Vol. 019 - How do you add impact to your portfolio as a junior designer?

Hi designers,

Welcome to Vol. 019 of the UX Jetpack Newsletter, where I share job searching tips weekly. This week we are talking about:

1. How do you add impact to your portfolio as a junior designer?
2. Stop making your case studies like a boring checklist
3. Job searching crash course
4. Where do you learn about digital accessibility?

If you enjoy those tips, please consider sharing them with your friends. They can sign up at https://uxjetpack.com/newsletter

How do you add impact to your portfolio as a junior designer?

By now, most junior designers understand it’s important to add impact in your portfolio.

The question remains: how do you do it?

Your project is not live;

You don’t have metrics;

It’s just a conceptual project;

No one can use it.

There are two ways you can incorporate impact in your case studies.

1. Connect your design to the core problem it’s solving.
   You want to tell people what your design is, but don’t stop there.
   Tie your design decisions back to the root problem that they are solving.
   Whether they are problems of your users or the business.
   That is the impact of your design. Otherwise, your design is just squares on the screen.
2. Show the data from your usability testing
   If you didn’t do another round of usability testing for your final design, you should do that and record the success metric.
   "6/6 participants successfully completed tasks"
   "5/6 participants said they enjoyed using the app"
   They might not be as impactful as metrics from live production.
   They still show how well your design performed.

Stop making your case studies like a boring checklist

If your portfolio still uses titles like

• Overview
• Problem
• Research
• Initial Design
• Usability testing
• Prototyping …

You are not providing any value with your titles.

When hiring managers see an affinity map, they know it's about research.

You don’t need to point that out.

Instead, use headlines to highlight the main point of the section.

• Overview → Build a home buying app from end to end, resulting in 25% increase in conversion.
• Research → Uncover how Millennials approach home buying.
• Usability testing → Test to see if the new message feature can help close more deals

Now, your case study becomes an engaging story.

Hiring managers can easily skim through without losing interest.

Job searching crash course

A free gift for you to kickstart your job searching in 2024!

I'm launching a free 5 days crash course on how you can get ahead in the UX job market.

It covers everything from

↳ Finding your strength

↳ Resume building

↳ Portfolio building

↳ Network tips

↳ Interview skills

This is the best content I've created so far.

You can sign up now

Where do you learn about digital accessibility?

One of the things I've noticed missing in junior designers is their awareness of digital accessibility. It's clear that they lack a basic understanding of colour contrast.

If you want to learn more about digital accessibility, Ricky Onsman has created a comprehensive list for you to explore.

Tons of experts to learn from in the accessibility world.

https://www.tpgi.com/digital-accessibility-blogs-and-newsletters/

If you enjoy my newsletter, please leave a testimonial. It would help me a lot to grow my audience.

Cheers,

Ryan

Say hi 👋🏼 on LinkedIn and ☎️ Book a 1:1 with me