5 Things Designers Should Spend Time On Besides Your Design Portfolio

The design portfolio has amazingly elbowed its way into becoming the single most valuable piece of work a designer must create and maintain to have a successful career in UX design. I have touched on this subject before and proudly show my own portfolios from years past. I advise students and give workshops on how to make portfolios compelling. But behind all of this i have a nagging belief that:

Design portfolios are overrated

At first glance this reads like clickbait (though, this already made an appearance in a very clickbait-y article a few weeks ago). But to be clear, I’m not saying design portfolios aren’t important, only that we put entirely too much emphasis on their value to a student’s job aspirations, or a designer’s career success.

Why design portfolios are overrated

Before highlighting more valuable activities for job-seeking designers, I need establish what portfolios don’t do well.

For the designers, portfolios over-emphasize proving value and competency in the hiring process. Of all my design hires, reviewing the portfolio is a tiny piece of the process. In fact most UX designers will find themselves interviewing with non-designers who pay little attention to a…