Common questions related to “UX/product design portfolio & interviews” (with honest answers)
Personal tips that I decided to share after engaging in 30+ office hour sessions with students all around the world, hosted by Students Who Design.
Background
Over the Winter Holidays, Hasque, Omar Abdul-Rahim,Sahil Khoja and Zain Khoja from “Students Who Design” had organized office hours for students who are preparing or currently interviewing for internships & full-time roles. I was contacted if I was willing to devote my time to this amazing initiative and of course, I said yes.
View list of people offering office hours here.
The Office Hour Sessions
Honest reflection — it was challenging to schedule meetings because I was traveling to South Korea at that time. However, I managed to complete over 30+ office hour sessions over the course of a one month period. From those sessions, I received many, many, many repeating questions which is why I decide to write about it. I think it’s worth it to leave this as a living document.
This article has three parts which consists of common questions asked with my answers. They include:
- Questions & Answers Related to “Interviews”
- Questions & Answers Related to “Portfolio”
- Questions & Answers Related to “Other Work” — to clarify this a little further, it’s about other things that you can do to stand out
Q. How should I present my projects during interviews?
I’ll start out with the most commonly asked question. For this question, I wrote some of my personal thoughts so if this helps you to think even further about explaining your projects during interviews, please do so and if not, you can ignore them.
#1. Intro
- Start out with a short blurb about the problem you were trying to solve and how you knew it’s a problem (or discovered that it was a problem)
- Then, briefly talk about your final solution and some key features that will solve this problem as a whole. Few design examples (i.e app screens) at the starting point could help listeners to understand the idea better
- If you wish, quickly explain when this project was done with whom as well as the role that you played within the team
- Next, at a high level, explain your overall process (research, ideation, wireframing, user testing, UI Design etc) but don’t start talking about each of them in too much detail right now. This is just to help listeners understand your overall journey throughout your project and how each process relates to each other — Why did you do research? What are the key questions you wanted to answer? How did those answers help you do ideate?
#2. Research
- After explaining your design process, talk about some of the research that you conducted which answered some of the key questions that you had — Did you get the answers to your questions? What were the key takeaways? What did you learn?
- Don’t waste your time mentioning thing like, “we did 9 interviews, 3 shadows, 20 survey results…” What’s more important than quantity is WHY you decided to do them and WHAT you learned from each of them
- It might be a good strategy to quickly explain the key findings and ask the interviewer if they are willing to hear more about any specific part of the research process. This helps you to stay in a conversation format, rather than you speaking about things from beginning to the end without a break.
- At the end, recap your key findings from various research you did to help remind listeners because this is a perfect segway into explaining your ideation process. By conducting research, you aimed to get answers to some of the questions you had to aim for a certain direction (to solve problem)
#3. Ideation / Initial Concept / Brainstorming etc
- By this point, you probably have a ton of insights from research which is why tying your research findings to the ideas that you developed is very important. Furthermore, how those ideas help to focus on solving the problem(s) that were identified is recommended
- Here, you might have done further research such as competitive analysis of looking at similar apps (for example) to better understand their UI/UX so that you can think more about the overall experience of your idea
- This is also a part where you can explain briefly about how the team decided to divide and conquer different roles — How did you decide on a direction? Based on what kind of framework, did your team reach a verdict? What were the decision factors to choose option a over option b? Did you do any lightweight user testing?
- Moreover, try to explain each of the artifacts in your PDF or portfolio website such as information architecture diagrams in more detail (why, for what purpose) instead of just showing them without any further context. When I asked why those were created, many people couldn’t respond to my question well.
- Always keep in mind that your explorations should’ve always mapped back to the problem you were trying to solve that is aided by findings from research and data (if you have any)
#4. UI Design / User Flow Diagrams / Prototyping
- At the very beginning, you might have showed the interviewer on some of the key screens that you designed. While it could be effective to show them again here, try to spend a lot of time zooming into key features of the project. You can only show so much and you want them to be the most important ones that will help understand what the final project contains
- It’s recommended that the design that you did should again, map back to the problem(s) that you are trying to solve. Try to mention that instead of focusing too much on the creative feature idea alone or the fancy tools you used to create this artifact
- Many student projects include two more more designers. If you had to work in this setting, it might be also worth it to explain how you divided up the work and responsibilities — Did you create a mini design system? Who drove the experience of xxx? Were there any hardships?
- For prototypes that you created that are related to the key experiences of your product, try to summarize what it’s about and show the video or gif. The thing about this part is that most people stop there, their project ends. However, prototypes are created because you want to test out something. Therefore, it’s recommended that you test it even lightly to the users and get some feedback which will help you iterate once more. Test to validate your hypothesis
#5. Conclusion / Learnings / Next Steps
- At last, you’ve reached the end and the goal line is near. I hope you gave the interviewers enough moments to ask questions and clarify certain parts in your process.
- Some people choose to conclude their presentation by mentioning one more set of iterations that they did after getting user feedback which is really great
- Other people talk about their personal learnings, pain points, remembering moments during the collaboration space and more. While I don’t have a strong opinion on any of these, I think they’re all great. Just keep in mind that now, the interviewers will have more questions to ask
Q. Do you have any general tips for app critiques?
For app critiques specifically, some of the tips were shared previously with my friend, Nishant Panchal. View the article below that Nishant published to hear more about the tips.
We also presented our own learnings and tips in our IxDA Georgia Tech event at our school when we were both pursuing the HCI degree. It’s an hour long video which hopefully will help you to prepare for the interview better.
Q. Do you have any further recommendations to prepare for an interview?
I’ve written down some of my recommendation on the previous sections above. Here are some additional tips.
- You will probably do more of the talking but consider interviews as a conversation (this doesn’t mean you should always ask questions lol). Try to have the interviewer engaged too when necessary. Let him/her ask questions at certain points of your walkthrough. Take a breath
- “Tell a story” about your journey to solving the problem instead of focusing a lot on having to explain every little detail of the project
- Be humble, hungry to learn, acknowledge the things that you don’t know instead of making things up in the spot. You’re looking for a entry level goal that will constantly help you learn and grow
- Try to focus on high level goals, problem, approach and key ideas instead of getting hung up on little details unless you’re asked to evaluate those
- Be thankful of their time and ask meaningful questions at the end
For more general tips, I’ve also written about some of these several years ago too if you want to check them out.
Q. What is one thing that I should definitely avoid?
Have you ever thought the interviewer when you were going in for an interview other than yourself? When you think about it for a second, you have an interview scheduled and you set aside everything else before and after for this golden chance to get an offer. However, the interviewer on the other side could have had a busy day.
Try building some empathy with the person sitting at the opposite end of the video. It’s just like when you’re designing a product right? Building empathy is not just knowing who they are — it’s understanding their workplace, their current situation, mood and more. Although it’s up to the interviewers to stay professional and fully engaged in the session, we’re all human beings so this might require some effort on your side as well.
During some of the office hour sessions that I held with students, some started to explain the project for 20 minutes from all the way to research until the end. This is something you should avoid. Since I didn’t have any chance to ask any question along the way, I quickly lost track and couldn’t really provide a good feedback about the project. Don’t dump everything at once! Help them listen to what you have to say and it starts by… (I’m saying this again) engaging in a conversation!
Q. How should I structure my portfolio?
Back in the day when I was a student, I wrote an article about how one should go about structuring the portfolio. This was my own approach that I took which might not be applicable or favorable to other people. However, considering how many people clapped for this article, I believe that this could be a great starting point if you are lost or just starting out.
Other than this, there are plenty of other great resources that you can find online. Places like Bestfolios and Cofolios will not only help you to find talented people’s portfolio website but also, motivate you to improve yours. Moreover, they are both fantastic resources to benchmark, adopt and compare different portfolio websites.
Back when I was applying for internships, both of these websites didn’t exist. Therefore, I had to stalk people on LinkedIn and hunt down their portfolio websites. However, nowadays, these exist! Please take advantage of them, spend time digging and create a scrapbook if you need to.
Q. What should I have on my landing page?
I think in general, your landing page could become your first impression to the viewers. It’s great when the design of it looks attractive. Some people have bias towards less design-y looking portfolios when they first land on it. To you, they might be recruiters or interviewers who might be busy glancing at hundreds of applications.
In addition to the visuals and interactions that sums up your hard skills and your design instincts, having the right kind of information that represents who you are is also very important. For some tips on the intro of your landing page, I’ve seen it work very well when people indicate these following items:
- Where you go to school for which degree
- Where you interned/worked before
- What role you are looking for (i.e Product Design Internship, Full-time)
- A short blurb about your approach to design, passion and interest
- For non-design background, how and why you got into design
- Preview of featured projects that explains it thoroughly
- Clear nav structure
- Other additional information about you (i.e links, resume)
Q. How many project should I have in my portfolio?
Quantity is not the most important thing but rather, how well your projects are organized is key. Some people have more projects than you because they have more experiences, past internship experiences or even side projects. It’s recommended to have at least two or three projects but I’m not a recruiter. If you feel like you need more projects, then get started on doing some more work!
Passion side projects, hack-a-thon initiative that turn into projects or freelance work are all great examples of the things that you can do if you are willing to devote your free time. When I was pursuing my Master’s in HCI at Georgia Tech, I slept for 3 hours each day for more than 5 months. Read more about it in the article below that I published a while ago.
Q. What are the key things that the companies look for in a portfolio?
Honestly, I don’t know how to give a good answer to this question. For each of the companies, the job descriptions are all different. Also, the responsibilities and skills required are also written differently. Therefore, what I wrote down here is just my own opinion.
From my understanding, recruiters and interviewers look for the bare minimum design skills such as UI design or interaction design first. This can be discovered from the degree that you’re pursuing, your internship experiences written on your resume, your portfolio website and other places like Dribbble or Behance that you often upload.
However, design isn’t all about aesthetics right? Therefore, it’s also good to see additional aspects of your product thinking skills inside your projects, how you collaborate with your teammates, your growth experiences, additional things that you do outside of school work and more.
I’m currently in the process of revamping my portfolio website and I decided to include my articles, my UI & interaction design explorations, public activities and more. Nowadays, there are many different routes that designers can expand their growth opportunities other than the work that they have to do in real life. Therefore, what I’m trying to say is that, if you have written any articles related to design before, uploaded things on Dribbble, taught a class in school or something like that, please show them! Link them inside your portfolio!
Q. What other things can I do in addition to my portfolio?
Let’s try to build empathy with the recruiters for just a second. When I was in your shoes, I always tried to think in the perspective of the people who came to see my portfolio such as recruiters who first screens you. The job of the recruiters are to find candidates on platforms like LinkedIn, prep and go to career fair events, communicate back and forth through email and phone calls on a daily basis with “potential” candidates and “potential” hires. How long do you think they have in glancing over your resume or your portfolio website?
This is why it’s very important to first, have a convincing landing page of your portfolio, just like how I mentioned it in the portfolio Q&A section above. After spending some time in your website, the recruiters (I’m not one of them so this is just a speculation) could try to collect more signals to find out if you are eligible for the role. I think here, is the place where you can really make a difference.
When it comes to applying for jobs, a lot of the students have similar projects, structure in which they explain them and look, some of your friends who you did projects together with could be applying for the same role at the same company. Out of all your friends and other competitors, what is it that will distinguish yourself from them? What would it make you an interesting, strong and passionate candidate for the job?
Well, this section is a perfect continuation with what I just mentioned above. I’ll tell you an honest story of mine. While searching and analyzing different portfolios, I found out that it was very effective when people embedded their personal blog that was well written, side gig that was meaningful and UI explorations that they did during free time. These were kind of additional factor with their well curated portfolio pieces that really inspired me. If I was a recruiter, I’d be definitely be feeling the passion that this person have for design and also, from those artifacts, would want to click on them to read more.
Q. I’ve seen designers write. Should I start writing too?
Uhh.. it’s awesome that you’re trying to get some initiative going. But, are you trying to do it just because some people are doing it? Or, are you doing it because you have a specific motivation like, keeping track of your learnings, spreading your personal experiences to people in hoping that others will benefit from it or, practicing the documenting process of your thoughts?
Writing is hard for many people and it takes extra time to think about an interesting topic, make numerous edits and generate contextual designs or images. It’s even harder when you have a full-time job or enrolled as a full-time student at school because it has to be done during your free time. But, as long as you have some kind of specific goals in mind, I think writing is a good reflection of yourself and it helps you grow in many aspects.
For me, I write because when I was first getting into design, possibly later than most people, over 90% of the people that I reached out through various social media channels didn’t respond to my questions. Therefore, I began to write about my experiences, share tips and provide recommendations. This is the same reason why I actively engage in mentorship sessions with many people too.
Ending Note
People who I’ve talked to ranged from students who wanted to get into design, who just got into design, who were making their first portfolio website, who were in the process of interviewing for jobs and a couple were full-time employees. I was thankful that many of them prepared what questions they wanted to ask me in advance and were very considerate of my time. Therefore, I too, had a really good experience from doing this.
For a designer, updating the portfolio and interviews that require a portfolio are an ongoing stress. We constantly have to find time to update it which eventually becomes who we are, what we have done and what we are capable of doing. For questions like, how can I get started on making a portfolio, what do you think about my portfolio or what else should I improve, I think there are common themes that emerge that I’ve provided some detailed answers. Hopefully, they are somewhat helpful for you.
Please, look for portfolios that you think did a great job. If you glance over, spend time on portfolios that are online, you will find plenty of opportunities to feel bad about your current portfolio, places to make improvements on, maybe new project ideas or tabs that you can include more stuff like your creative side projects, articles that you are writing or activities that are related to teaching design.
There aren’t any fixed way of presenting yourself and there aren’t really 100% best practice that you should definitely follow or else you don’t get a job. Just like design and just in life in general, you can never satisfy everyone. Portfolio is the same. There are people that will love how you organized it and there will be feedback that you should change.
However, as a designer of your own portfolio website, it is ultimately your job to demonstrate and represent who you are. You make the final call. Do your job at your maximum capacity and then publish it online. That’s the best you can do and if you get a chance to explain even further during interviews, that’s the time to shine.
It’s simple, if you feel like you can do more, then do more instead of feeling sad when you compare your site to other people’s sites. If you feel good right now, then it must be time where you can start applying. The beauty is that you will always question it and will see yourself changing things every now and then. It’s just like learning the tools right?
Please 👏 if you liked reading this article and was helpful in preparing for your interviews!
