Being a designer-developer hybrid in 2019
Job titles, skillset and portfolio examples for designers who code and coders who design.
Personal Thoughts
Just to be clear this isn’t yet another article about whether designers should code or not, this is for designers who already code and do full-fledged front-end development. If you have ever tried looking around for inspiration, motivation and role models, you may have tried googling “unicorn”, “designer-developer hybrid”, “devigner” or whatever the most current label is.
Unfortunately, by doing so you will likely find many articles by angry designers and developers alike saying that you just can’t do both, or that you’re doomed to be bad at either if you ever attempt it, which is somewhat strange because I rarely see anyone say that about other hybrid professions: full-stack developers, IT projects managers, support engineers and many more. It is understandable that some want to be narrow-specialists and not generalists, and I do not think there’s anything wrong with that at all either! However, seeing so much negative information can be really frustrating and discouraging if you’re already a multidisciplinary professional yourself, or are aspiring to be one.
After all, hybrid jobs are on the rise, with “Intersection of Design and Development” being one of the top key areas according to 2019 report by Burning Glass Technologies compiled from over 1 billion job postings. They also project a 21% growth of hybrid jobs over the next decade compared to only 10% growth of the market overall. This may indicate that the career prospects for hybrid designers are solid as well.
In this article, I’ll try to provide some objective and actionable information regarding the current designer-developer roles on the market, and what you can expect and/or strive for.
a) Careers and job titles to explore
A lot of the time the job you’re looking for will either be listed under UI/UX designer, or Front-end Developer with the hybrid skills required within the ad itself, in that sense it can be slightly harder to look for a job that fits you perfectly. However, there are several titles that imply hybrid skillsets, among those, are:
1. UX Engineer
Tech giants like Google, IBM, and Microsoft all have open positions for UX engineers, these positions also come with a nice paycheck.
From Google’s listing:
Minimum qualifications:
Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, HCI, Design, or equivalent practical experience.
Experience in UI development in a platform (such as web, Android, or iOS).
Preferred qualifications:
Body of design work demonstrating strong design process, and interaction and visual design skills.
Effective leadership, communication, project management, and organizational skills.
2. Design System Engineer
A lesser-explored job title that you can see listed by companies like Spotify, Framer, and others.
From Spotify:
As a Design Systems Engineer, you will contribute your technical know-how and design aesthetic to push Spotify’s current standards to an even higher level. An eye for details is as critical as an ability to see the big picture as you develop UI and animation libraries, design tools and foundational frameworks.
3. Front-end Designer/Front-end Web Designer
The requirements and details for this job title will vary widely from one listing to another, with some gravitating more towards design, and some more towards development.
From Framer:
As a front-end designer at Framer, you’ll help us maintain, improve, and implement Framer.com while shaping its underlying structure and responsive layout system. You’ll also work to establish and maintain best practices and improve the mobile presence of our site. With your expertise, you’ll strengthen the team, level up the technical abilities of teammates, and collaborate with both Design and Engineering.
Other
Any other hybrid looking titles, UI/UX Developer, Creative Developer, Full-stack Designer, Product Developer, Creative Technologist, etc.
b) Skills to develop
Let’s start with the most sought-after skills, in 2019 for hybrid roles, at the minimum these are:
UX:
- user research
- user testing
- content planning and creation
UI:
- wireframing
- prototyping
- visual design
- accessibility
- tools like Sketch, Figma, InVision, etc.
Front-end:
- HTML
- CSS(SASS,LESS)
- JavaScript(ES6, React or other similar frameworks)
- tools like command line, npm, GitHub, etc.
There’s a multitude of other skills you may want to develop, but they will vary depending on the role you’re applying for, some are more UX-heavy, some are more VD-heavy, and some are more development-heavy. If you’re looking into creative development, you’ll certainly need top-notch front-end skills and almost none of the UX knowledge, and if your title is a UI/UX designer, even if the job requires coding, it’s unlikely you’ll be asked to develop an entire product on your own. My advice is, find what makes you happy and hone those skills, the rest will fall into place.
c) Portfolio Inspirations
Creating a comprehensive portfolio can be challenging as the formats for designer and developer portfolios tend to be different, after looking around, I found several really good examples of fellow hybrids’ personal portfolios that I hope will inspire you as well:
1. Ivo Mynttinen
2. Marina Aísa
3. Aaron McGuire
4. Daniel Campagne
5. Owltastic (Meagan Fisher Couldwell)
6. Stratis Bakas
7. Philippe Hong
8. Tyler Stober
9. Bernat Fortet Unanue
10. Weston Thayer
Hopefully, this post will inspire and motivate some of the fellow hybrid professionals, or those aspiring to become one. As always any additions and suggestions are welcome.
