A guide to making your portfolio stand out
Ever wondered what a hiring manager is looking for when viewing your profile? As a resourcer working within product design, my job is to pick out the best portfolio’s and profiles to showcase to our clients within digital health.
Here I give you some top tips on what to include in your portfolio to give you the best chance to land your dream job!
Be precise!
When I’m looking through a portfolio, my first point of call is finding out what area of work that particular person has done specifically. If you have worked in a group on a product, make sure to include what specific role you played in that certain project, it’s great to include this at the top and make sure you’re using the right language such as ‘I’ or ‘we’ if you have collaborated with a team. You will be surprised how often this question needs to be asked and it can sometimes be misleading if you haven’t pointed that out right from the beginning!
Check, double check and check again!
Grammar is not my strongest point, so using free tools like ‘Grammarly’ can really help make sure there are no spelling mistakes in your portfolio as it’s something so small but would make all the difference to a hiring manager.
Detail is everything…
Most of the time, the process as a UX designer is long and gruelling so show the hiring manager that amazing effort you have put in, to get to the end goal! Explain everything… you have done usability testing? What were the specific questions that you asked and what was the plan? If you did a survey, how did you find those participants? We want to see the problems you were faced with and how you overcame those problems, so if you do show any workings out explain them and tell us your results! After all, the hiring manager wants to see how your brain works, so pretty visuals are great, but your analysis is just as crucial!
Keep it balanced and clean!
The overall aesthetic of your portfolio is going to be the first initial impression a hiring manager is going to have of you, so you want to make that look clean and as easy to read as possible. Test it out by sending it through to your friends or even go that step further and reach out to a senior designer to take a look through and ask to review! Don’t be afraid to ask for feedback, this is going to help shape your portfolio and maybe give you ideas that you have not yet thought of!
Most importantly… keep it up to date!
Often, I will speak to candidates who are actively looking for work, but don’t have their portfolio prepared to showcase their work or don’t have their most current experience on there. Sometimes hiring managers are happy to interview based on a CV, however it is becoming more and more relevant to showcase your portfolio at the first stages. Therefore, don’t underestimate the importance of this, put the work in to create a portfolio you are proud to show off!
I hope some of you have found this useful if you are struggling to get passed that initial first stage!
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