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Tips for Product Design Job Seekers

May 2021

At Slack, I'm hiring again. That means I'm reviewing quite a few portfolios and sitting for case study presentations. This is some of my favorite work because you get to see all the different ways designers approach and solve problems. And I don't just mean the problem of designing a product. I also mean the "problem" of acquiring a new job.

Below is a bit of a brain dump of all the things I see working and not working in the way designers present their work and more broadly apply to jobs. Hopefully, with this information, you're able to land that design role of your dreams:

Applying

  1. Referrals are king. I can't emphasize this enough. Applying via a referral increases your chances of making it to the next round by 3-4x. When someone already at the company submits your application, recruiting and the hiring manager tend to take special care in the review.
  2. You probably only need 2-3 projects in your portfolio. For a recent role at Slack we received >400 applications. What this means is that the reviewer is going to be seeing a lot of stuff and is likely going pretty quickly. As a reviewer, I might average 30-90 seconds per application.
  3. Only show your best work. Reviewers are only going to spend a minute or two on your site. Don't risk them spending all their time looking at a superfluous project.
  4. Double-check your password! I can't tell you the number of people who were auto rejects because they provided an incorrect password (or didn't submit one at all). If you password protects your site, make sure everything works!
  5. Don't bother with "Coming Soon" projects. It's unlikely your reviewer is going to come back to your site when that project is finally updated. Put the projects you want them to look at front and center.

Interviewing

  1. Practice. Seriously! Think of this as an actual presentation you'd give to a client. I'm looking for how well you're able to present and tell a story behind your work.

  2. Use big pictures. I often see designers trying to fit an entire 1400px UI into a slide. Then, when they share their screen via Zoom, it's impossible to see what your work looks like. When showing off a particular design detail, show a zoomed-in clip of the UI you're talking about.

I'll keep adding to this list as I think of more tips.