Great points Leslie. How would you show or speak to measurements of a design if you don’t have access to those metrics? Being a consultant, many times we are off engagements before designs are tested.
Hi Rizwan! I've been a consultant and I understand the challenges. It often helps to speak to other forms of impact, such as the milestones being green-lit by high level stakeholders or the work successfully launched first in one market and then other ones (it suggests that the first market showed enough success to continue to a fuller rollout). Hope that helps!
Leslie, thank you for writing this! I’m going to use this as a guide. If you have time, I’d love to hear your thoughts on this:
During my time at a few pre-seed startups, the connection between research and design doesn’t always exist. Instead, there is usually a combination of an executive order, an unrealistic deadline, and a prioritization of speed + feasibility.
I’m curious how you view the lack of a connection between research and design in this context, and if you have a recommendation to counteract the lack thereof.
I’ve been there, all designers have. It’s all in the storytelling. There are two approaches, which you can use together or pick one.
1. What you tried to do and will do next (if possible) - When you start to provide context, share that you weren’t able to do user research prior to launch. You can mention that you tried, but the timing didn’t work out. You don’t want to blame specific folks but you can mention there was some exec pressure to ship to learn, which meant a rapid turnaround. However, you are planning to do some post-launch interviews and will review metrics regularly with your product dev team.
2. What you would have done - Usually near the end of the presentation, you can include a slide like “Reflections,” “Next Time” or “What I Would Have Done Differently” and talk about what kind of research you would have done or anything else you’d have done differently. That shows the hiring manager that you’re aware of what would have been the right approach.
The last thing I’ll say is that hopefully you have a second project to share that does have research. If you don’t, that’s okay, you can mention you’ve read some user research books and are offering to run research with other designers on your team etc.
Thank you for writing this amazing concise and practical article.
My question is what would you recommend changing from the process you outlined above, when presenting my portfolio case studies, if i was targeting Senior UI Design roles and not Product Designer roles?
Thanks for the kind words, Consecca! I haven’t hired for senior UI design positions and I don’t know which companies you’re interviewing with and what they look for in candidates, so take my advice with that in mind. Also, I’m sure you’re doing this but I recommend talking to folks in those roles and asking how they talk about their work.
To answer your question, let’s separate “senior” from “UI.” For UI work, the change I’d make to what I shared in the article is to focus more of your preso on the UI iterations you worked on with feedback and collaboration with xfn teammates. You want to have a logical justification for where you took the designs. By logical I mean, you factored in the use cases shared with you by xfn leads, as well as patterns and design system (if you have one) that you expanded on or followed.
To show seniority, it’s often identified through scope, innovation and complexity. These can usually answered by looking at your body of work and asking: What projects can you show that cover more that one workflow or platform? What teams did we have to get buy-in from and stay aligned? What projects covered redesigns? What innovative designs did you try (it’s okay if those didn’t make it through)? How did you work with eng to try to get those designs in?
That’s what I’d think would help when looking for senior UI positions. Hope this helps and good luck!
Great points Leslie. How would you show or speak to measurements of a design if you don’t have access to those metrics? Being a consultant, many times we are off engagements before designs are tested.
Hi Rizwan! I've been a consultant and I understand the challenges. It often helps to speak to other forms of impact, such as the milestones being green-lit by high level stakeholders or the work successfully launched first in one market and then other ones (it suggests that the first market showed enough success to continue to a fuller rollout). Hope that helps!
Good idea. Impact comes in many forms such as key decisions, project being green-lit, feedback, research results, etc. thanks!
Nice writeup. That outline is a super useful guiding framework. Ty for sharing
Leslie, thank you for writing this! I’m going to use this as a guide. If you have time, I’d love to hear your thoughts on this:
During my time at a few pre-seed startups, the connection between research and design doesn’t always exist. Instead, there is usually a combination of an executive order, an unrealistic deadline, and a prioritization of speed + feasibility.
I’m curious how you view the lack of a connection between research and design in this context, and if you have a recommendation to counteract the lack thereof.
You’re super welcome, Tyler!
I’ve been there, all designers have. It’s all in the storytelling. There are two approaches, which you can use together or pick one.
1. What you tried to do and will do next (if possible) - When you start to provide context, share that you weren’t able to do user research prior to launch. You can mention that you tried, but the timing didn’t work out. You don’t want to blame specific folks but you can mention there was some exec pressure to ship to learn, which meant a rapid turnaround. However, you are planning to do some post-launch interviews and will review metrics regularly with your product dev team.
2. What you would have done - Usually near the end of the presentation, you can include a slide like “Reflections,” “Next Time” or “What I Would Have Done Differently” and talk about what kind of research you would have done or anything else you’d have done differently. That shows the hiring manager that you’re aware of what would have been the right approach.
The last thing I’ll say is that hopefully you have a second project to share that does have research. If you don’t, that’s okay, you can mention you’ve read some user research books and are offering to run research with other designers on your team etc.
Hope that helps, and good luck!
Omg, this is like the best response ever! Thank youuuu 🙏🤙🏻🫶🏻
Of course, happy to help ☺️💛
Hi Leslie,
Thank you for writing this amazing concise and practical article.
My question is what would you recommend changing from the process you outlined above, when presenting my portfolio case studies, if i was targeting Senior UI Design roles and not Product Designer roles?
Thanks for the kind words, Consecca! I haven’t hired for senior UI design positions and I don’t know which companies you’re interviewing with and what they look for in candidates, so take my advice with that in mind. Also, I’m sure you’re doing this but I recommend talking to folks in those roles and asking how they talk about their work.
To answer your question, let’s separate “senior” from “UI.” For UI work, the change I’d make to what I shared in the article is to focus more of your preso on the UI iterations you worked on with feedback and collaboration with xfn teammates. You want to have a logical justification for where you took the designs. By logical I mean, you factored in the use cases shared with you by xfn leads, as well as patterns and design system (if you have one) that you expanded on or followed.
To show seniority, it’s often identified through scope, innovation and complexity. These can usually answered by looking at your body of work and asking: What projects can you show that cover more that one workflow or platform? What teams did we have to get buy-in from and stay aligned? What projects covered redesigns? What innovative designs did you try (it’s okay if those didn’t make it through)? How did you work with eng to try to get those designs in?
That’s what I’d think would help when looking for senior UI positions. Hope this helps and good luck!