Unstuck
Helping burned-out employees see which parts of their job can still change
As the sole designer, I took Unstuck through 2 pivots, then designed and built a working app that turns a person's own work week into a clear picture of what to change first.
Try the app
Year
2026
Role
UX Designer, solo
Context
Designlab UX Academy capstone
Industry
Career wellbeing
The Problem
People stay in jobs they no longer want because they can't tell if the job can get better
The Solution
A working app that turns a person's own work week into a clear picture of what to change first
It starts with a real work week
Effort is its own exercise
AI builds the list from what people said
AI offers ideas and people choose
Background
Lots of people are good at jobs they no longer want
Many stay for years because they can't tell whether the job can get better, and they're too drained to find out.
18 of 20
people who were skilled at a job they no longer wanted stayed for a year or more
My survey of 26 people
0 of 5
people I interviewed got unstuck on their own. A friend's tip, a therapist or a breaking point had to move them first.
My 5 interviews
Research
People only trust what they figure out themselves
When someone else named a person's strength, they usually brushed it off. An app that names strengths would have the same problem. So I moved Unstuck away from finding the next job and toward checking whether the current one can change first.
First idea
Unstuck started as an app to help people decide which phone apps to delete. Interviews showed people weren't bothered by storage. They were bothered by the noise. Also, iPhones don't share the app usage data the idea depended on, and 4 of my 5 participants used iPhones. So I dropped it.
Second idea
The second idea, called Signal, would show people their strengths and suggest other jobs where those strengths could transfer. My mentor pointed out that Signal is already a popular messaging app and suggested the name Unstuck. Research then changed the idea itself.
Competitors
I tested 5 tools: Teal, CareerExplorer, Claude, Jenova and APT. Teal assumes you already know the job you want. CareerExplorer takes 100+ questions and returns over a thousand matches. Claude and Jenova can give good advice, but only if you know what to ask. APT came closest, but its gentle chat leads into a paywall. None of them was built for someone who shows up drained.
Ideas I dropped
I explored and dropped 3 ideas for being too complex for this project: a digital sand tray for arranging your ideal workday, an exercise for naming your fears about switching jobs, and a venting session that AI would analyze.
Define
Personas built from what I heard
Design
4 decisions that shaped Unstuck
01
Start with last week, not "What are your strengths?"
Asked directly, people gave thin answers. Real work moments got detail. So the session asks, "What took up your time at work last week?"
02
Compare effort with how much the company relies on each task
These are 2 separate exercises, and the gap between them shows where to start.
03
AI never tells people what to do with their career
It builds the list and offers ideas for next steps, but people reach their own conclusions.
04
Build a working app instead of a clickable prototype
Testers could talk through their real work week, which got more honest reactions.
Testing, round 1
Round 1 showed the idea worked but the words didn't
Round 1 had 3 people: a product manager, a software quality lead and a customer success manager covering a region alone after team cuts. All 3 found their biggest gap, and 2 said something about their week out loud they hadn't said before. The results screen got the strongest reaction every time.
01
Energy became effort
"Energy" was read as something work gives you, so I renamed it effort.
02
Voice input that speaks up
Voice input failed silently on a company laptop, so the app now says when it can't hear and offers typing.
03
Asking about unassigned work
One person never mentioned onboarding a new teammate because she didn't think of it as her job, so the app now asks about work that was never assigned.
One person said she'd never show her manager self-reported numbers, which led to an FAQ on where the numbers come from. Some work can't change right now, so people can put it on hold instead of failing a step.
Testing, round 2
Round 2 checked the fixes and found what comes next
The same 3 testers came back and 2 new people joined.
What I found
All 5 read effort the way the app means it, so the rename worked
People understood the widest gap quickly, though 2 wanted it explained on the screen instead of behind an info icon
2 of 5 missed the list of their earlier answers at first, so I added a line pointing to it and removed the fade that hid the last item
2 of 5 felt some work mattered more to their boss or team than to the company, so the impact screen now asks which one the company would miss most if it stopped
No one had a good way to handle work they can't change. 2 said they'd write "Nothing can be done" as a step, which led to the "Can't change right now" option
One tester wanted to pick more than one suggestion, so people can now choose as many as they like
2 said seeing progress on Home would bring them back, which led to the Progress screen
Before: biggest impact on the whole company
After: what the company would miss most
Before: the gap was behind an info icon
After: the gap is explained on screen
Before: every item needed a step
After: work that can't change goes on hold
Before: one suggestion at a time
After: pick as many as you like
Results
All 3 round 1 testers found their own biggest gap without being prompted
Final Thoughts
What I learned and what's next
One word can change how people read a whole app. "Energy" made sense to me and meant something else to my testers. Building a working app also changed how I tested. People talked through their own week instead of a made-up one, so their reactions were honest.
Next, I would
Run a month-long diary study to see if people come back and if their effort ratings actually drop
Test with people outside office jobs, like hourly or frontline workers
Work out a clear business model, since my mentor asked how Unstuck would make money
Explore a path for people like Nicole, whose boss is the problem, such as the advocacy service my mentor suggested
Check session by session whether the AI's list matches what people said