⁉️ How Do I Know If My Portfolio (or LinkedIn) Is Holding Me Back?
The silent reason you're not getting interviews, callbacks, or promotions.
👋 Happy Saturday, my dear UX friends, Marina here!
Let’s be blunt—
Most experienced UXers don’t have a skills problem.
They have a storytelling problem.
You’ve grown.
You’ve delivered results.
You’ve solved messes no bootcamp portfolio could prepare you for.
But when someone looks you up?
Your materials still say: “capable mid-level designer who worked on some features.”
That mismatch doesn’t just cost you interviews.
It quietly erodes trust, dilutes your influence, and stalls your next move.
🚨 Here’s how to spot the red flags:
🚩 You’re showing range, but not direction.
If your portfolio looks like a sampler platter, you’re making people do the work of figuring out what to hire you for. That’s not their job—it’s yours.
🚩 Your case studies explain the process, not the thinking.
People don’t need a play-by-play of your double diamond. They need to know how you made decisions, what trade-offs you navigated, and what changed because of your presence.
🚩 Your wins are buried in text—or missing entirely.
If someone has to squint to find the outcome, it doesn’t count. Clear, scannable evidence of influence is what lands roles. Not paragraphs about “collaborating cross-functionally.”
🚩 You haven’t updated anything in over a year.
That alone is a signal. If your most strategic work isn’t visible, it might as well not exist.
✅ What to do instead
You don’t need a full redesign. You need a tight materials audit.
Here’s what I ask my mentees to check:
Does your LinkedIn headline show who you are now, not just your title?
Is your portfolio framing you for the level or kind of work you want next?
Does your resume open with a pattern of strengths, not a laundry list of skills?
Do your case studies make your thinking obvious—fast?
Do you have a brag sheet to capture wins that haven’t made it into public artifacts yet?
Update just one of these, and you’ll feel the shift.
Update all five, and your next opportunity won’t be a coincidence.
Need help figuring out which part to fix first?
My paid subscribers get access to my UX Career Audit checklist (below, in this issue) (and a few surprising examples of what “good” actually looks like) (also below, in this issue)