“I’ll send you one of my articles on storytelling,” is something I said at the end of a recent mentorship session (and probably a few before). I then realized I haven’t posted any articles on storytelling. Oops. It’s a crucial topic covered in the Design Career Handbook, and I talk about it all the time. How’d I forget to write about it here?!? Well, time to remedy that oversight.

Everyone loves a great story. A well-told one builds a connection between the storyteller and the audience. Developing and presenting an informative and engaging narrative is an indispensable skill for everyone, especially designers. Storytelling is a key component of communication. It’s essential to your portfolio case studies, presentations, and, of course, interviews.

Now that you are forming your point of view on what makes great design and how to achieve it, you’ll need to evangelize, and sometimes argue, for it. You do that through effective storytelling. You’ll use it to explain your process, share why you’ve explored specific directions, and instill confidence in your particular solutions. You’ll use stories to explain why your design will succeed with its intended audience.

For some types of design (e.g., graphic design, visual design, motion graphics, etc.), storytelling can be more conceptual or emotion-based. The work may require a narrative based on its inspiration, style, use of color, imagery, typography, and motion.

Storytelling can be more literal in other types of design (e.g., product, industrial, and service design). Those disciplines often use story elements to convey the why of the design process in relation to people and their needs—the problem to solve, who has it, and what solution will address it.

Consider what makes a compelling story—whether it’s a book that keeps you turning pages, a TV series you have to binge, or a video game that raises the stakes with each level. The best stories use standard building blocks to pose questions creatively. And the audience is eager to learn the answers to those questions.

Often, the classic hero’s journey can be tapped to provide a narrative arc. Who is the hero (your end user or customer)? What is the setting (where do they encounter your product, service, or design)? What is their challenge to overcome or task to achieve? And, finally, how does your solution help them accomplish their quest? (Bonus: How did they feel after?) There is much more to learn about storytelling from literary techniques, but I’m going to jump to my number one tip when mentoring on the topic: Include more drama and suspense!

It’s completely understandable if you’re still learning to navigate the design process and how to articulate it. In fact, you’re expected to walk others through your process in case studies, presentations, and interview questions. But without emotion and conflict, your narrative will fall flat and be easily forgotten.

Now, when you have a few years of experience under your belt, I can guarantee a recruiter or hiring manager wouldn’t be talking to you if they didn’t already believe you have the level of experience (i.e., process, hard skills, and craft) that they are looking for. Especially if you are in that camp, your storytelling skills are an important component of what they’re looking for. You’ll need to communicate design choices and solutions to influence cross-functional partners, stakeholders, and executives. Those opportunities must be compelling, and you have to have a strong point of view.

I had a mentorship session the other day with a high-level designer with experience at very prominent tech companies. He told me that he was getting through earlier interview rounds, but dropping out after 1:1 chats with executives and startup founders. We went through a few mock interview questions to assess what might be improved. One of the questions was:

Let me start by sharing what went well with the designer’s response. It was concise (5-7 minutes) and structured effectively using the STAR method:

• Situation: Provide an overview of the situation.

• Task: Describe your responsibility and specific tasks.

• Action: Explain the details you took to address the task(s).

• Result: Share the outcomes achieved by your actions.

The designer was (mostly) confident in his narrative delivery and came across as an expert on the specific product and knowledgeable about the industry.

The story's flow was clear, and I understood everything described. Did it address the prompt? Yes. Did I feel he could do a high-level designer’s job? Sure. But there was nothing memorable. I wasn’t excited. It didn’t leave me wanting to know more. I didn’t think, “I want to work with this person,” or “This person would bring something fresh to my team.” The question is one that we call a “softball,” meant to prompt an easy, dramatic, and nuanced anecdote! Here is a summary of our chat:

The designer’s response concerned an executive who wanted to see an elaborate design solution for a product feature. The story’s conclusion was essentially, “The executive agreed with our recommendation, and we launched it.” Well, yes, that was a good outcome. It was preceded by a few sentences about presenting different prototypes and securing agreement from cross-functional partners. This is such a common scenario that when you hear only the story’s logical event beats, it’s bound to sound generic.

Of course, care is needed when recounting real-world stories about people you’ve worked with. You don’t (typically) want to characterize anyone as a villain or hard-headed. But that’s where language comes in. You can let your reader or interviewer make up their own mind. They will pick up (in a good way) when you express emotion in your delivery (i.e., uncertainty, frustration, elation).

When I pressed the designer to tell me more about how he was feeling, how his partners were feeling, and how he thought the executive was feeling at each stage, juicier details came to light. Here were a few of my suggestions:

• “The executive wanted us to explore a more complicated interaction design,” could have acknowledged the executive’s enthusiasm: “The executive was excited to provide more information access to our users in a slick interactive way.” That not only sets up the challenge but also signals the designer’s openness to suggestions and acknowledges his understanding of the executive’s motivation.

• Recall that the question was about a major conflict. The story had the makings of a showdown, but I didn’t hear about it. It was just that the executive wanted an elaborate solution, and the designer proposed a simple one. Where is the anger, the debate, the negotiation, the jubilation?

• Here is a small tweak. Instead of saying, “We were pretty sure that… [our proposed direction was better] based on [metrics or user research],” I suggested just saying, “We were confident that… [our proposed direction was better] based on [metrics or user research].”

• In the designer’s response, when the team presented the various prototypes (including their proposed solution and one that addressed the executive’s request), it came across as though the executive had just given up on his idea in the end. I suggested a little more give-and-take, followed by conviction. Something like, “The executive really liked the slick prototype and was still pushing for it. I explained that interaction design was pretty cool and that we’d find another use for it. But I doubled down on the fact that the simpler solution gave our users exactly the information they needed, when they needed it. It helped that I had deliberated and aligned with the product and engineering team beforehand. The executive appreciated that we had done the exploration, but agreed we were making the right call.”

This is a truncated version of our session, and I assured the designer that he has all the makings of crisp and compelling responses to those types of interview questions. He just needed a little more drama and high-energy delivery. One last thing, suspense is mostly about pacing. Even in a short interview response, taking the right pauses at key points in your story is all it takes for the interviewer to lean in to hear what’s next.

For a bit more on interviews, check out this post:

And there’s a segment on case studies here:

Since last time:

• Hope my hot takes on career reinvention (x) punk rock pique your interest! I’m getting closer to launching my next book. Check out the announcement: Find Your Inner Rebel. 🤘🏽

• In case you missed it: It was an honor to be interviewed on the AIGA Design Podcast with Lee-Sean Huang and Giulia Donatello. We dug into the usual hot topics: adaptability in design careers, the evolving role of design leaders, the importance of personal branding… and AI. Listen to the podcast or watch the video. 🎧

Our book would make an excellent gift for any designer! It has job search, interview, and portfolio advice, plus plenty of tips for working designers to level up.

The Design Career Handbook: Everything You Need to Know to Get a Job and Be Successful is available in paperback and ebook formats on Amazon and Barnes & Noble online.

Buy on Amazon

Buy at Barnes & Noble

A few weeks ago, I caught the documentary The AI Doc: Or How I Became an Apocaloptimist at my local theater with Jeanine and a couple of our friends. I wrote on LinkedIn that I found it to be informative and thought-provoking. It was well-made, presenting significant perspectives on all sides of the AI debate → what it can do for humanity vs. the existential risks that it may pose. I was surprised by many notable figures participating in the film, including:

• Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI (ChatGPT)

• Dario Amodei, CEO of Anthropic (Claude)

• Daniela Amodei, President of Anthropic (Claude)

• Demis Hassabis, CEO of Google DeepMind

• Ilya Sutskever and Jan Leike, prominent AI safety and risk researchers

• Karen Hao, author of the must-read book Empire of AI

I’m sure I missed a bunch of other important names. Notably, Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk were invited to participate, but declined and/or backed out.

The documentary was directed by Oscar-winning filmmaker Daniel Roher and Charlie Tyrell. Roher provided a very human, emotional throughline by revealing that he and his wife, Caroline (also a filmmaker), were expecting their first child. They openly worry about the world their child will grow up in. Their feelings of uncertainty weave through the hypotheses, concerns, and chats with numerous subject-matter experts.

The takeaway is that AI isn’t going away. Which means we all must educate ourselves and participate in the discourse on what place it should have in our lives. In the very least, I implore you to research the issues, the companies supplying AI technologies, how institutions are employing them, and the legal and governmental stances on regulating them. You can start by checking out the documentary’s trailer.

Now, I joke all the time about not being an expert, yet I seem to be reading about, talking about, and experimenting with AI nearly every single day. That’s because I’m just like you—trying to figure out where it fits into my daily routine, as well as my hopes and dreams for the future. (Yes, I typed that em dash, and every other word in this post.) Another thing I’m clear about is that I’m a technologist. Throughout my career, I’ve been imagining, using, and building all kinds of tech that enabled me, my peers, and others to do things we couldn’t do before. With the comparisons to previous technological revolutions, I’m still on the side of: “But this is different.”

It’s clear to me, and many others, that the impact of AI is much more widespread and happening faster than anything that’s come before. Matt Shumer, who’s been working and investing in the AI space for six years, wrote an article in February called “Something Big Is Happening.” It was viewed over 30 million times within a week, garnering coverage by mainstream media. Schumer said he wrote it for his parents and family to describe how rapidly AI models are advancing and how big an impact they will have across all sectors of industry and jobs.

A few of the extreme views:

I’m not interested in using AI. ←→ I’m not using AI enough.

It takes too much time to learn AI. ←→ AI is enabling me to do 10x more things.

AI cannot do my job. ←→ AI is going to take my job.

I hate AI slop. ←→ This is the worst it’s going to be. It’s getting better every day.

AI is ripping off creators. ←→ I’m an artist now.

Having vibe-coded an app myself, I can attest to the dopamine hit that’s been compared to the addictive qualities of gambling. My app was a personal experiment, but tons of people, organizations, and friends of mine have taken a positive view of the practice, even the Human Rights Foundation. I sometimes have extreme luddite-inspired days, wanting to unplug and shake my fist at it all. But then I follow my own advice. The advice I give to everyone I mentor and coach, and the advice Jeanine gives to all her students. That is, we must experiment with it firsthand, talk to others who are doing the same, and decide for ourselves.

I’m still hopeful for some cool breakthrough, preferably in battling disease or reversing climate change. I’m dumbfounded that people are using it for creative endeavors. I’m unclear about the joy in (predominantly) using AI to create art, fiction, or film. I don’t think AI-generated work is “owned” by the creator, and it seems that, since the Supreme Court declined to hear the case, the standing US court ruling is that AI-crafted work cannot be copyrighted. You may have caught my caveat above; I think we’re all wading through the question of how much AI assistance we believe is appropriate. Is using it for research okay? How about summarizing our thoughts or clarifying our ideas? What about generating ideas? It’s up to each of us to decide.

There’s so much being reported about AI that it’s hard to keep up. It can be all-consuming and overwhelming. Here are the types of headlines that catch my attention and help me form my own opinions.

• People are mixed on it, but this significant MIT study sparked a conversation about ChatGPT’s impact on our brains. Cognitive neuroscientist Dr. Caroline Leaf is among many who say AI is rewiring our brains. Psychologists, sociologists, and researchers continue to weigh in.

• Top engineers at Anthropic and OpenAI have indicated that “pretty much” 100% of the code on their respective platforms is now written by AI. (For non-techies: AI is building the next version of itself.) Tech companies are saying this is how software is built now.

• There are spikes of uproar over how AI is impacting journalism. Major news outlets have been criticized for a rapid decline in the quality and/or integrity of their reporting on events, issues, interviews, and even book reviews.

• There have been multiple reports in recent years of lawyers citing “hallucinated” court cases, facts, or quotes. A few have had to pay fines, been disqualified, and even suspended from practicing law.

• A few “authors” (writing under pen names) have bragged about churning out hundreds of books using AI. As a pure money-making scheme, I get it. As a prolific reader, I'm bummed about this. Do fans of genre writing even care if books are AI-generated? And in the off chance that you didn’t know, dear reader, those AI-generated books are only possible because the AI companies pulled off the biggest content heist ever, using millions of pirated books to train their models (OpenAI, Anthropic, Meta, Google, and even Apple have all been implicated).

• I saved the best (actually the worst) for last: AI’s impact on education. I remember the early position that “AI would level the playing field.” Of course, there was something to that. But there are as many voices today speaking about severe cognitive decline happening rapidly due to AI use. There are countless anecdotes from educators about the precipitous drop-off in attention spans, a lack of focus beyond short periods, and the need to compromise on learning objectives and simplify materials to help “students to pass.” On one hand, I’ll openly say that education reform is long overdue, and the entire academic system seems ill-equipped to evolve as quickly as the tech world demands. On the other hand, I’m occasionally encouraged when I hear of students and academic institutions discussing the issues and experimenting together.

Clearly, I’m mostly pointing out the negative aspects of AI. But that’s the point, we are easily enticed by shiny new things. We lack concern about long-term consequences and overlook horrific “one-off” events. As a comparison, it’s hard to argue that we’re unaware of the mental health harms of social media, but we’re not going to stop using it altogether. (BTW: Meta and Google are in court for intentionally engineering addiction in minors.) We need to look at all sides of the equation, sooner rather than later. Be informed so you can make the best decisions for yourself.

What can you do?

• Follow prominent voices and respected news and research covering AI topics. Spend a little time learning about the companies behind the tools that you use. Make an effort to use the ones that most align with your values.

• Read Empire of AI by Karen Hao, which provides details on how these AI technologies came about, including the geopolitical, environmental, ethical, governmental, and, of course, financial implications of it all.

• Watch The AI Doc: Or How I Became an Apocaloptimist if you see it playing near you. Hopefully, it will be released on a streaming platform eventually.

• The tech community and leaders of various AI companies have urged or, at least, expressed an openness to regulation. It’s up to the public to demand it of our local governments. The film’s website lists resources on its Global AI Action Plan page to help you get informed and involved.

Especially for students:

• Don’t automatically accept output from AI platforms as the most correct, ideal, or best. Researchers call this “cognitive surrender,” and indicate that a large majority are “readily incorporating AI-generated outputs into their decision-making processes, often with minimal friction or skepticism.” [I bolded that last bit.]

• Verify facts and cite sources to minimize the risk that you are copying or plagiarizing someone else’s work - whether visual art, design, or writing.

• You are not learning if you are simply regurgitating AI output. The world needs your voice and perspective. That means sitting with the information you are absorbing, noodling it around in your brain, making fresh connections, and forming your own opinions.

Don’t leave your critical thinking to the robots, or we’ll end up here, or here, or here, or here, or here, or here… Okay, I’ll stop, already.

Top image: Cameron, James (Director). The Terminator. Hemdale Film Corporation; Pacific Western Productions; Orion Pictures, 1984.

Since last time:

• My book about career resilience and reinvention is coming along. I’ve completed a first draft and am in the editing phase. More to come! 😅

• In case you missed it: It was an honor to be interviewed on the incredible AIGA Design Podcast with Lee-Sean Huang and Giulia Donatello. We dug into the usual hot topics from adaptability in design careers, the evolving role of design leaders, and the importance of personal branding. Of course, we had to touch upon AI. Listen to the podcast or watch the video. 🎧

Our book would make an excellent gift for any designer! It has job search, interview, and portfolio advice, plus plenty of tips for working designers to level up.

The Design Career Handbook: Everything You Need to Know to Get a Job and Be Successful is available in paperback and ebook formats on Amazon and Barnes & Noble online.

Buy on Amazon

Buy at Barnes & Noble

This is not a post about AI, rather its antithesis - about being an exclusive human. Specifically, it’s about personal branding, which is not a new topic for me. I touched upon it in this post on interviewing, and this shorter one on standing out. We wrote about it in the Design Career Handbook, and it also appears in my next book on career resilience.

Personal branding inevitably creeps into nearly every conversation I have with mentees and coaching clients. There are two things that I enjoy when I get to dive into it with others. The first is that it’s relevant to all; everyone can benefit from deliberately thinking about their personal brand. The second is that it allows me to skip past the boring stuff and learn more about what really makes another person tick.

I was only half kidding about the boring stuff. Yes, I talk with others about their skills, working experience, career highlights, and future hopes and dreams. But today, more than ever, competition is fierce. I hate to burst the bubble, but no matter the field, other applicants for the same jobs you desire will be equal to or exceed you in some of those areas. The bar is high.

But don’t despair!

That’s where personal brand comes in. In some fields (especially performative ones such as acting and music), this is referred to as the X factor. It’s that elusive quality that can give you an edge over the competition. What I appreciate about that definition is the non-specificity; the unknown. You, a singular human on this planet, must have some interesting and unique things about you! Now, I don’t think of myself as a branding expert in the traditional sense, but I follow one whose words I greatly respect. Before writing a narrative non-fiction tale of intrigue, Marty Neumeier wrote numerous books on brand, design, and creativity. In his early megahit, The Brand Gap, he defined brand as “a person’s gut feeling about a product, service, or organization.” You’ll come close to understanding a brand’s core if you ask someone how a particular company or product makes them feel. Now imagine that applied to you. That’s your personal brand.

It includes your reputation, which takes time and effort to develop. It reflects how you interact with others in all manner of ways, personally and professionally. It’s about your character and what you wish to be known for. It helps others imagine what a positive experience working with you would be like. Are you flexible, thoughtful, helpful, generous, dependable, diligent, curious, proactive, committed, or skilled? Do you roll up your sleeves and get shit done? Attributes, interests, values, strengths, drivers, passions, and accomplishments all contribute to your personal brand. Essentially, the important things you tap into to define yourself and express your unique perspective. Your personal brand shows up in your work, the tone of your communication and writing, your elevator pitch, and how you appear online.

I know that’s a lot, so let’s get into tangible areas for you to consider that also contribute to your personal brand. I often discover that we dismiss or diminish our backgrounds, select past work experience, or paths we’ve taken. And we limit sharing activities and hobbies that bring us joy to the most superficial level (e.g., I love hiking, reading, cooking, or my pet). What about them is important to you and why? While I do advise against oversharing, I also promise there will be unique things you can leverage, no matter how small or unrelated they may seem. Even the subtlest of unusual connections will make you memorable. They will help you stand out. They needn’t be heavy-handed. It’s about how you artfully incorporate them into your story.

These are a few examples from conversations I’ve had, including one just last week:

• A person who previously worked in healthcare as a frontline worker → Unsurprisingly, people in these fields tend to work in complex, fluid environments, have a heightened empathy for others, develop a resistance to being easily rattled, and can make decisions under pressure.

• A person who enjoys music → When probing deeper, there were two noteworthy things I learned: they had eclectic musical tastes and an ability to identify the sound of uncommon instruments. I suggested that those facets of their interest represented broad curiosity and the ability to notice distinct details and nuance.

• A person who has a deep fascination with magic → While acknowledging this as a very nerdy interest, we discussed how magic can mystify people of any age or demographic, and that its power is in surprise and delight. Aren’t those qualities the world can use more of?

• A person who had been a cook and thoughtfully considers restaurant spaces → Since I was feeling like an expert, having seen a few cooking shows and The Bear, this was a fun conversation! We discussed the artistry of combining ingredients in unexpected ways (even comparing it to music remixes) and the fact that experiential design is a niche field that focuses on the emotional, sensory, and interactive experiences of physical spaces.

Prior jobs and hobbies can demonstrate impressive transferable skills and offer refreshing or even amusing elements to incorporate into your personal brand. People will remember you, whether in a casual or professional setting. Leveraging what's truly unique about you strategically can pique a recruiter's or hiring manager's interest. With just the right amount of stimulating details, they will want to learn more about you. That could prompt a callback or advance you in the job interview process.

I hope this sparks a few ideas for developing your personal brand. Explore and experiment to see what feels right and what resonates with others. Like nearly everything else, your personal brand should evolve with you, through life changes, new interests, small career pivots, and major shifts.

Since last time:

• I’ve been working on a new book about career resilience and reinvention.

• In case you missed it: It was an honor to be interviewed on the incredible AIGA Design Podcast with Lee-Sean Huang and Giulia Donatello. We dug into the usual hot topics from adaptability in design careers, the evolving role of design leaders, and the importance of personal branding. Of course, we had to touch upon AI. Listen to the podcast or watch the video. 🎧

Our book would make an excellent gift or recommendation for a designer or aspiring designer! In addition to job-searching and portfolio advice, it includes plenty of tips and stories for working designers looking to advance their careers.

If you already have it, thank you! We’d be grateful for your review on Amazon. ✏️

Don’t have it yet? The Design Career Handbook: Everything You Need to Know to Get a Job and Be Successful is available in paperback and ebook formats on Amazon and Barnes & Noble online!

Buy on Amazon

Buy at Barnes & Noble

A coaching client recently shared another designer’s portfolio and asked for my opinion on its design. I immediately categorized it as “retro.” That was due to its minimalist 80s or early 90s user interface aesthetic, although it layered an e-ink look with justified text in a pixel font and a gray color palette. While I rolled my eyes a bit, I told my client that, even though I wasn’t excited about the portfolio’s style and disregard for readability, it stood out, and I would probably reach out to the designer to learn more about their actual case studies. For that reason alone, I deemed its design successful.

Now I’m as nostalgic as the next person, maybe even more so. Nostalgia hits everyone at different life stages, whether we’re trying to recapture something from our past or embrace something we missed out on. I’m a fan of either catalyst. In the past handful of years, I’ve noticed music from my generation popping up in commercials for cars, medications, insurance, you name it. Visual design-wise, I’ve seen a lot of hand-drawn lettering and letterpress-style graphics marked by telltale imperfections. I haven’t gotten tired of these styles because they evoke a non-digital making process. However, trends are fickle. It is possible to have too much of a good thing.

Meanwhile, I’ve also seen a rise in retro portfolios over the past five years or more. For a minute, I swear I heard designers online calling it brutalist. The Brutalist movement is best characterized by architectural choices from the 1950s to the 1970s. It reflected harsher geometric shapes and exposed materials like pipes and concrete. In terms of intent, it was about revealing structure, being honest and truthful, and favoring functionality over conventional aesthetics. From a digital design standpoint, the bold, oftentimes jarring anti-design movement in early 1990s web design could be seen as a spiritual offspring. That’s why I thought the terms neo-brutalism or neubrutalism might catch on.

It’s not at all surprising to me that younger designers who grew up with digital screens and video gaming platforms are drawn to pixel UI and early computer and internet interfaces. In an obvious way, their upward trend reflects another anti-design movement that rejects today’s flat, minimalist, over-polished interfaces; the sameness of software, mobile, and major website and app services.

In a random encounter, I sat next to a guy at a neighborhood coffee shop yesterday. We laughed at the serendipity that he was a 24-year-old industrial designer. (That itself supports my recommendation to get out of the house and network.) After introductory chit-chat, I asked for his thoughts on the retro design trend.

He said, “You mean Y2K?”

“Uh, maybe? I’m talking about pixel UI and early computer interfaces and stuff.”

“Yeah, I love it!”

“What do you love about it?”

“I don’t know. I like video games and Nintendo.”

That checked out. But I wanted to know more. In my head, I was thinking about the traditional design maxim, “You have to know the rules so you can break them.”

“What’s good about it?” I asked.

He thought for a moment, then gave an unexpected response, “I don’t know. But I do wonder what those designers in the 90s and 2000s were thinking when they did that style.” He added, “I guess that included you!”

As much as I wanted to take that last comment as a prompt, I was okay with us shifting topics. Before we moved on, he offered this opinion: “I expect designers are already moving into 2010s aesthetics, though...” I thought, “There’s a 2010s aesthetic?!” We pivoted to discuss how there’s a sameness in automotive design and that it was a shame some cars have lost their iconic styling. (I’m looking at you, Ford Mustang!)

Overall, his comments gave me hope. There must be young designers who aren’t just copying, they’re thinking about the why. That’s the mindset good design will always need.

I was talking about this with Jeanine, who teaches design to students every day, and she reminded me that she sometimes sees the Aesthetics Wiki circulating. Depending on where you are in your design career, this will be either the best or the worst thing you look at today.

I’ll try not to sound judgmental, but it probably comes through because browsing that website disrupts my design-is-not-art argument (although I clearly hedged with a caveat). Prone to getting lost down many a rabbit hole, I amazingly limited my perusal to under 10 minutes to write this article. That said, you might read up on Pixel UI and Y2K Futurism. But this quote on the overall Design Aesthetics page should level-set your expectations:

These aesthetics often pre-date the internet and are older. Many of these aesthetics would be known to people unfamiliar to the concept of an internet aesthetic, as these aesthetics occur “in real life,” with their names being codified by appearing on professional and traditional mediums. This is opposed to the internet, which tends to be more used by the youth and would rapidly change. However, included here are also trends and brand-specific aesthetics that do not last that often. As trends are important in marketing, many of these aesthetics are dropped as the market becomes over-saturated or time passes.

There is a lot of power in naming, and the Aesthetics Wiki has over 100 named styles and movements. By all means, take a look, be inspired, remix something with your own ideas. Whether you adopt the “know the rules so you can break them” mindset or not, remember that just because something was created or, in this case, named, doesn’t mean it’s good or worthy of emulation. That’s especially true of things on the internet.

I have a few brief conclusions:

1. The last point in that wiki overview on design aesthetics is vital. If you think you are late to a trend, you probably are.

2. The amount of categorization and classification humans are capable of astounds! You should still look beyond the same digital resources as others to be uniquely inspired.

3. We may dislike something that can still be successful. (Design serves a purpose for its intended audience.)

Since last time:

• I’ve been working on a new book about career resilience and reinvention.

• In case you missed it: It was an honor to be interviewed on the incredible AIGA Design Podcast with Lee-Sean Huang and Giulia Donatello. We dug into the usual hot topics from adaptability in design careers, the evolving role of design leaders, and the importance of personal branding. Of course, we had to touch upon AI. Listen to the podcast or watch the video. 🎧

Our book would make an excellent gift or recommendation for a designer or aspiring designer! In addition to job searching and portfolio advice, it contains plenty of tips and stories for working designers looking to advance their careers.

If you already have it, thank you! We’d be grateful for your review on Amazon. ✏️

Don’t have it yet? The Design Career Handbook: Everything You Need to Know to Get a Job and Be Successful is available in paperback and ebook formats on Amazon and Barnes & Noble online!

Buy on Amazon

Buy at Barnes & Noble

Well, I know it’s been a little while. The thing is that I’ve been busy with another writing project. Anyone I’ve talked with over the past months has heard me say I have a few dicey stories from my life and career that didn’t fit into our first book. So, I’ve used them as the throughline to my next one, which is more broadly focused on career resilience and reinvention. I’m both nervous and excited to finish it and get it out into the world. It’s been odd to examine my own career as I’ve helped others with theirs.

Meanwhile, I’ve continued to mentor and coach people at various career stages. My conversations have ranged from people just starting out to those with 25+ years of professional experience. They’ve worked at large tech companies, including Meta, Amazon, Apple, Netflix, Google, Adobe, Microsoft, and LinkedIn, as well as AI-focused startups. But there have also been some in finance & banking, media & entertainment, healthcare, and other industries. Perhaps I’ve influenced some of our conversations due to what’s been on my mind while writing. Or it’s just a hot topic for those who either have an itch to try something completely different or are working through how to position themselves in a very topsy-turvy job market. The point is that career path uncertainties are not just limited to tech.

The sub-themes within the larger umbrella of career resilience are universal. Considering one or more of the following can be quite helpful, given the mountain of challenges in securing a job, changing jobs, or pivoting an entire career to better align with your hopes, dreams, and needs. Even if you are starting out, it may help to keep these in mind as you find your way.

1. Strategic Flexibility

More than ever, jobseekers need to consider all the angles to find a role or set a career path that better supports their goals. This may be relocating to another city, starting at the ground floor, or targeting less competitive industries. Sometimes, it’s switching to an adjacent role or downleveling to a more hands-on position. Continuing on to Master’s-level education has been a topic of interest for recent undergrads struggling to enter the job market and for those mid-career. On the one hand, I’ve challenged individuals who see earning more credentials as the only route to securing their first or next job. On the other hand, I’ve supported the path for those I believe would benefit from being around like-minded peers, prompting them to develop their skills more quickly. In one case, I enthusiastically agreed that it was an adventurous way for the person to achieve their nomadic dream of working in another country.

2. Self-Awareness

It’s important to continuously evaluate what brings you genuine satisfaction over (only) what looks good on paper. Yes, working for a prestigious company will always look good, but you may have to give up something of yourself to maintain that job. As this article’s title points out, careers are long. Those of you actively working know that production and throughput expectations have only increased. (Where are those 4-day work weeks, anyhow?!?) It’s easier than ever to burn out. More and more people are hitting mid-career and needing to take a break. A 12-year veteran in tech, who has worked at a global media company and is now at a startup, recently shared that they are feeling the sparks of burnout. They want to spend time with their significant other, travel, and make sourdough bread! Instead, they are pressured to work harder or risk being replaced by a more eager, younger person kicking off their career. First, recognize these feelings for what they are, then seek strategies to break a negative spiral before it picks up momentum.

3: Environmental Consciousness

Not to be understated, it’s common for your own desires and goals to diverge from those of an employer. (Or the other way around.) Everyone has challenges at work, whether it’s with a manager, close collaborators, or leadership. Yes, sometimes it is you. However, misalignment also arises from shifts in company culture and team reorganizations. You can choose to keep your head in the sand or use it as a catalyst to change your situation. One designer, about 6 years into his career, hit a wall where he felt detached from his company’s customers. That’s rough for a user-centered designer. Unsurprisingly, what changed was the organization’s push to use more AI in its research and development process. He’s gainfully employed, but considers it non-negotiable and isn’t prepared to wait and see if the situation improves.

4: Continuous Adaptation

This is something I talk about a lot. Whether a trend in our specific profession, new processes or tools (including AI), or a big change in our company’s direction, you need to be flexible with whatever comes at you. In the best-case scenario, be prepared to adapt continuously while striving to maintain your core principles. This suggestion is relevant beyond technology and AI, but those instigators do come up often. I’m not exaggerating when I say that I discuss the impact of AI with everyone I speak to. (Don’t we all?) While I’m constantly learning how others are adjusting, I maintain my advice: we must experiment to understand the various capabilities to determine how much, if at all, we’re willing to use them in our work. For the record, I strongly oppose some use cases and am more open to others. I don’t hide my opinions. I touch upon what’s behind my thinking here: Having ‘Taste’ in the Age of AI.

5. Integration of Life and Work

Given our personal lives and work lives are so intertwined these days, it can be more difficult to make career decisions that honor our values, relationships, and lifestyle preferences. While I recognize that having the choice of where to work is a huge privilege for some, I also acknowledge that others need to make compromises. (More on this in point 8.) That said, I seldom hear, “I just want to make a lot of money.” Even if that’s in the back of our minds, everyone says with earnest authenticity that they want “to make an impact,” or that they wish to work on products or projects that they “genuinely care about.” One professional with nearly 25 years of experience is targeting new industries and lower-level roles to focus on hands-on craft and strategy. They’re being more deliberate about where they work next. Important secondary benefits include regaining sanity by stepping back from the corporate bureaucracy and, ideally, achieving a better work-life balance in terms of working hours and days.

6. Proactive Relationship-building

I advise you to create and foster connections in your personal and professional communities. Networking is not only a superpower but a proven career boost when seeking a job. I say, “It’s not just who you know, it’s who knows you.” I spoke with a designer recently with 7 years of experience at major tech companies. He shared his struggle to connect with his coworkers remotely. We talked about scheduling 1-on-1 get-to-know-you video chats outside of regular working meetings. As awkward as it sounds, it’s a decent stand-in for the ad hoc hallway run-ins and coffee meets afforded by working on-site. The other option I suggested was to take advantage of company travel opportunities to meet with teammates in person, even requesting a budget to do so as an individual. He plans to try both, but is also considering a change, targeting an on-site role, or at least a hybrid one, for his next job search.

7. Permission to Pivot

This advice is something that we don’t hear enough, and is a significant component of my next writing project. In short, you must give yourself permission to explore alternatives, whether it’s a way of working, an employer, or your entire career. Today, pivoting is almost a necessity given how rapidly jobs are evolving. I had a wonderful conversation with a person who is nearly 10 years into her career. She had just completed a self-selected career break to consider a path completely different from design and technology. This wasn’t a short side quest, mind you. She spent more than a year learning about another profession and the credentials required to work in the mental health space. It was driven by her taking a step back from what she had been doing to re-examine her life and career goals. I applauded her bravery to explore the option. There may have been a smidge of embarrassment when she shared that she decided not to pursue the alternate path. But I doubled down on my praise for her decision to reconsider what mattered to her. I suspect that having done this deep self-reflection now will make it easier to do again in the future.

8. Balancing Pragmatism and Passion

Yes, we’d all be happier if we had a job where we “did what we loved” every day. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that aim, and I wish it upon everyone. However, sometimes we fall into the trap of defining ourselves too much by our careers. In fact, sometimes a job causes us to lose the passion that drove our career choice in the first place. Also, when we’re in a job we don’t love, we may feel we’re not fulfilling our potential or wasting time. This is often an extra identity burden for those in creative fields. I often invoke the argument of “design is not art” (and the caveat, “except when it is”), in those cases. But at the end of the day, we need to survive and thrive financially. I’ve mentored many to take any job they can, even if it’s not ideal, to gain real-world work experience. I’ve respected people who have worked for companies whose ideals don’t align with their own, particularly if they needed the paycheck to support themselves and their families. If either of those applies to you, you can create a healthy separation between your day job and your creative or social impact endeavors outside it, whatever they may be. In fact, doing so can lead to greater appreciation and higher performance at work.

If any of this sounds familiar, I hope it’s reassuring to know you’re not alone. I’m rooting for you and wish you all the luck in your career journey. Keep on going! Reach out if you’d like to chat.

Since last time:

• I’ve been working on a new book about career resilience and reinvention.

• In case you missed it: It was an honor to be interviewed on the incredible AIGA Design Podcast with Lee-Sean Huang and Giulia Donatello. We dug into the usual hot topics from adaptability in design careers, the evolving role of design leaders, and the importance of personal branding. Of course, we had to touch upon AI. Listen to the podcast or watch the video. 🎧

Our book would make an excellent gift or recommendation for a designer or aspiring designer! In addition to job searching and portfolio advice, it contains plenty of tips and stories for working designers looking to advance their careers.

If you already have it, thank you! We’d be grateful for your review on Amazon. ✏️

Don’t have it yet? The Design Career Handbook: Everything You Need to Know to Get a Job and Be Successful is available in paperback and ebook formats on Amazon and Barnes & Noble online!

Buy on Amazon

Buy at Barnes & Noble

A few weeks ago, I attended the Inaugural Midwest House Summit. It truly was a celebration of bold ideas and cross-sector collisions, intended to spark innovative connections among entrepreneurs, founders, investors, and policymakers in the Midwest. I’m not gonna lie, it was COLD in Grand Rapids, Michigan. In fact, my plane was initially diverted to Detroit because the GRR airport was snowed in right before we were scheduled to land. Anyhow, I made it, and my sensibilities from growing up in Chicago took hold as I bundled up with layers, a hat, a scarf, and gloves. The venue was the brand-new, gorgeous Bamboo co-working space, featuring a theater, several roomy stage areas, meeting rooms, kitchens, and tons of open collaboration space. There was a lot of energy and a true sense of community in the air that extended beyond whether or not you were a regional native or a coastal visitor. One thing was certain: people were joyously celebrating IRL human connection. That was a common theme in both the event talks and the various conversations I had with people.

And that turned out to be fortuitous, as human connection was central to the fireside chat between Trista Van Tine, founder of Nunchi, and me. I have to thank Trista for reaching out a few weeks prior to ask if I was game to make the trek and share the stage with her in a session on relationship building. We figured that we’d revisit our prior discussions about social networks while also looking to the future, so we named our session, “The Unscalable Connection: How AI Hype Drives Us Back to Human-First Micro-Networks.” I know that sounds like a lot, but if I say so myself, we covered a lot of ground, and the audience deftly followed along, if the enthusiastic head nods in agreement were any indication.

The following are a few key points and anecdotes from our conversation, and why we think people are craving a different kind of connection these days.

💬 The state of social networks

• The major social networks (Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter/X, etc.) are simply too big, with many already 10 to 20+ years old. They all started out with the intent of building community and connecting with others. They blended personal and business contacts. They all needed to grow. This meant more features and more engagement models. They all evolved into social media platforms, abandoning parts of their original core missions and blurring into one another.

• As early as 2010, Dave Morin, an early operator at Facebook, left to found Path with Shawn Fanning, the Napster founder. Path attempted to recapture the value of a close network (the app was initially capped at 50 connections).

• More recently, in 2024, Twitter and Medium Founder, Ev Williams, announced Mozi. It’s another go at fostering a network of connections that you actually care about; people you want to have relationships with.

• LinkedIn, arguably still a valuable professional network if you work hard to make it so, has often been criticized as performative, depressing, annoying, and even cringe. (For the worst offenders, check out r/LinkedInLunatics.)

👥 A generational observation

• If you are a late millennial or younger, you may have missed what made those first social networks interesting and valuable in the first place.

• It’s fair to say there is an aversion to platforms like Facebook (the social network for old people), which may provide a clue as to why platforms like Discord, Slack, and even Reddit have met a need for connection and conversations.

• But it’s not just young people. I have a former colleague (and fellow GenXer) who completely deleted her LinkedIn profile and started a new account. Her reason: to rebuild a network of people that she truly wants to engage with.

• Trista and I both read The Anxious Generation by Jonathan Haidt, which argues that the epidemic of youth anxiety, depression, and other issues stems from the growth of smartphones and social media since the 2010s. While screen addiction is not limited to the young, it is an overwhelming challenge, given that students need to develop critical thinking and communication skills to operate in work environments. (Evolving higher education plays an important role here.)

🤖 The AI effect

• There’s no doubt that we’re all feeling the pressures of AI. For this topic specifically, we discussed societal challenges while acknowledging viable, positive applications of tech.

• A growing body of research, statistics, and personal anecdotes indicates that AI adoption is contributing to the decline in entry-level jobs.

• We already suffer from content overload. Now, there’s AI-generated content just ramping up the throughput while often lowering the quality and value (i.e., AI slop). That also means a greater disconnect from human creators.

• While I don’t shy away from my own biases and opinions on AI, I also follow my own advice: I experiment with various tools to understand their capabilities and make my own decisions about what I’m willing to use them for. (Highly recommended read: Empire of AI by Karen Hao.)

• That being said, I wouldn’t be surprised if we saw an AI bubble burst like the dot-com crash: when funding dried up and companies that weren’t doing anything truly valuable went under. Do we need another AI image or video generator? No! We need more headlines like: AI-Guided Robot Plants ‘Baby Corals’ Across the Great Barrier Reef and How AI is helping revitalise indigenous languages.

After weaving through these topics and observations, we concluded that technology has fundamentally altered how we interact with each other and with information. Amid overall media fatigue and doomscrolling, there’s a longing for nostalgia and simplicity. And, because large online networks have exceeded their carrying capacity (the size at which degradation begins), it’s inevitable that we are trickling back into IRL social groups and knowledge and interest sharing. We touched upon a random assortment of anecdotes that give us hope about these types of gatherings, from Gen Z choosing teahouses over bars and apartments turned into coffeeshops, to one that I like to hear: independent bookstores making a comeback with a focus on events, including “single mingles.”

✅ A few of our calls to action

• On technology:

  • Stay informed about advancements and research by following reputable industry experts and critics alike

  • Experiment with tools to understand capabilities

  • Be flexible; don’t become overdependent on any single tool

• On networking:

  • Keep your network circle small, but active

  • Be intentional; research and understand others, be thoughtful in your communications

  • Set yourself a recurring reminder to foster your network (I named my monthly reminder “Cool People Catch-ups!”)

  • Make a regular practice to reach out to 10 people: a few you know and a few you don’t know

  • As often as you can: meet up in person over coffee or lunch

I hope you found this recap informative, and wish you all a wonderful holiday season and much success in 2026!

Since last time:

• It was an honor to be interviewed on the incredible AIGA Design Podcast with Lee-Sean Huang and Giulia Donatello. We dug into the usual hot topics from adaptability in design careers, the evolving role of design leaders, and the importance of personal branding. Of course, we had to touch upon AI. Listen to the podcast or watch the video. 🎧

• I have since been vibe coding. (Gasp!) Besides the goal of gaining first-hand experience, I’ve been paying particular attention to how much these environments inherently consider accessibility, security, and safety. My own experiment coincided with this article by my friend, Stephanie Lucas, on trust and ethics in product design. I followed her suggestion about further prompting the environment to run an inclusive design and trust assessment. Sound interesting? Let me know if you’d like to learn more. 🛠️

Our book would make an excellent gift for a designer or aspiring designer! Besides everything related to job searching and portfolios, it contains plenty of advice, tips, and stories for working designers looking to advance their careers.

If you already have it, thank you! We’d be grateful for your review on Amazon. ✏️

Don’t have it yet? The Design Career Handbook: Everything You Need to Know to Get a Job and Be Successful is available in paperback and ebook formats on Amazon and Barnes & Noble online!

Buy on Amazon

Buy at Barnes & Noble

I’ve had many productive one-on-one mentoring and coaching sessions with talented designers this summer. They’ve ranged from quick chats with recent graduates to multi-session engagements with designers having two to fifteen or more years of experience. The conversations often prompt me to reflect on a previous post related to the inevitable “How do I stand out?” question. If you missed it or need a refresher, it’s a quick read: 7 top ways to stand out as a designer. That post was intentionally high-level, essentially the TL;DR version of my most common advice to designers. Although the specifics of my guidance are tailored to each person’s unique background, experience, and path, there are common themes. Today, I’ll share the three most frequent.

You’ve polished your resume. You’ve supplied your portfolio link. You’ve applied to dozens, if not hundreds, of jobs. 😬 Maybe you’ve even had a referral or two.

So why is your inbox so dusty?

You don’t understand what’s not working. You think you’re missing something obvious. Maybe it is something obvious. If so, don’t beat yourself up about it. Often, it’s not that obvious. You may need to hear the same advice in different ways from multiple people for it to finally make sense.

Before I continue, I want to be clear that the bar has been raised. It’s 100% expected that you know how to design end-to-end. Perhaps you have a standout skill, too. Of course, you have a growth mindset and enjoy experimenting, even with AI tools (gasp!). You’re enthusiastic, energetic, and ready to go.

But you have to be discovered. Below are a few things to help you stand out from the competition enough to, hopefully, increase your inbound recruiter inquiries.

Your LinkedIn profile isn’t doing you any favors.

If your profile lacks:

• A clear headline with your focus or specialization

• An About section that’s personal and purposeful

• Plenty of details about your experience and skills

• Images and a link to your portfolio or website

then you’re asking a recruiter or potential hiring manager to do extra work just to understand who you are. They won’t. They’ll just move on.

OK. This is the easiest one! Even if you are a social media rejectionist (and I get that), your LinkedIn profile does SO MUCH work for you, especially if you are a passive job seeker. And, it’s often a recruiter’s true first impression of you, before your resume and before your portfolio.

✅ Do this to maximize the value of your profile:

1. Add a clear, compelling headline, About section, and absolutely, add your portfolio or website link.

2. Add your most important skills to the Skills section, and strong descriptions and images for relevant Experience and Education sections.

3. Take advantage of all the profile features (Top skills, Featured posts, Experience, Education, Interests, Volunteering, Certifications, Recommendations, etc.).

4. Be active on the platform. Follow companies, people, and organizations. Post, repost, comment, and react to content.

All of your profile information and activity will match you for potential roles and help recruiters find you. You’ll look serious about your career when you’re networking.

Your personal brand is too generic.

If your brand statement sounds anything like:

I creatively develop user-centered experiences that solve real problems with impact.

…then unfortunately, you sound just like thousands of other designers. If we made it to your portfolio, I, a recruiter or a hiring manager, already know what you do and the skills we're looking for.

This is the conversation I love having the most. Why? Because every one of you is a highly unique person. I want to know the story of you. I encourage you to dig really deep. Don’t shy away from what differentiates you from others.

✅ Consider these:

1. Complete self-reflection exercises and questions to uniquely reveal the passions and motivations that drive everything you do.

2. Identify the lens from your past that provides a distinctive edge (for example, education, creative hobbies, social volunteering, unconventional upbringing, a surprising industry pivot).

3. What makes you weird, in a good way?

What we ultimately want to know is whether you bring something new to our team or environment. Would you be fun to work with? Your brand statement can do so much more than serve as a weak skill qualifier. It should intrigue and hint at what they’ll learn about you through the rest of your material and when they meet you.

Your case studies are not memorable.

Even with the gobs of portfolio advice out there, I’m still surprised at what I see all the time. One extreme or the other: case studies that don’t say anything fresh, or case studies that are pages long with cookie-cutter section headings. Our eyes glaze over. What’s perfect? There’s no right answer; it depends on the project. And, it depends on your skill as a storyteller.

✅ Here is what I advise (and help with!):

1. It’s always the Goldilocks principle: not too much, not too little, but just right. What is most notable about each project? Even those that weren’t exciting or even failed should have pertinent learning experiences. What should I remember?

2. Yes, some projects should demonstrate your end-to-end design process. But others needn’t tell the entire story. They should focus on the most salient takeaways. Can you shine a spotlight on your contributions to its success?

3. Consider highlighting: a particular skill (a strong one, or one that demonstrates your personal development), a major constraint, a super insight that drove a design principle or key decision, or an anecdote of a healthy debate or a compromise (showcasing your collaboration).

4. Save some juicy details for your interviews and portfolio presentations. You want a hiring manager to ask, “Oh? Tell me more about that.” It’s smart to reserve interesting material and highlights for later stages of the process.

Ideally, each of your case studies can be individually memorable while collectively positioning you as a well-rounded, experienced designer.

Your resume, online profile, and portfolio are your marketing kit. Collectively, they serve one purpose: to get recruiters and hiring managers interested enough that they’ll follow up.

It’s up to you to put in the work to make sure your profile and portfolio tell the right story, in the right way, to the right people.

Since last time:

• I’ve been completely focused on another writing project! It’s still in the realm of career development. I’ll be sure to share more when it’s further along. 📝

• I was also interviewed on the AIGA Design Podcast. We dug into the usual hot topics from adaptability in design careers, the evolving role of design leaders, and the importance of personal branding. Of course, we had to touch upon AI. Listen to the podcast or watch the video. 🎧

We could use your help spreading the word. Please forward our newsletter to anyone who might find it useful. Our book would make an excellent gift for a design grad! Besides everything related to job searching and portfolios, it contains plenty of advice, tips, and stories for working designers looking to advance their careers.

If you already have it, thank you! We’d be grateful for your review on Amazon. ✏️

Don’t have it yet? The Design Career Handbook: Everything You Need to Know to Get a Job and Be Successful is available in paperback and ebook formats at Amazon and Barnes & Noble online!

Buy on Amazon

Buy at Barnes & Noble

I know it’s been (more than) a minute, but I hope you’re enjoying your summer, too! ☀️

I first wrote about the following overlooked tip in the first chapter of Part 4: Succeed in Your Job from the Design Career Handbook. I mention typical onboarding activities, such as learning about a company and its mission, meeting your team, and discovering the specifics of your direct responsibilities. I recommend asking lots of questions. The chapter ends with a short paragraph about what I call spelunking. (Although I didn’t call it that in the book because then I’d have to explain that it means “cave exploring”, and that it’s just a metaphor. 😛)

A portion of the following appeared in my guest post for ADPList’s Newsletter: Proven guide to a long career in design: Three frameworks to maximize your personal growth in every role.

Go Spelunking

If you’ve joined a company, you’ll learn plenty through training or informal meetings with your manager, an onboarding buddy, or new colleagues. Don’t be afraid to ask, “What else is important for me to know?” Asking plenty of questions demonstrates your eagerness to learn—the oft-referred-to growth mindset. Everyone expects questions. A new teammate is exciting for the team dynamic, as topics you initiate with curiosity stimulate discussion.

Particularly at established organizations, you’ll get access to resources and project libraries where you’ll find a wealth of references. Ask your onboarding buddy or a new colleague what would be helpful for you to review and which are a priority. Be a sleuth. Don’t be shy about poking around information that you have access to. You’ll pick up valuable tips and likely answer some of your own questions. Reviewing past documents and files should reveal many insights about existing processes, designers, and cross-functional partners. I refer to this as spelunking.

This is precisely what I did when I joined 23andMe during its rise to peak popularity. Although I was hired to build and lead the product design team, this tip is helpful for any stage of one’s career and any role, really. 23andMe, like many companies, had servers full of documentation from product roadmaps, development specifications, release notes, analytics from A/B and multivariate tests, marketing plans, customer research, design files, and even meeting notes.

By poring over this information and data treasure trove, I quickly gained a comprehensive understanding of the marketing landscape and detailed insights into our customers, products, teams, and internal processes. Importantly, what I learned equipped me with specific questions I could ask immediately in strategy and roadmap sessions. This happened in my first couple of weeks.

I also identified the power players in the company and scheduled meetings with them. Those are the people you want in your corner. They were either the authors of documentation or frequent commenters and providers of feedback. I invited influential cross-functional movers and shakers to my first design sprints. Because they had fun and truly participated in the product ideas we generated and collaborative decisions on what to explore first, I could bypass common roadblocks. The output of that work resulted in many quick wins that increased product engagement and revenue. The aspirational ideas informed the product roadmap for a year.

By digging in early, you’ll demonstrate the hustle valued by all and be seen as a rock star collaborator immediately. This practice is an effective way to establish yourself early in a new environment. At the very least, it will help you develop a clear point of view in your product or service space, especially if it’s an industry new to you.

Since last time:

I discussed spelunking and a bunch of other topics with the multi-faceted talent, Johanna Salazar, on her podcast, The Media Machine. Thanks, Johanna, for recommending that I circulate this tip again!

• Listen to the audio podcast on Spotify, Apple, or Amazon Music 🎧

• Watch the full video interview 📺

We could always use your help spreading the word about our book. It would make an excellent gift for a recent design grad! Besides everything related to job searching and portfolios, it also contains plenty of advice, tips, and stories for working designers looking to advance their careers.

If you already have it, thank you! We’d be grateful for your review on Amazon. ✏️

Don’t have it yet? The Design Career Handbook: Everything You Need to Know to Get a Job and Be Successful is available in paperback and ebook formats at Amazon and Barnes & Noble online!

Buy on Amazon

Buy at Barnes & Noble

This is a companion post to last week’s Nail the Interviews. Be sure to check it out for tips on behavioral and technical types, frameworks to give convincing and succinct responses, and how to artfully navigate conversations. In this post on networking, I share highlights from another chapter in Part 3: Look for a Job from the Design Career Handbook.

Yes, all of the following will be obvious. But sometimes, when we hear advice over and over, we start to ignore it. You should not ignore this advice. Networking is more critical than ever. Not long ago, studies showed that 30-50% of job hires were through referrals. That was already a statistic worth paying attention to. In the past year, I’ve seen people casually estimating as high as 75-80%.

Now…I haven’t tracked down legit research on that stat. But I can tell you that it’s completely logical. With the sheer number of candidates applying to open roles, recruiters and hiring teams happily utilize any filters they can to reduce the number to evaluate. Of course, referrals aren’t guaranteed to be the best candidates, but that’s just not how the world works. Referrals will often, at least, get a preferred look.

Here are two more scenarios. A network contact may recommend you for a position before it's publicly shared. And if you are connected to, and actively seen by, recruiters or people responsible for hiring, they might just reach out to you.

Networking is a superpower that will serve you throughout your professional life. It doesn’t cost a thing and is one of the most important activities you can do to advance your career. If you are naturally social, it will come easy for you. It will take some work if you are more of an introvert. Networking is connecting with others and engaging on a deeper level.

Authentic networking is not (overtly) transactional

With a mindset that networking should be mutually beneficial, help others whenever you can. Think of it as karma—as you put positive energy out in the world, you’ll attract it back to yourself.

Consider what you have to offer. It could be supporting something that isn’t related to your area of expertise. It could be as simple as providing feedback on a project or leaving a comment on an article or social media post acknowledging a person’s thoughts and letting them know what you found insightful. You can elevate the reach of someone’s voice by sharing something they posted with your network and commenting on how you found it valuable. If you read someone’s book or saw them speak at a conference or an event, you can send a note of gratitude and tell them what was specifically helpful or inspiring. If you know an interest or skill that a person is developing, you can share a video, article, or online course that you ran across.

This is building up social capital. If you are helpful, over time, others will return the favor when needed. That’s the true value of networking. Look for opportunities to expand your network every day. This could be at school, an organization or community group you belong to, industry meet-ups and conferences, or even while you’re traveling.

The key is being curious about others. Strike up a conversation and offer to stay in touch, schedule a video chat, or meet for coffee in the future. Exchange contact information and connect on social networks.

Engaging with others is especially valuable on professional networks. You can follow peers, thought leaders, influencers in your field, organizations you want to know more about, topics you are interested in, and people working in industries or companies where you’d like to work. Adding your voice by commenting on posts, videos, and articles will help you stand out and get noticed. Don’t forget to add value, not just opinion, by including facts, information, references, or a unique perspective.

All this effort is necessary to become an active part of a professional community. Your engagement must be authentic, which helps you build credibility for what’s next. What’s that? Well, you will connect with people that you don’t know personally. That’s the power of building and expanding your network, especially when job-seeking. A growing network results in more people sharing opportunities and job referrals with you and actively elevating your voice in the community.

How to ask for a networking chat

You may have something to offer someone now or in the future, but you’re more likely to have a need first. The most common things you may seek are information and advice. For example, you may be interested in knowing what it’s like to work in a specific company, environment, or industry. You may wish to hear about someone’s career path. Or, you may be looking for interviewing tips for your field.

These are all great reasons to send a message requesting an informational interview or a casual coffee chat. These can be in-person if you live near each other, over video, or just a phone call. Typically, introductory meetings are 30 minutes. But they can be 45 minutes or even an hour. It all depends on the other person’s availability. Don’t forget to open your message with an authentic connection before you present a request. Here are a few ideas and a general format:

• I read the article/book/paper you wrote on {topic}…

• I saw the webinar where you spoke about {topic}…

• I noticed that you are connected to {person}…

• I learned that you are active with {an organization, initiative, or cause}...

• …I’d appreciate connecting with you to follow your updates.

• …I’d be grateful to learn more about {company, industry topic} from you.

• …Would you be available for a 30-minute coffee, video chat, or phone call in the next week or two?

Now, I must be real and say that you will not hear back from many people. Don’t feel hurt. They’re likely very busy and get many inbound chat requests. Stay positive and keep working at it. I promise that those who respond do so because they are willing to be helpful.

When you get a positive response, the etiquette is to follow the other person’s lead if they provide a time frame for their availability and preference for how to connect. Ask how they’d like you to follow up and offer to send a calendar invite with details for an online video chat or a physical location. If they suggest their availability to meet, provide your email and phone number. Do your best to settle on details without too much back-and-forth.

After you schedule a meeting, prepare questions you’d like to ask. Be ready to answer questions the other person may have, too. Remember, conversations are two-way! It’s a good idea to send a short message the day before the meeting, reminding them of who you are, why you wanted to meet, and that you’re looking forward to it. If you requested the meeting, you must lead and set expectations.

Once you’ve thanked the person for meeting and exchanged introductions, they may prompt you to share more about yourself and your interests. Be sure to include the topic of your initial outreach. Be genuine and follow up with a deeper inquiry on whatever you referenced (e.g., content the person created, a mutual connection, an organization, etc.).

How a networking chat might go

How your informational interview or casual conversation goes from there highly depends on the situation. But it is the perfect time to demonstrate your curiosity. Here are just a few ideas of things you can ask:

• Questions about their career path or professional field

• What was it like to work at a specific company in the past, or on a product, or a campaign that they helped launch

• What it’s like to work at their current company, its mission, values, the size and structure of teams, and how they collaborate with each other

Many of these questions are similar to those you might consider asking during a job interview. While networking, keep it professional. Avoid asking intrusive questions unless the other person shares something personal, such as about where they live, having a family or pets, or if they mention their hobbies or interests.

Remember that the other person is also trying to get to know you in these conversations. That helps them determine how best to provide support. They will pose questions that show their interest. They may ask what drew you to your field and about your career goals. There can be questions about prior experiences you’ve had. Queries often start with “Tell me more about…” to poke into something you mentioned.

More inquisitive questions may pop up if your interest concerns a job opportunity or if it’s a follow-up conversation. In those cases, an interviewer may, from a high level, assess your experience and professional acumen. As interviewers, we also like to mix in questions to gauge your growth mindset and how you keep up with the industry.

Respect the person’s schedule and ensure the meeting wraps up on time. Thank the person and ask if it’s OK to reach out again.

Bonus outcomes of networking

Ultimately, networking is a major way to learn more about the professional world and could lead to a job opportunity later. In fact, having a job referral could result in your application jumping to the front of the line. A recruiter or hiring manager could consider and review your materials ahead of other applicants.

Forging relationships with experienced professionals could also lead to mentorship opportunities. Even if informal, talking with people in your field will help you develop listening and communication skills while being immersed in the particular lingo.

Another benefit of networking conversations is that they help you build your personal story bank. In addition to all the experiential anecdotes you bring to the table, you’ll learn what other people find interesting about you by answering their questions and hearing how they respond to your questions. File these in your story bank and write them down to revisit when preparing for job interviews.

Building a solid network takes a lot of work and time. True relationships aren’t just transactional. Provide value without an expectation of something in exchange. Make a genuine effort to keep in touch and show an interest in updates.

Since last time:

I was honored to be the debut guest of Design Shift, a new podcast by Justin Lokitz, advisor, entrepreneur, educator, and author. Thanks, Justin! It’s shared in 3 formats:

• Read a summary of our chat 📖

• Listen to the audio podcast 🎧

• Watch the full video interview 📺

We could always use your help spreading the word about our book. It would make an excellent gift for a recent design grad! Besides everything related to job searching and portfolios, it also contains plenty of advice, tips, and stories for working designers looking to advance their careers.

If you already have it, thank you! We’d be grateful for your review on Amazon. ✏️

Don’t have it yet? The Design Career Handbook: Everything You Need to Know to Get a Job and Be Successful is available in paperback and ebook formats at Amazon and Barnes & Noble online!

Buy on Amazon

Buy at Barnes & Noble

Whether you’ve been laid off, are looking to make a change, or are a recent grad, you’re probably in job search mode. So I’ll get right to it.

Nail the Interviews is a chapter smack in the middle of Part 3: Look for a Job in the Design Career Handbook. It’s preceded by chapters on: resilience, networking, internships, applying for jobs, and all about the recruiting process. It’s followed by chapters on: crushing design challenges, presenting like a pro, staying top of mind, and what hiring managers want. The chapter is lengthy, so I’ll only share highlights.

It’s a Conversation

It may not feel like it, but think of an interview as a two-way conversation. Yes, you’ll answer questions about yourself and your experience. But you’ll also have opportunities to ask questions.

Interviewing includes phone calls, remote video chats, and in-person meetings. It starts with an initial phone screen and can progress through multiple rounds of interviews. These calls assess whether you meet the requirements, get a feel for your personality and potential, see how well you communicate, and ultimately predict your success in the role. Early-stage calls usually take 30 minutes or less; more in-depth screening calls can range from 45 minutes to one hour.

As you progress through the interview process, you should raise additional questions about the opportunity. From a conversational interview or first phone screen to your portfolio presentation, you are also deciding if the role is appropriate for you. Aim to learn more about the company, the team, your potential manager, the work, and the role. Having good questions demonstrates that you care about the prospect and have a genuine interest.

Most questions you’ll encounter are standard regardless of design discipline, industry, or role level. Hiring managers may have their favorite questions, or there may be some that cater to particular roles. There are plenty of resources where you can find example interview questions. We’ll cover the different types along with a few of our top suggestions to ace them.

Behavioral Interviews

When you look up “common job interview questions,” you’ll see many that are typical of a behavioral interview. Some favorites have been in our repertoire as hiring managers for years, and we can guarantee that interviewers will ask these questions. Here are a few:

• Tell me about yourself.

• Can you share a project you are proud of and why?

• What are you good at, and what skills are you still developing?
  (strengths and weaknesses)

• Where do you find inspiration?

Our biggest tip is creating a document, listing core questions, and writing out your answers. You are crafting your narrative script. And you know what comes next, right? Practice! You should rehearse speaking your answers out loud. You may feel weird or embarrassed, but trust us, it will be worth it when you are well-prepared to answer questions confidently in an interview.

As you practice, review your delivery, get feedback from others, and decide what flows well and what doesn’t in your responses. Revise and tighten your script. The goal is for stories to be easily accessible in conversations so that you can deliver them in a compelling and concise way while also sounding natural.

Technical Interviews

These interviews are exactly what they sound like. These are the questions that aim to assess your tech knowledge and proficiency alongside your design process. If you are asked a specific question about a tool or to describe how to accomplish an outcome with design software, use the opportunity to flex your expertise. Just don’t lose sight of the fact that using software is the means to the end of creating successful design solutions. While rare, an interviewer may ask for a peek into your design files. Hiring teams want to know if you’re agile, efficient in software, and have organized files.

SHE formula

This is a terrific formula for open-ended questions, particularly personal ones such as “Tell me about yourself” or “What do you like to do outside of work?” There’s no wrong answer here. You want to present yourself as interesting, perhaps with a surprising hobby or passion. SHE stands for Succinct, Honest, and Engaging.

The key is to share something authentic without going on too long. Avoid topics that could be polarizing or controversial, such as politics. Stick to points that show you as well-rounded and reflect your character.

STAR method

Another one of our go-to interview recommendations is the STAR method. STAR is an easy acronym to remember and an excellent framework for assembling a narrative on the fly. You can also consider this approach when drafting portfolio case studies. STAR can help you determine headlines and scannable quotes for a case study.

STAR stands for Situation, Task, Action, and Result.

• Situation: Provide an overview of the situation.

• Task: Describe your responsibility and specific tasks.

• Action: Explain the details you took to address the task(s).

• Result: Share the outcomes achieved by your actions.

Think of it as a condensed way of recalling the highlights of a project without getting into every stage of the design process. It can help you sequence your thoughts and convey the salient details in response to typical questions that begin like this:

• Tell me a time when…

• Have you ever…

• Give me an example of…

• Tell me about how you would…

Most behavioral questions that start with the phrases above will be inquiries about your interactions or actions. That means your interviewer expects a narrow response. Use STAR to structure an anecdote about a specific aspect of one of your projects. It could be about aligning on a goal, negotiating a direction, debating about insights from data and feedback, or testing a solution.

Using STAR helps you to be concise with your response. If you aim for just a few sentences and about 1–2 minutes for each portion, you’ll have a crisp 5–8 minute response. Stick to pertinent details to address the question. Without visual aids, you can lose your interviewer if you provide too much information. Also, avoid answering generically. You must go deeper than you “worked hard” or “figured it out.” Provide specific examples of what you did and the impact.

Navigating Conversations

There are a few valuable tips for all conversations you have in life. The first is to be an active listener. It can be challenging in an interview as the point is to focus on listening closely when the other person is speaking rather than thinking about what you want to say next! Active listening includes paying close attention, reflecting on what is said, and responding appropriately. This is why rehearsing your interview responses is worthwhile. In a conversation, you need to artfully think on your feet when responding and get yourself back on track to anecdotes you want to share.

Conversations with interviewers are your first opportunities to demonstrate curiosity. You should prepare before your first contact by researching everything you can about the potential employer. Whether it’s a company, an agency, or a small business, be sure you know what they do and write out a list of questions you can ask. It can be about their clients or customers, products and services, initiatives, the team you may work with, or more about the role. This preparedness will show how much you are interested in and value the opportunity. Have a few questions ready if you have an open-ended chance to ask, or use them as topic follow-ups.

• About the company and executive leaders

• How the business is doing in terms of revenue or funding

• Design’s role in the company strategy (the proverbial seat-at-the-table topic)

• Learning, mentorship, and growth opportunities

You should dive deep and ask questions about the specific role and team, which may include topics such as:

• The traits and skills needed for you to hit the ground running to make a personal impact

• Who will you work with regularly, and what are their strengths and gaps (peers, partners, stakeholders)

• Your potential design manager’s leadership style

• The biggest challenges facing the team at the moment

You’ll have successful interviews if your responses and questions establish your qualifications for the job. Remember to sprinkle memorable anecdotes from your story bank into conversations. Leave your interviewer with something surprising that influences your design perspective or that you are extremely curious about. These details can differentiate you from the competition.

The interview is a crucial stage where your storytelling skills and practice in advance will pay off. Please let us know if any of these tips work for you.

We could always use your help spreading the word about our book. It would make an excellent gift for a recent design grad! Besides everything related to job searching and portfolios, it also contains plenty of advice, tips, and stories for working designers looking to advance their careers.

If you already have it, thank you! We’d be grateful for your review on Amazon. ✏️

Don’t have it yet? The Design Career Handbook: Everything You Need to Know to Get a Job and Be Successful is available in paperback and ebook formats at Amazon and Barnes & Noble online!

Buy on Amazon

Buy at Barnes & Noble

Anyhoo, a fascinating conversation has emerged in the AI discourse, particularly in relation to design. As far back as late last year, I started seeing opinion pieces about how taste will be more critical than ever as more products and services are developed using AI.

Daniel Bentes, an engineer and founder working in the AI space, put a great deal of thought last November in his article, "What AI Lacks and Might Never Overcome: Taste," After starting with a neuroscientific examination of taste, he added an incredible range of cultural and historical references from art, music, and dance. In the article’s opening paragraph, he said:

“While AI systems can analyze millions of artworks or musical compositions, they fundamentally lack the cultural context, emotional depth, and lived experience that inform human taste.”

Bentes’ article was ultimately not critical, as he concluded with many questions and ideas about developing AI systems that aim to combine human and machine capabilities, rather than just replicating human taste.

Martin O’Leary, a fintech growth marketer, posted “Why Taste Is The Only Moat AI Can't Copy in 2025” in r/entrepreneur a few months ago. There is a fairly balanced set of perspectives in the comments, but O’Leary ended it with this:

“The startups that will win aren’t the ones obsessed with what AI can do. They’re the ones obsessed with what only humans can. They’ll use AI as a tool, not a crutch, crafting products that feel like magic instead of just looking the part.

Here’s what happens when everyone has the same tools: mediocre taste makes you invisible. Good taste makes you unforgettable. And bad taste? That’s just infamous.

AI’s leveling the playing field. Good taste is what sets you apart.”

Sari Azout, founder of Sublime.app, wrote the following in her newsletter, “What matters in the age of AI is taste”:

“AI is powerful but taste-blind. It can make anything but it has no idea what's actually worth making.

But AI + your taste? That's the game-changer.

The more AI can execute, the more your eye for what's interesting – your ability to discern and curate what matters and why – becomes everything.”

Further in, she discussed the importance of a curated personal knowledge base to “teach AI to see through your eyes.”

Kira Klaas, a corporate marketing executive, recently shared the following in her newsletter, “When Everyone has AI, Only Taste Matters”:

“We shouldn’t be surprised. Every technological revolution follows a similar pattern: early hype, mass adoption, inevitable backlash, and finally, meaningful integration. We’re rapidly approaching the backlash phase with AI—and when it hits, the brands that have focused on taste rather than tech are the ones who are gonna make it through unscathed.”

It also wasn’t the first time that Klaas had written about taste. Last year, she wrote “What does Taste Mean at Work?”

Earlier this month, my former colleague and a design director at LinkedIn, Harrison Wheeler, posted a poll asking if people thought taste was a differentiator. He followed it up with, ”Do you have good taste? That’s debatable.” Harrison offered his perspective as a millennial:

“We've got to be careful about turning 'taste' into just another careless buzzword we throw around in meetings to sound like we know what we're doing because it carries some weight and it might come off as pretentious to people you’re trying to influence.”

He went on to write about how taste and intuition are linked, and that his “own gut feelings aren’t formed in isolation,” but “that doesn’t mean that he relies on intuition alone.”

(Be sure to subscribe to Harrison’s newsletter and podcast, Technically Speaking. We’ve had it listed on our recommended resources page since our book came out.)

Lastly, David Mendes, a brand design manager, wrote about the commoditization of taste in his newsletter. After sharing a few methods of how humans develop taste, and suggesting how they may not be dissimilar to how GenAI image models have been developed, he added:

“No matter how you look at it, from algorithmic to manual approaches, inspiration is becoming homogenized and taste flattened. An average of collective judgment. And that's not very differentiating.”

I know that was a lot, and there’s much more of this discussion out there. I recommend taking a moment to read any of the references above in full.

Although not specifically relating to AI, we wrote about taste in the final chapter of the Design Career Handbook. A few of the thoughts in the previous references align with our perspective. We know it’s not exactly the same, but we prefer to use a term that evokes less subjectivity, design sense. Here’s an excerpt:

Continue developing your eye and how you determine great design. Some people consider this taste, but we’re not fans of that term. When a person is said to have good taste, they are identified and associated with popular or desirable things—fashion, music, food, products, and just about anything. Sometimes, a person with good taste is a trendsetter. Things that they like become liked by others.

Taste is often considered a subjective and elusive trait; you have good taste, or you don’t. However, according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, the definition of taste is critical judgment and discernment of quality. As a designer, you’ve developed these skills for critiques—evaluating solutions based on principles, heuristics, research, and data.

As you design solutions of your own and consume design with a critical lens, you’ll equate taste with the ability to recognize quality. Non-designers may not have the frameworks or language to describe how they do this. But you do. You have the tools to evaluate the quality of a thing—its ability to successfully address a problem or goal for its intended audience and resonate on an emotional level.

Building on your tactical evaluative skills, you add customer satisfaction insights and your definition of delight. All of this combined is reflected in a term we’ve used a few times in this book: design sense. Having a mature design sense includes:

• Being highly knowledgeable about design foundations

• Recognizing when rules are followed and broken (with or without intention)

• Having a keen eye for detail

• Evaluating solutions thoughtfully

• Making deliberate design decisions

• Keeping in mind the why in your process

As you grow as a designer, all of this will become intuitive, and you’ll help others to do the same. From a practical standpoint, your interests will expand, and your ambitions will evolve as you form new perspectives through feedback and self-reflection on what you wish to accomplish.

Since last time:

• It was truly special to give a talk on design career strategies in my hometown at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago! Check out the post for several highlighted topics and the t-shirt that I chickened out of wearing at the actual talk! 🖼️

We could always use your help spreading the word about our book. Please share with anyone interested in design. Besides everything related to job searching and portfolios, it also contains plenty of advice, tips, and stories for working designers looking to advance their careers.

If you already have it, thank you! We’d be grateful for your review on Amazon. ✏️

Don’t have it yet? The Design Career Handbook: Everything You Need to Know to Get a Job and Be Successful is available in paperback and ebook formats at Amazon and now also via Barnes & Noble online!

Buy on Amazon

Buy at Barnes & Noble

Learn more about the book

But the old creative in me suspects there is a lot less serendipitous discovery of art and design inspiration found by flipping through an art history book or design magazine or simply walking through an art gallery or an unfamiliar retail shop with an observant eye. Even browsing websites that cover modern artists and designers more deeply will provide fresh influences.

Of course, this isn’t a novel idea. It’s what artists and designers have been doing forever. We learned by studying the masters and creators who came before us. The following excerpt appears in the Design Career Handbook:

It is valuable to be curious about art and design history. You’ll make connections, recognize influences, and find inspiration for your work. For example, you may come across the cool personal style of a “social media influencer” and notice that she is riffing off a famous streetwear brand.

If you’ve studied design, you might realize that Barbara Kruger’s work heavily influenced that streetwear brand’s iconic logo, down to the font choice.

Kruger’s art from the 1980s was striking in her use of black-and-white photographs overlaid with red bars and declarative captions to make provocative statements. Her style may have been inspired by artists, including Aleksandr Rodchenko, from the Constructivism movement in the 1920s and 1930s—in intent, medium, and color palette. As you build your mental visual library, you’ll create a deep bank of references and often think, “Where have I seen that before?” as you observe design around you.

As John Mauriello states in this informative video on industrial design trends, “The creative process is ultimately about copying, transforming, and combining elements to create something new.” In the video, he discusses the line between remix and ripoff through various product examples, from sunglasses to housewares, guitars, and shoes. He also illustrates the well-tread use case of Apple referencing Braun in its product design. Former Chief Design Officer Jony Ive was never coy about citing Dieter Rams as an inspiration during his time at Apple.

Influences can be more controversial in the brand design world, given they can involve trademarked or copyrighted assets such as logos. There is no doubt that creating a unique logo is extremely challenging given the increasing number of them that exist in the world. That being said, it’s also quite logical that graphic designers may explore similar directions, resulting in similar-looking logos completely independently. Design agency FullStop examined a few, including Medium, Airbnb, Beats, and their doppelgänger counterparts.

All design disciplines have a gray area between how much you reference something you admire versus straight-up copying it. Even more so if, in your mind, you consider it an homage. That said, with varied and exhaustive creative study, you will be more likely to remix surprising influences in unexpected ways. Thereby adding a unique take to your work and continuing to develop your personal design point of view.

So be sure to schedule a trip to an art gallery and visit the art and design section of your school or local library! In the meantime, here are 10 inspirational resources you can start browsing right now:

1. Artforum

2. Art of the Title

3. Artnet

4. Creative Review

5. D5 Magazine

6. Designboom

7. Innovation Magazine

8. Juxtapoz

9. Letterform Archive

10. Wallpaper

Find many more links on our Resource Page: books, design organizations and agencies, documentaries, groups, learning resources, newsletters, podcasts, and thought leaders.

BTW: The point is not lost on me that my previous article was: Design is not art (except when it is)! 🙃

Since my last update:

• I was grateful for the opportunity, along with other mentors, to guide students over two days at a local hackathon at West Valley College. More than ten teams explored super innovative ideas within the theme “Hack for Humanity.” I was particularly excited to help shape expert storytelling for their final project presentations. ✏️ + 🛠️ = 🔥

• I’m thrilled that I’ll be visiting my hometown next week to give a talk on design career strategies at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago! Not only did I grow up visiting the Art Institute as a kid, I also took life drawing and sculpture classes there during my undergrad years. 🖼️

We could always use your help spreading the word about our book. Please share with anyone interested in design. Besides everything to do with job searching and portfolios, it also contains plenty of advice, tips, and stories for working designers looking to grow and advance.

If you already have it, thank you! We’d be grateful for your review on Amazon. ✏️

Don’t have it yet? The Design Career Handbook: Everything You Need to Know to Get a Job and Be Successful is available now in paperback and Kindle ebook, and will also be available via Barnes & Noble online soon!

Buy on Amazon

Learn more about the book

Since we’ve talked to many students lately, we thought sharing this age-old debate would be interesting. It’s common and perfectly logical that people are steered toward design because they are creative or artistic. Nothing wrong with that! The following excerpt is actually how we begin the Design Career Handbook:

We must start with one of our all-time favorite discussions: design is not art. We have this opinionated point of view because our undergraduate study was traditional industrial design. At the time, the discipline was predominantly concerned with physical products. In human factors, a core aspect of the curriculum, we learned to focus on the psychology and behavior of the people who use products. So, for us, design has always been about what someone needs to accomplish. On the other hand, art is about the artist and what they want to express.

Design is objective—it has a goal that is either accomplished or not accomplished. Art is subjective—those who experience it can have different interpretations and reactions, none necessarily wrong.

That being said, design and art are intrinsically linked. Professional design absolutely benefits from a creative mindset. In fact, many designers we know also practice art as an applied skill in their jobs or as a creative outlet—including illustration, photography, painting, pottery, jewelry making, and music. The key is knowing what amount of your artistic point of view and creative skill is pertinent to a given design project and your responsibilities.

For the record, we love art! The books, paintings, and framed prints in our home, frequent visits to museums and maker events, social feeds full of creators that inspire us, and the numerous art and craft making tools we own attest to this.

We also love beautifully made products. In the best case scenario, physical objects and digital services fulfill their functions while providing joy in their use or simply because of their level of craft.

(Someday, I’ll have that Eames Lounge Chair!) 😀

Late in our book, we discuss how strong design sense and good taste result from developing a critical eye and intuitively discerning quality.

We’d love to hear about your relationship to design and art. Let us know in the comments or message anywhere you find us online.

It’s been a while! Here are a few things we’ve been up to since our last update:

We could always use your help spreading the word about our book. Please share with anyone interested in design. It also contains plenty of advice, tips, and stories for working designers.

If you already have it, thank you! We’d be grateful for your review on Amazon. ✏️

Don’t have it yet? The Design Career Handbook: Everything You Need to Know to Get a Job and Be Successful is available now in paperback and Kindle ebook.

Buy the Paperback

Buy the Kindle Ebook

Learn more about the book

“HOW DO I STAND OUT?” is a top question for job seekers and designers seeking promotion.

The following are seven top ways we advise:

1. Be qualified.

Put in the work to be really, really good. Know the process. Master the tools. Maintain a high quality. Have a design perspective.

2. No cookie-cutter portfolio.

Present diverse projects and case studies that tell compelling stories of “why.” Each has a crystal clear, memorable takeaway.

3. Have a personal brand.

Be interesting. Your personal brand expresses your unique voice and style. Others want to learn more about you.

4. Demonstrate a growth mindset.

Your past work highlights your flexibility. You experiment with new technologies and are excited to develop new skills. 

5. Have an execution mindset.

Use proven design and research processes, but don’t let them bog you down. Get what you need to keep moving forward efficiently.

6. Be an excellent collaborator.

You’re a thoughtful communicator who appreciates healthy debate. You recognize the strength in teams and help people align.

7. Show Impact.

Your narratives depict success through user-centered goals and business metrics. You ensure that leadership sees your work.

The list is quite simplistic. A few subtle pieces of advice make all the difference. We wrote an entire book diving deeper into these topics and more.

When we teach and mentor, we look for nuances not only with career level but also with each person’s unique experiences, strengths, and opportunities. What makes your perspective fresh? Where do you shine? Where do you have room to level up?

I’d be happy to help you discover what makes you stand out. Connect with me on LinkedIn or ADPList. - Kevin

If you already have the book, thank you! Would you mind leaving a review on Amazon? ✏️ Much gratitude to those of you who have already written one. 🙏🏼

Don’t have it yet? The Design Career Handbook: Everything You Need to Know to Get a Job and Be Successful is available now in paperback and Kindle ebook formats.

Buy the Paperback

Buy the Kindle Ebook

Learn more about the book

This week, two stood out to me. Depending on where you are in your career, one or both are notable. It’s OK to lurk, but engaging in cool threads is even better.

We often hear, “How do I stand out?” in design. However, this post by Jeremy Schifeling kicked off an engaging, broader conversation. Jeremy is an expert career coach, speaker, and friend of the Design Career Handbook. He shared how he is perplexed by job candidates who are “SO AFRAID to stand out.” He later playfully asked if he was the “crazy one.”

Being the provocateur this time, I left a one-word comment, “Generational.” to see how that might fly. Our follow-up banter surfaced an anecdote by Jeremy about generational preferences for communication and my belief that expectation tweaking and behavior changes are necessary for job-seeking and in the workplace. While that was very high-level, other commenters offered in-depth acknowledgment, perspectives, and actionable suggestions. Thoughts touched upon cultural differences, the effects of the pandemic, anxiety, and introversion.

Read the full post and its comments. At the least, maybe you’ll relate. At most, you’ll pick up a tip or two. Follow Jeremy; he shares tons of data, insights, and suggestions. His writing is approachable, and he’s authored books on job searching and careers.

Here’s another one. This post by Mindaugas Petrutis opened with, “The worst advice junior designers keep getting is 'Find a great mentor!'” Now, I’m friendly with Mindaugus and know his style. He expertly starts with a “hook” and then pivots to an intriguing topic. In the rest of the post, he listed examples of people with different responsibilities in a company from whom designers have learned the most. He ended with a question, “What unexpected relationship shaped your career?”

My response:

Design mentors are critical. Working designers (actually all professionals) suffer from the "curse of knowledge." We assume everyone knows what we know. In particular, we need to help early-in-career and leveling-up professionals identify their skill and knowledge gaps.

That being said, I love this topic. Our book on design careers has a chapter called "Partner in Crime." Its aim is slightly broader, but the basic premise is to find cross-functional partners with whom you get along. These relationships provide opportunities to learn rapidly about different domains as you support each other's goals.

In response to your question, it wasn't necessarily unexpected, but it was unplanned → one of my earliest professional relationships was with a self-proclaimed "sales guy." He was ten years my senior and had been working in tech for a long time. He knew the practical ins and outs of business and selling.

I learned a ton from seeing him operate on customer acquisition and keeping customers happy. Notably, there was mutual respect, which led to our becoming business partners. That relationship was instrumental in my healthy respect for business impact throughout my career.

For the record, Mindagaus very much believes design mentorship is essential! And I agree wholeheartedly with the rest of what he wrote. Read the full post for its core insights and the valuable comments others shared. Give Mindaugas a follow; he regularly shares thought-provoking content. He’s also building Coho—a community platform that will be valuable to high-level designers and design leaders.

One more thing. We were thrilled to recently speak with students from two graduate programs at California College of the Arts in San Francisco. They were in the MBA Design Strategy program and the MDes program for Interaction Design. We covered what it's really like to apply design thinking on the job, the very convoluted state of job titles + the pros and cons of presenting oneself as a generalist or specialist, and, of course, advice on landing that first design job. The students were engaged and had excellent follow-up questions (differences between product team roles and what makes a portfolio stand out were hot topics). It was also the first time offering our book at an event!

Meanwhile, we are planning to share more content from the book here! 😅

If you already have it, thank you! Would you mind leaving a review on Amazon? ✏️

Don’t have it yet? The Design Career Handbook: Everything You Need to Know to Get a Job and Be Successful is available now in paperback and Kindle ebook formats.

Buy the Paperback

Buy the Kindle Ebook

Learn more about the book

In fact, we were blown away. 🤯

It's kind of nuts. If you haven't already, you're going to hear more of these two "podcasters" talking about all manner of topics. Oh, they're completely AI-generated. The entire conversation. It was not scripted. “They” decided what to talk about based on a simple input. In this case, a single public webpage from the book’s website.

They made us sound brilliant! 🤖🤖

The bit about customizing a portfolio for each job was not quite right. Other than that, they delivered a fairly accurate and compelling overview. Let us know what you think about this technology and the conversation—especially if you've read the book!

The Design Career Handbook: Everything You Need to Know to Get a Job and Be Successful is available now in paperback and Kindle ebook formats. The content is the same, but we’re quite proud of the printed version! 📖

Buy the Paperback

Buy the Kindle Ebook

You can also read a few reviews from ACTUAL HUMANS on the book website and on Amazon.

Design Career Handbook website

@DesignCareerHandbook on IG

@DesignCareerBk on X

Kevin on LinkedIn // Jeanine on LinkedIn

It’s available now in paperback and Kindle ebook formats. The content is the same, but we’re quite proud of the printed version! 😀

Buy the Paperback

Buy the Kindle Ebook

We’ve been saying, “We know the market is tough, but the world still needs designers—really good ones.” And we stand by it. Despite the job scarcity we’ve been experiencing, and the search and interview challenges many of you are facing, we hope you stay the course. The field of design is changing fast, there’s no doubt. But we remain optimistic and are rooting for you.

We hope you check it out and look forward to hearing what you think. Send a message or connect with us on LinkedIn (links below).

If you’re not a designer—Thanks for following along. Be sure to recommend the book to designers you know or anyone interested in the creative industry!

Your friends,

Kevin and Jeanine Flores

The Design Career Handbook: Everything You Need to Know to Get a Job and Be Successful is available NOW.

DesignCareerBook.com

Design Career Handbook website

@DesignCareerHandbook on IG

@DesignCareerBk on X

Kevin on LinkedIn // Jeanine on LinkedIn

We probably told a few of you that we planned to launch this week, and we had the best intentions.

And then another (semi-panic mode) round of editing occurred. You know, because this book isn’t a story where it might have been okay if a character was underdeveloped or there were a few minor plot holes. (Look out for those in my future fiction writing.) 😬

And then there were all these dominos to set up. We knew what they were, but we didn’t exactly have control of the timing. For example, we needed to see the “Ready to Publish” status from Amazon’s system before filing our copyright submission. And then, we placed an order for author copies to send to our generous contributors (which still haven’t arrived). Since we’re waiting to have those in hand, here’s a sneak peek video of our last proof copy.

Anyhow, we had to follow our own advice and finally say, “It’s done.” We also wanted to stick to our self-imposed deadline for a launch in August. So, there you have it!

The book will be available on August 28th at Amazon in paperback and Kindle ebook Edition. It’s the same content (although we’re quite proud of the work that went into the print version).

We hope you check it out and look forward to hearing what you think.

Thanks again for following our updates!

Your friends,

Kevin and Jeanine Flores

The Design Career Handbook: Everything You Need to Know to Get a Job and Be Successful launches on AUGUST 28th. Please share with your design friends. 😄

DesignCareerBook.com

Design Career Handbook website

@DesignCareerHandbook on IG

@DesignCareerBk on X

Kevin on LinkedIn // Jeanine on LinkedIn

What wasn’t done was typesetting the pages for the paperback. We knew it was our last step and planned not to over-design it. That wasn’t our intention for the book, but c’mon, it must look professional. 🧐

Long-form document typesetting is complex! We needed to level up our advanced InDesign skills. We had to precisely review how content flowed, particularly across page breaks—paragraph by paragraph, page by page, and chapter by chapter. There are many bullet lists, contributor anecdotes, illustrations, charts, and quotes. And sometimes, they just didn’t land on the page in an ideal spot.

Of course, reading a book on a screen is different than reading a book in your hands. Our first taste was printing out the entire manuscript on standard 8.5″ x 11″ paper (with crop marks for the actual book size). That gave us a sense of the tactile flow—visual scanning and turning pages. We did more editing—a lot more. It was mostly small tweaks: trimming a few words here, adding a few words there, and moving bits up and down.

We were feeling pretty good when we submitted the manuscript last week and ordered our first proof copies of the paperback! They arrived yesterday, and we have to admit, it was a little surreal. It’s a beefy book with our words and images—in our hands. 🤯

Besides details we couldn’t possibly have experienced before (e.g., the feel of the cover, the inner and outer page margins), more things have caught our eye. And we’re painstakingly improving them. 😅

We’re proud of how it looks and reads. Even though we’re going to get another set of proofs, we believe we’re only a few weeks from launching. Thanks for following our updates!

Your friends,

Kevin and Jeanine Flores

The Design Career Handbook: Everything You Need to Know to Get a Job and Be Successful is coming soon. Don’t forget to share with your design friends. 😄

DesignCareerBook.com

Design Career Handbook website

@DesignCareerHandbook on IG

@DesignCareerBk on X

Kevin on LinkedIn //Jeanine on LinkedIn

Phew!?

It took much longer than expected or planned, but it’s nearly ready. Compiling our best instruction, tips, and advice about learning design, developing portfolios, job searching, interviewing, and career growth has been a true labor of love. The last step before publishing is to complete the physical book layout.

The official title is the Design Career Handbook: Everything You Need to Know to Get a Job and Be Successful. Lofty, but we think aspiring and working designers will find a ton of information to help them on their design journeys. In addition to our personal experiences, we spoke with different types of designers at various career stages for their diverse perspectives. They are design students, freelancers, designers working in agency and corporate environments, design managers responsible for hiring, and even a senior design recruiter.

The book will launch in paperback and ebook versions in August 2024. If you’d like to learn more, visit our book website and share it with your design friends!

DesignCareerBook.com

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Along with material from the book, we have plenty of other ideas to share. Subscribe to receive portfolio and interviewing tips, advice to help with your job search, and tools to level up in your job. Oh, and book launch announcement, too!

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We look forward to connecting with you,

Kevin and Jeanine Flores

Design Career Handbook website

@DesignCareerHandbook on IG

@DesignCareerBk on X

Kevin on LinkedIn //Jeanine on LinkedIn

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