How to create an effective portfolio as a designer

We are designers. We are the ones who solve problems with interfaces. We're the ones who whip up a solid flowchart or workable wireframes.

Let me present you with a problem for which you must design a solution:

Challenge: You want a new job
Target Users: People who can offer you a job
Solution: A solid, professional portfolio

Here are six key design principles to keep in mind for your portfolio:

1. Empathy - who is the user?

As with any product, you have to start with the people. Ask yourself the following:

Who are the users?

What are you interested in?

What makes you happy? What makes you angry?

What do they do five minutes before looking at your portfolio?

How long do you have to watch this?

What is their expertise (or better yet, where do they lack knowledge)?

Is this person a developer you want to work with? A design agency you want to join? A sales manager? CEO?

The motivations, behaviors, and even the language used by different individuals vary. So you have to consider who you are selling to.

2. Concentrate on your dream job

Your portfolio is about finding a job. Remember that the best way to show you're good at something is not to say it, it's to show it.

This means knowing what you want and presenting the projects that best highlight those skills. If your sole focus is user research and UX design, don't show logos you've created for your friends. If it doesn't support exactly what you want, it's a pure distraction.

This not only applies to the role you want, but also to the type of problems you would like to solve. Are you a data visualization person? A hardcore process person? Do you like product sales or do you prefer social networks? The work you show will likely be the work you get!

Maybe the work you want is different than in the past. If you're trying to expand your skills or switch focus entirely, you have two options:

1. Focus on the aspects of the work that might be applicable to the new job. For example, if you only have logos, talk about the process of working with a client to identify their problems and how you used iterative principles to get the best solution.

2. Spend time on a side project. Nobody has to ask you to design something: have fun with your own project, document your steps and then present it like any other work

3. Get inspired

Don't start blindly! As with any new product, do your research. Check out the competition. What are they doing, what do you like or dislike? There's no harm in getting inspiration from your peers and applying it to your portfolio.

4. Tell a story

Design is a journey, and your skills as a designer are best expressed by how you navigate that road. what is your process How can you organize things in a way that shows clearly and concisely:

What was the problem you wanted to solve?

How did you solve it?

What were the biggest challenges?

How did you overcome these challenges?

What were the results?

What worked well?

What would you do differently next time?

5. Less is more

If you're trying to show something that's personal to you, it's easy to overdo it. Stay as minimal as you would be with any other case.

When you think you're done, go through each section, page, and ask yourself what's the most important thing you want the user to take away from it. Then ask yourself if there is something on the screen that is not relevant to this case. If yes, remove it.

Also, take at least a day off, and then come back to your portfolio with a fresh perspective.

6. Build and test it

Don't get stuck in Sketch. There are so many websites now that help designers to create websites without any developer skills. Get your hands dirty and get your "MVP" up and running at least enough for a few people to run.

Don't be afraid to get the same feedback you would get on any of your other work. Present it to some friends and family and judge their answers. Listen to their feedback, draw your insights from it, and repeat as needed.

Also, there's nothing quite like testing it in the real world. Apply now! Every conversation, no matter where it leads, can help.

7. Market it

This is not technically part of your portfolio but definitely part of your effectiveness! As with any product, you need a way to market it. Link it to a professional profile that you maintain and post it on the many designer networks (Dribble, Behance, etc.).

Remember - your portfolio is a living document: never stop testing and tweaking! You'll soon find that the jobs you get are more and more consistent with the work you want.