Your portfolio is a showcase of your creativity and innovation skills. It can help you land your dream job, attract new clients, or impress your peers. But how do you choose the best work samples to include in your portfolio? Here are some tips to help you make smart decisions and create a portfolio that stands out.
Before you select your work samples, think about who will be looking at your portfolio and what they are looking for. Are they potential employers, customers, collaborators, or mentors? What are their goals, needs, and preferences? How can you demonstrate that you can solve their problems, meet their expectations, and add value to their projects? Tailor your portfolio to your audience and highlight the work samples that are most relevant, impressive, and persuasive to them.
Your portfolio is not just a collection of finished products. It's also a story of how you approach creativity and innovation. Show your process by including sketches, drafts, prototypes, feedback, iterations, and reflections. Explain how you came up with your ideas, how you tested and improved them, and how you measured and communicated your results. Your process reveals your skills, methods, tools, and mindset. It also shows how you learn from your mistakes, adapt to changing situations, and collaborate with others.
Tailor your portfolio for the role you want to secure. If you want to work for a consultancy, it can be good to have at least one project where you show the entire process: concept sketches, prototyping, detailed design, design for manufacture, branding, packaging and marketing (as if you worked at a consultancy). If you want to work in a CAD-based role, ensure you show your flashiest models alongside how you created them.
You want your portfolio to be comprehensive, but not overwhelming. You don't need to include every work sample you've ever created. Instead, focus on quality over quantity. Choose the work samples that showcase your best work, your range of skills, and your unique style. Avoid duplicates, outdated, or irrelevant work samples. Aim for a balance of breadth and depth, diversity and consistency, and novelty and familiarity. A good rule of thumb is to have between 10 to 20 work samples, depending on the type and length of your projects.
In my experience, 3 to 5 projects is the correct amount. Try to show all of your skills within those projects, starting and finishing with your strongest work. Employers that I’ve had interviews with don’t want to see 4 pages of random sketches or renders at the end of a portfolio - if you can’t make it a project that shows a process, don’t include it.
Your portfolio is not a static document. It's a dynamic reflection of your growth and development as a creative and innovative professional. Update and refine your portfolio regularly to keep it fresh, current, and relevant. Add new work samples that demonstrate your latest achievements, skills, and trends. Remove or replace old work samples that no longer represent your best work, your goals, or your audience. Review and revise your portfolio at least once a year, or whenever you have a major change in your career, industry, or market.
Your portfolio is your personal expression, but it's also a communication tool. You want to make sure that your portfolio conveys the message you want to send to your audience. Get feedback from people you trust and respect, such as mentors, peers, clients, or experts. Ask them to review your portfolio and give you honest and constructive criticism. Find out what they like, what they don't like, what they find confusing, and what they find compelling. Use their feedback to improve your portfolio and make it more effective and engaging.
In my experience, YouTube videos are a fantastic tool to get an understanding of what makes a good portfolio. SamDoesDesign and DesignTheory have great videos: some where they discuss general advice and others where they critique student’s work - these are particularly helpful. Behance is a great way to look at super aesthetic portfolios and get inspiration for graphical layout, but remember a lot of those portfolios lack design process. Employers want to see why you’ve done that page of sketches and how it helped your process, not just a page of pretty sketches.