Creating A Portfolio That Reflects Your Design Journey

93% of Junior UX portfolios I see don't do this. 😔 👇 ↳ Reflect Real-World Problem Solving: → Many portfolios show beautiful interfaces but fail to show the designer's process of solving problems that matter. 💡 Pro tip: If you're new to UX, don't use bootcamp or school projects only. Get freelance or hackathon work as case studies. ↳ Have Personal Branding: → Many UXers don't give enough background on themselves. Companies hire you, not your 𝐩𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐟𝐨𝐥𝐢𝐨. ↳ Showcase Collaboration and Feedback: → It's rare to see a designer's ability to: ✅ Work on a team ✅ Articulate their working process ✅ Show their design changes based on feedback ↳ Show the Research Process: → The best case studies tend to: ✅ Showcase qualitative and quantitative data to back their designs ✅ Incorporate their insights into their solutions ↳ Show Empathy and Understanding: → I've noticed many junior designers have zero context to their users and the business in their case studies. 𝘛𝘩𝘦𝘺 𝘰𝘧𝘵𝘦𝘯: → Don't demonstrate their problem-solving process → Don't tell me why they did what they did and why it matters → Don't explain why their solutions help users and the business 🥇 𝗬𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗮𝗰𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗽𝗹𝗮𝗻: ☑ Craft a compelling story for your case studies that don't bore your reader to death ☠️. ☑ Show the results: what went wrong, what went right and what did you learn? ☑ Show how you've worked with others and leveraged feedback in your designs. ☑ Show your research process, how you gathered and interpreted data, and why it informed your design decisions. ☑ Articulate what problems you tackled and why. Show your thought process and how your design solves these issues effectively. ☑ Please for heaven's sake, get a real portfolio website. In this competitive market Dribbble sites, Behance sites, PDFs, and Figma files are not enough. ✨ Portfolios are hard to maintain and even harder to grow, but if you care about your UX career they are worth it. --- PS: What's stopping you from finishing your portfolio? Follow me, John Balboa. I swear I'm friendly and I won't detach your components.

Not getting another interview after your portfolio presentation? Maybe this is why 👇 I've sat in many portfolio presentations. I also work with numerous mentees, helping shape their stories. The biggest mistake I always see is not showcasing the why behind your work. Context. So many presentations go like this: - Hi, it me 👋 - Here's my first case - Here is a persona I made - Here is another persona I made - Here is an arbitrary user flow - Here is a sketch I made - Here is a wireframe I made - Here is the final solution - I learned a couple of things Your presentation should be a story, not a simple show and tell. Don't just tell your audience WHAT you did. Tell them WHY you did it. The why connects your thought process to your design. We want to hear what drove your decisions. Paint a vivid picture of the challenges you faced, the insights you stumbled upon, and the brainstorms that led to breakthroughs. What separates you from other designers is how you think and your design decisions. ✅ Frame your failures ✅ Dissect your decisions ✅ Incorporate your successes ✅ Create a beginning, middle, and end ✅ Show the path from initial idea to final Each slide and each statement should reveal a bit more about your thinking process. Details matter. Subtleties matter. They all add up to a powerful narrative. When your presentation is infused with purpose and passion, your work shines. It demonstrates your technical skills and your capacity for critical thinking, problem-solving, and empathetic understanding. And that's what sets you apart. Not just the sheer quality of your work but also the depth of thought put into it. Make them remember what you did and why you did it. Because, in the end, it's the why that truly matters. ------------------------------------- 🔔 Follow: Mollie Cox ♻ Repost to help others 💾 Save it for future use

Let’s chat about the purpose of a portfolio because I feel like this is getting lost in translation somewhere. The purpose of a portfolio is to highlight your skills and abilities. You are showcasing what makes you uniquely you with your designs and what you could bring to a team and an organization. In order to do this, you need to tell a story around the designs. The most common mistake I see when reviewing portfolios is that the person will share a screenshot or a PPT file and not provide any context around it. Hiring managers can make an educated guess as to why you created this artifact and how you did something, but that’s the main problem is that they are guessing. They could be 100% wrong in their assumptions. You want your portfolio outlined in a way that if you were not present, they would still be able to understand the big picture. To do this, consider adding these talking points: - Summary of the project - Problem / Goals - Objectives - Stakeholders - Your role on the project - Target audience - Design process - Tools - Deliverables - Reflections In my opinion, this should give insight into everything and then, when you have your interview, the hiring manager should have a much better understanding of you as a designer. And most likely, they will want to dive in deeper into your portfolio projects, and you’ll be ready because you’re prepared (and awesome). Of course, if you have more questions around portfolios and how to make them, there is a whole week in Instructional Design Institute dedicated to portfolios. The next cohort starts in 12 days and I can't wait to nerd out with folks!

We all know we're supposed to "show instead of tell." But most design portfolios fail to do this and here's why. 👇 Designers love showcasing their raw work in their portfolios including outputs or deliverables such as: → Sketches → Diagrams → User flows → Wireframes → Sticky notes → Journey maps But to be honest, 90% of the time, I have absolutely no idea what is going on in those images. For example, I'll often come across a screenshot or picture of 25+ sticky notes, but: → They are too zoomed out. → If I zoom in, they're too blurry. → Even if I can seem them, they're too overwhelming. Then I start asking myself questions such as: → Am I supposed to read every sticky note? → What's important about these sticky notes? → Is this worth my time and attention to decipher? This is where storytelling comes in. What if instead of showing a raw zoomed out screenshot of sticky notes, we instead pulled out the key highlights and takeaways? Then we can guide the reader's attention to what's actually important, and optionally include a link to the original raw image afterwards. This creates a far more compelling narrative for our audience (hiring managers and recruiters), and ensures we're showing the right level of detail that is necessary to understand the story. Now to be clear, I'm not saying you should entirely avoid raw images or assets (or even raw Figma files). For example, these can be effective during the interview process because the designer can use their voice to guide their audience through the image. But when it's an online written case study submitted with an application, then you won't be in the room when a hiring manager first sees it. In that moment, your story will need to stand on it's own. It will need to communicate the right level of clarity and detail to compel the hiring manager to offer you an interview. In summary, when we want to "show instead of tell", that doesn't mean slapping a raw screenshot or image in our portfolio. It means reflecting on how we're using our words and images to give context, clarity, and tell an impactful story. Use it effectively to your advantage. What are your thoughts? #ux #design #portfolio #casestudy #storytelling

I was talking to a hiring manager who said something that stuck with me: “The best portfolios are everywhere. I’m looking for people who get it.” He wants someone who can clearly show how they think and how they fit. That’s where some portfolios fall short. I’ve reviewed hundreds of portfolios over the years. One thing is consistent and great work showing the final product with no context can get overlooked. Think about how to make it easy to understand:
 - What problem were you solving?
 - Why did you make certain decisions?
 - What was your role in the project?
 - What came out of it? (Impact, learnings, results) Tailor it to the role:
 - Want a UX job? Show UX work. Walk us through your research, early sketches, wireframes, testing, not branding projects. - Going for a visual/brand design role? Highlight your layouts, redesigns or campaigns. - Applying for a senior position? Make sure we can see leadership, not just execution. Tell the story, not just the outcome:
Some of the strongest portfolios I’ve seen had the goal, their role, process shots or early ideas and a short note on what worked. It doesn’t have to be everything but it does have to be clear. Your portfolio is your voice when you’re not in the room so help the viewer understand how you think, what you care about and why you're the right fit. I've learned a lot from the hiring managers and creative directors I've worked with over the years and I’m grateful for the insight they’ve shared. Every hiring manager sees things a little differently but I hope some of this helps someone out there trying to figure out how to stand out.