haven’t done a huge amount on my own profile. If I do spend time updating my profile it would be on something like LinkedIn” – professional services staff member, CAHSS
Use of profiles by staff from the College of Science and Engineering
A reasonable proportion of staff members from CSE had offered to be interviewed in their responses to a survey about staff profiles. To hear as wide a range of perspectives from CSE staff as possible, the UX team reached out to individuals working for CSE to understand how they published their profile content. In total, 32 staff from CSE were contacted, and 14 interviews were conducted.
CSE academics tended to have other profiles besides their University one
Personal websites, Github presences, research group sites and research data repositories were just some of the different places CSE academic staff described using to publish profile content to publicise their achievements and their work
Most of the professors in our domain, what they do, they create their own personal profile, like on Google sites on GitHub, anywhere and they update their information by themselves” – academic staff member, CSE
Profile use by younger staff and staff on lower-grade roles (compared to University population)
Given the aims of the research project, it was not appropriate to gather data about staff ages and job grades in order to specifically target these staff for interview. Using the University Grade Profiles data, however, it could be inferred that most staff on grades lower than grade 6 fell into the professional services category, therefore some insight on the underuse of profiles by lower-graded staff could be gleaned by referring to what professional services staff had said. To understand why younger staff underused profiles, those interviewed were asked to reflect on how they had used profiles earlier in their careers for a retrospective view. Several said they had tended to make greater use of networking channels and social forums when promoting their work and furthering their careers rather than profiles.
In conclusion: Profiles design favoured academics and habits affected profile use
The insights from professional services staff suggested there was scope for tailoring a profile provision to better meet their needs which could, over time, lead to an increase in use by this group of staff. Given the propensity for CSE staff to use a wide range of other technical platforms and channels for publishing profile content, it was uncertain whether a changed profile provision would shift them to make more use of profiles.
Read more about the importance of profiles to staff and staff preferences for profile content in the accompanying blog posts:
Representing myself online: Staff preferences and practices for content within online profiles
