Getting a paid UX internship after completing a bootcamp
After completing the UX UI Design Track at Springboard in March 2021, I began my “intense” job hunting experience for the first time ever in my life. Or more specifically, hunting for my first official “career” job. Springboard offered career support throughout the course allowing me to prepare myself for an entirely different interview process than I was familiar with (in reference to my previous part time jobs). Even with completing my Bachelor of Commerce degree in university, I was never made aware of how different interview processes would be for different role and jobs. So I want to take this opportunity to share my experience.
Springboard’s career support
Before diving into my experience, I want to touch upon the career support that helped me with my job hunt. Springboard’s curriculum was designed to incorporate career modules throughout the course to allow individuals to get exposed and prepared for job hunting. You would have the opportunity to schedule calls with career coaches who help and keep you accountable for making progress to getting a job. The career modules consisted of homework that pushed you to attend meetups, conducting informational interviews, updating your LinkedIn, and practicing mock interviews. In my experience, the mock interviews were super valuable to me as coaches would “pass” you if you did well or ask that you reschedule and keep practicing. You’ll have to learn to get comfortable with all the different interviews since you will be applying to multiple jobs and doing a bunch of them. Overall, this was great for me as I learned what to expect and how to frame my answers for the behavioral interview, portfolio walkthrough, and whiteboarding interviews. However, you definitely do not need a bootcamp’s career support in order to successfully find a job. I just needed more guidance than I had initially expected and it set me up for success!
If you’re interested in Springboard, feel free to use my code to get $750 $̶1̶5̶0̶0̶ off eligible courses: https://www.springboard.com/invite/TOCKE
My job hunting strategy
Before I got myself head deep into even applying or looking at job postings, I made sure that I was prepared. I asked myself if I had the following:
- Online portfolio — Was my online portfolio complete with a minimum of 2 projects? Did it show my skills and passion? Could you get a feel of my personality?
- Offline portfolio — Could I comfortably talk about 2 of my projects? Did I have extra side projects that I could show? Could I show what I valued as a designer?
- Interview questions and answers — Was I ready to answer interview questions with the STAR method? Could I answer questions without memorizing an answer sheet that would make me stumble more?
- Notion board — Was I ready to start applying and tracking my progress? Applying to hundreds of jobs without a spreadsheet becomes difficult as you do not remember all the details. I wanted to create a notion board to identify patterns and if using different job hunting strategies mattered, or if it was pure luck. Feel free to use my notion board: https://wax-jupiter-0fd.notion.site/Job-Application-Tracker-Template-13b7e36363b0408cb9d4d7b27ae89b8d.
Looking back, I applied to approximately 45 UX/UI jobs and only heard back from 13 companies. You might be like, that’s great, but I also included the automated rejections in that number. From the companies I had at least a call or first interview with, there was only 4 which is 8.89%… That’s pretty low, which is the reality of things. Even though I only applied to less than 100 companies, job hunting was intense and mentally exhausting. In order to take care of my mental health whilst everything, I only applied to 5–10 per week to companies that really spoke to me. I didn’t want to get into the habit of applying to jobs “just because”. Every two weeks, I would change my job hunting strategy from applying solely on Linkedin, to Indeed, to cold-emailing, to using referrals, and towards attaching cover letters. My goal was finding out if there was an actual difference with using different strategies as I was told “connections are key” for majority of my adult life.
I found out that I had the best luck through directly contacting people from companies (half of those being cold emails and the other half being through slack channels) and LinkedIn. I also noticed that applying to local companies worked way better compared to other provinces or countries.
With only a small percentage, I was unable to really see if there was any statistical data if you used one strategy vs another. It seemed like it was all dependent on the company and how much they believed in you.
The interview process
My interview process is definitely on the less intense side compared to designers applying to US tech companies. I applied to small and medium companies as I didn’t want to feel intimidated and I just wanted to get my foot in the door. Despite the little interview opportunities I had, it did become discouraging when I would receive a rejection after pouring my time and effort into the process. To give you some perspective on the typical product designer interview process:
- Behavioral interview
- Portfolio walkthrough
- Whiteboarding interview/Take home assignment
- Additional interviews with higher ups
The different types of phases in your interview process may differ from company to company. For my UX internship, I had a meet and greet call, behavioral phone interview, and a portfolio walkthrough with the design director. The process was more about getting to know one another and seeing if it would be a good fit culturally.
Getting the offer letter
The job strategy that got me my paid UX internship was *drumroll please* cold-emailing! Never in a million years did I think that simply reaching out could catapult me into my tech career. For those who are curious, in my email, I simply introduced myself, showed what I could offer, and asked if there was any opportunities available. The company did not have any open positions posted at the time and it was just pretty great timing! After the interview process, I was given an offer letter!! I finally did it. I learned that sometimes you can create your own opportunities and shooting your shot doesn’t hurt! Don’t be afraid to try reaching out to companies.
Conclusion
Everyone’s job hunting experience is different and really varies from city to city. Don’t feel discouraged if you aren’t able to find a job within X months because maybe its just not meant to be the right job for you. An opportunity will always appear! If you are truly passionate about becoming a UX/UI designer, your passion will show to recruiters and they will see that shine through during your interviews. My experience is definitely not what an average designer goes through however, I still wanted to give another perspective on what it might look like. Additional tips for job hunting:
- Be strategic and try different ways when you are applying to jobs to figure out what works best with you. Is it making your resume be ATS friendly? Adding a cover letter? Curating your resume to each role?
- Practice how you answer behavioral questions and doing portfolio walkthroughs. The more you do it, the more comfortable you’ll become and everything will flow more easily.
- Add personal touches to your portfolio site, you want to stand out from other designers.
- Don’t give up! There is always light at the end of the tunnel, and I know you’ll become a fantastic designer.
