176: Stuck at the Final Round of UX Interviews? Andrew Re-Did His UX Portfolio and Got 3 Offers (Including Blue Origin)

About this episode

Andrew shares his experience of revamping his UX portfolio, leading to multiple job offers after struggling to secure a position despite reaching final interview rounds.

What do you do when you have years of experience, you're making it through rounds of interviews, but you still aren't getting offers? For Andrew, the answer was scrapping his entire UX portfolio and starting over. Andrew had been applying to jobs for a year. He was making it to the final interview rounds at companies like Facebook, Amazon, and Google, but he wasn't getting offers. On paper, everything looked great. He couldn't figure out what was missing. Eventually he did. After six years at GE, he'd gotten so deep in the work that in interviews, he'd talk at length about how interesting the products were and the intricacies of the industry. He was selling the products instead of himself. So he scrapped everything and rebuilt his portfolio around a single core message: what he does, what he's good at, and what he can bring to the companies he's applying to.  The clarity changed how he talked about himself in interviews. By the end of each conversation, hiring managers knew exactly who he was and how he'd be an asset. Three offers followed, including one from Blue Origin, where he accepted a role that brought him back to the intersection of hardware and software that drew…

People in this episode

Host: Sarah Doody

Guest: Andrew

Topics covered

• UX interviews
• portfolio development
• self-presentation
• job offers
• career strategy

Keywords

• UX portfolio
• interview strategy
• job applications
• career development
• self-marketing

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Blue Origin, Facebook, Amazon, Google, GE

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