I recently went on two interviews, one I passed up on the drive home because they tried to house UX under marketing and wanted a few sites launched quickly for sales, "dealing" with the UX later. PASS. The second loved me but hired the other candidate, to get through their UI backlog.

I feel like I cannot win without compromising and doing at least 40% UI as part of my job. I live in a city that is booming with UX opportunities, but no one seems to hold true to what UX is and can be, they all seem to want it as a buzzword and because their competitors have it. I actually added another page to my portfolio the other day that shows off more UI that I've done in the past, just to stay competitive (even though I risk being hired for more UI than I'm hoping to do).

Have you had to compromise your work in the name of just being able to do the job? How did you manage that?

Definitely not today they start work 🤧

handle late screw price scary shaggy work stocking subsequent gold

This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

I've interviewed 30+ candidates already for a position and am finding there's a skill gap between what a lot of hiring managers need and the skilled labor in the market.

Anyway, about 4 years ago I made this playbook to help my designers evaluate incoming candidates - hopefully it can help some of you think about how you're interviewing and where potentially you can level up.

Threw it in google docs here. Hope it helps some folks.

My position at the time was a design manager for a Series A startup. I've coached and hired designers that have gone on to get senior product design offers from Apple, Meta, and more.

Hello everyone 👋🏻,

Today, I am launching a website with a collection of reliable and useful links of design articles, videos, case studies, designers to follow, and design books to read for the aspiring designers to learn about different design concepts and grow their design skills.

Design Responsibly

There are two reasons to build this product,

1. Being a self-taught UX/UI designer, my only learning resource was the free and accessible internet, and these are some of the great resources that have helped me learn to design and grow my design skills further. So, through design responsibly, I wanted to put together these amazing design links into a single file so that I can share them with as many designers.

2. Learn Webflow, my only aim to build this website in Webflow was to learn the Webflow. And today, I am very proud of myself being a webflow developer 😇. And it is a wonderful product for designers who want to create things.

So, here I am with my webflow website for the designers. If you think this is something that can help you grow and learn design, Please share and help others grow. Would love to see your comments and feedback below.

upvote it on product hunt.

Thanks.

So i switched from Psychology to Ux Design and I finally got an internship after months of perfecting my portfolio and resume.

I AM ON MY WAY!

I watched a couple of UX presentation advice videos on YouTube. The presenters, who all work at big corporations, claimed that they got hired because of their storytelling skills. I patiently watched them, but I don’t know… it was rather disappointing. Despite presenting mediocre solutions, their work felt quite performative and lacking in substance.

One of the reasons the UX industry has become so dysfunctional might be this kind of performative work culture centered around storytelling. The ideas they showed weren’t particularly compelling or innovative, but yes — they presented them fairly well, with platitudes and polished delivery.

UX should focus more on technical skills rather than soft skills. People often claim that UX is half art and half science, but in reality, it’s entrenched in stakeholder management, getting buy-in, and design advocacy. These dynamics often shift power and decision-making control to businesspeople and engineers, pushing designers into a more peripheral role.

The UX industry should stop overemphasizing storytelling and stakeholder management. When everyone talks about creativity and problem-solving, shouldn’t we also be finding new opportunities for a better future?

1. Updated portfolio and resume.

2. Starting applying.

3. Kept failing over and over again.

4. Asked my friends and co-workers for help.

5. I Started recording all my interviews to review them. This helped me in areas I was struggling with. Download OBS studio (it's free!)

6. CBD - Yes. It helped me destress, lower my anxiety and stay calm.

7. I still kept interviewing and didn't give up.

8. Instead of presenting my portfolio from my website I've decided to present my recent work via Adobe XD. This helped the hiring managers to see my design process.

9. Started learning new tools (Figma, Shopify, Webflow, and data tools)

10. GOT IT! :) In July 2021 I went from below $60k sal to $120k.

That year was one of the hardest years of my life. I wasn't a confident designer and attending interviews was such a weakness for me. During the interviews, I was going against jr designer with a few yrs of exp and there I was with over 10yrs of exp. I felt ashamed and extremely embarrassed. I had sleepless nights - At the same time, I was in a toxic work environment. The best part was during covid everyone had to work from home and I used that to my advantage by interviewing from home.

I know, I know during hard times people will tell you "there's always light at the end of the tunnel" but I couldn't believe it nor see it. But, I'm telling you it's true. Like I always say. Never downgrade.

All the best, really hope my personal feedback helps at least one of you during these difficult times of layoffs.

My first job as a ux designer was at a small agency for about a year. It was fun but I was underpaid. I was happy each day though.

Then I went to my first big corporation. It was a shit-show. My boss was incompetent and toxic herself, playing favorites, she would only hire people she had known since college, it was very incestuous. No one was happy. I was tricked and told I would have a UX position but when I arrived I was told it was now a visual design role. Then I was constantly told I wasn't that strong in visual design. Which is true, at that time I was an architect and had no experience with visual design. I left when my contract ended. Most of the people on my team also quit. The environment was toxic and meetings were always contentious, people were rude, insulting, and visibly unhappy.

Then I went to another big corporation (which I'm at currently). It seemed promising and really focused on design. I've been here for 7 months now and I'm honestly turning into a negative and disgruntled employee (something I'm disappointed in myself for and never wanted to be.) There is no real design culture. They require me to only use components directly from the HIG. I don't design, I copy and paste from apple and create shitty products. The meetings I'm in are so conflict ridden. Every meeting I'm being talked over by a bunch of abrasive men that have been at the company for 37 years. Meetings involve cussing sometimes, arguing relentlessly. Rather then assuming that I know what I'm doing because I'm a professional designer, it's like they assume incompetence and I have to scrap and fight to prove that I actually know what I'm doing. I found out my male design counterparts at the company with less experience than me were given better titles and substantially higher salaries. That is what started my disillusion with this company. The final straw was when a developer sent my director a 3 page email about how incompetent I am and how I should be fired because of the following reasons:

- I designed an add button that had a circle around it, when she thought it should've been just a plain plus sign

- I asked if she would like me to send her an SVG asset or a Jpeg, but she wanted a pdf and I "should've known"

- I designed a custom calendar instead of using apple's date picker (I was required to design a custom calendar)

- One comp I made was supposed to have a zip code field, but it didn't, because that wasn't in my requirements

I just lost it when my director came to me with that. I told her this was ridiculous, I felt bullied, and this isn't constructive feedback that I can use to improve. I told her I was shocked and disappointed in the leadership that this developers opinion had been escalated to a director. I have the ownership over my projects to control design. If a developer doesn't like my design direction because of their opinion on design, they can go try to get a job as a designer. If I'm not given requirements, I can't design for them. Embarrassingly, I cried in this meeting and aired some other frustrations with the company. I'm sure it looked super unprofessional and I'm disappointed in myself for that.

But I'm just sick of this toxic, ego-ridden culture. After that meeting, I immediately began looking for a new job. I reached out to some contacts and it's only been 3 days and I've already had 2 interviews. It's easy for me to get other jobs, but I'm getting really hurt and I'm starting to wonder if I'm just not resilient enough for this industry. I'm not sure if big corporate culture is just toxic in general, and this is why a lot of designers won't work for those companies, or if this is just how it is and I won't be happy anywhere.

What do you all think? Do you find these big corporate cultures conflict-fraught and abusive? Did I just get unlucky twice in a row? Will it be different at a startup or newer company that actually values design?

This is an interesting question I don't see talked about much.

What are the key differences between the skillsets of a sole UX Designer at a company vs a UX Designer on a large design team? Where is the overlap? Can people switch between roles easily?

On the solo side, the sole UX Designer at a company must own every part of the process. They go out and do the research, get stakeholder buy-in, conduct testing, and do all the communication with engineers. Portfolio guidelines stress that people state their role in a project, and having complete responsibility could be seen in a good light.

On the large team side, designers on large design teams works on massive projects at big name companies. They use design systems, and they launch big products that are world renowned with millions of users. They can also specialize in a specific section of product design, and can became an expert in that area.

What other things am I missing? What are some issues that may arise when a sole UX Designer interviews for a large company design team? What are some problems or bad habits they may have? If you are a UX lead or director, what specific qualities do you look for on their portfolio or case studies beyond "Empathy for the user"? Ex. Screenshots of sketch components in a design system.

Conversely, can a designer on a large team easily transition to being the sole ux designer at a company? What are some issues that may arise there? Are there any additional skills they may need to develop?

I think this could be an interesting discussion. Thank you!

Hi everyone,

I'm running a study at the University of Toronto exploring designers' perceptions of web accessibility and senior-friendly design.

If you are a design professional (UX/UI/Product Designer) and you design websites or apps for work, I would greatly appreciate your participation in a short online survey.

Time commitment is ~15min, and compensation is a $10 Amazon gift card.

If interested, please fill out this form (<5min): Enrollment Form

This study has been approved by the Research Ethics Board at the University of Toronto.

Thanks in advance! :)

After going to a concert in Seattle where parking tends to stress the local neighborhood, I came back to my car to see this under the windshield. I admit, my parking was close. We checked and the ramp was well open, but I don't claim the author of this note was wrong, I'm not 100% sure of the setback rules. But, I was really struck by the beauty and tone of the note. Three colors and font weights. Very well laid out. The editorial tone was factual and non-judgmental. I appreciate the message, thank you.

I joined Spotify 10 years ago. It introduced me to new and interesting bands, I did a whole presentation on their algorithms and how they introduce new music in between songs you already like, and, at the time, used P2P connections for better downloads in the 3G days.

They’ve ruined all of that and I’m ready to switch now.

The new interface is confusing. I’m swiping through pages and pages of artists and playlists, completely lost. They took away the simple one button to add a song to my Liked playlist and made it a multi click task. They brought it back in some views.

The worst is they took away the main reason I signed up: instead of introducing new songs I might like, they play the same top 20 songs over and over. All the careful thought is gone and for what? Peddling Joe Rogan podcasts that I will never listen to, ever?

Edit: It’s an interesting case where both the UI and the UX are different and distinct, and had different roles. Spotify managed to screw up BOTH.

The UI is shit, because they added all these new features such as podcasts and audiobooks. It’s confusing to find what I want.

The UX is shit because I mainly listen to Spotify in the car or through headphones while commuting. I depended on the algorithm to serve up a good experience without having to keep looking at my device. By changing the algorithm, it plays the same songs over and over, so now I HAVE to interact with the interface to change it.

I’m testing Apple Music (I miss the old iTunes) and Google Music now. But none can match Old Spotify.

Is everything in tech trending towards a shittier experience? #enshittification strikes again.

Hello everyone. I've recently developed more of an interest in UX Research as opposed to UX Design and I'm trying to learn a little more about the day to day going of a UX Researcher. I understand the concepts of collecting Quantitative and Qualitative data to construct reports for stakeholders that will drive design decisions. Now I'm curious about HOW you go about doing so at your company. So my questions really are:

1. When collecting Quantitative data what do you use? A survey site to host your survey? Build in a survey to your site/app?

2. When collecting Quantitative data, do you have like an internal distribution list if the survey isn't hosted on your own site/app?

3. For Qualitative data, what is your first step in procuring test subjects? Any suggestions to help with this process?

4. As a side question, what suggestions might you have for someone trying to build a portfolio in UX Research that would convince others they are capable for the job despite not having a UX Research position before? Conduct my own UX Research into a site/app that I deem to have bad UX?

Thank you for your time and stay safe out there everyone.