What I Learnt Redoing My Portfolio
I spent the first few months this year progressively refining my portfolio as I continued to look for work in industry. Through this process of iteration and reflection, I've come to discover how little I knew, from when I set out to where I am now. I want to share what I've learnt over these past few months so that it might help you if you're on a similar journey. In saying that, much of the lessons I've learnt aren't only restricted to this particular case or field and can be applied in all other areas when wanting to improve, whether it’s a skill or a project. I've divided the process into these following key steps from my own experience:
To understand them a bit more clearly, I'll use my journey of reviewing and revising my architectural portfolio as a guide. I've also included some annotated pages from the various iterations of my portfolio to see the progression across them.
0. The Why
Before we get into the actual process, there are some things that need to be considered for improving. There are two main factors I've found that we need to define before we can even look at improving. These are: ‘Motivation’ and ‘Context’.
‘Motivation’ is a driver that pushes us to improve. For me, the reason behind wanting to improve my portfolio was two-fold. The first and primary driver was to get employed - to present a good portfolio so that I would be a favourable candidate. This is what could be described as an extrinsic motivator — being driven by external forces.
The second driver for wanting to improve my portfolio was an intrinsic motivator — driven by internal forces - wanting to showcase the work I've completed over the past few years in a way that does it justice. After all, I put a lot of effort into them and it would be a shame to let that go to waste.
Whether motivation is intrinsic or extrinsic, both are valuable drivers to understand when wanting to improve. I’ve been looking into self development recently and learning more about what drives me. If you do want to learn more about the difference between intrinsic and extrinsic motivation, you can have a look at this journal. It is quite dense, but I like the more nuanced definitions of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation it provides compared to other sources/articles. If there is no motivation or drive to improve, then it's like shooting yourself in the foot before you even start the race. I think it's crucial to define why we want to improve from the outset, so that we’re not kidding ourselves along the way. When times are challenging, we can come back to this motivation to drive us. There is a caveat to this. Sometimes motivation is driven by action. It’s a pretty big topic, so I’ll properly dedicate another post about motivation in future.
The second thing to understand is 'Context'. In my case, I’ve been trying to find employment in my field of architecture, so identifying what matters when working in architecture is critical for me to understand and address in my portfolio. Knowing what matters in context is important in guiding the decisions we make along the way. We'll keep coming back to this throughout the process.
If 'Motivation' is the reason you're going on a journey of improvement, then 'Context' is where that journey is taking place.
1. Finding the Direction
Looking back, I wish I had put more effort into this stage from the very beginning. It would've saved me a lot of the time and effort I put into my first attempts. Having the ‘Motivation’ to improve is well and good, but focusing your efforts in the right ‘Direction’ is key for improving. I came across the idea from Vicky Zhao, a YouTuber who talks about thinking systems. She talks about mental models in one of her videos, one of which I found quite relevant here, the idea of 'Speed Vs. Velocity'.
'Speed' is about how fast you go or the amount of work being put in, whereas 'Velocity' is about how fast you go in a particular direction (emphasis on direction!). It doesn't matter how far you go if you're going in the wrong direction. Here's the video that talks about it along with a number of other interesting mental models.
I'm guilty of prioritising speed over velocity; just doing without thinking too much about the direction. But this can be dangerous - I came to the unpleasant realisation that the progress I had made was not quite in the direction I wanted to go in. This is sometimes desirable when the purpose is more about exploration and discovery, in which case, alternate directions can take us to unexpected destinations. However, when trying to work efficiently, it is better to determine the direction to take.
To find our 'Direction', it's good to look to external sources, at what others are doing and what's needed to achieve what you want. For me, this came in the form of a 'Portfolio Insights Seminar' run jointly by DES and CISSA, two faculty clubs at Melbourne University.
Here, I was able to hear first-hand from professionals in the field what they look for in portfolios when hiring. A key takeaway I got from this was that usually, attractive portfolios and clear communication are more important than having strong or amazing projects.
These insights gave me a concrete direction to think about. This wasn’t the only form of guides for direction by the way. A lot came actually from YouTube videos as well as talking to friends and getting outside opinions on my work. There were, however, some fears I needed to overcome.
There was a 'fear of comparison', when looking at other's work and comparing to my own, and a 'fear of judgement and criticism' from others around me. These both were quite the challenge to overcome, but for me, it was about balancing my motivations with my fears, knowing that I could only improve if I'm honest with myself and my work.
The ‘fear of criticism’ was something I came to terms with during my architecture degree with constant feedback sessions. It helped to understand that criticism is not directed at you personally, but your work, so separating yourself from your work is really important.
What I was able to acquire once I overcame my fears, however, was invaluable. It was through overcoming my fear of comparison that I was able to use YouTube as a learning tool. From watching videos that critiqued portfolios, I was able to gain more concrete goals to work towards. In particular, I found the videos from DamiLee, Upstairs and Show it Better quite helpful.
2. Reflecting
Collecting all this information to get an understanding of 'Direction' is all well and good, but the next step is crucial: 'Reflection'.
It's important to reflect on yourself and your work. For my portfolio, I was looking at what I had done and compared it against all the tips, directions and examples that I had found relevant, and asked the critical questions:
Is it achieving what I want it to?
How can it be better?
These questions were difficult for me to answer in the first few iterations of my portfolio, because I hadn't done the initial work of defining the right direction.
My most recent attempt was much more successful, since with a clear direction and guide, I was able to clearly see what aspects needed improving in my portfolio.
It was also hard for me here to make the decision to let go of weaker projects because they were not adding enough value to my portfolio. I’ve always been one to keep everything,but my reflection allowed me to realise I had not been curating my work as much as I should've been. I think it's important to constantly be reflecting and readjusting your trajectory.
Portfolio V1 - Page 1
The above are pages extracted and annotated from my portfolio across 4 versions, focusing on two of my projects. There are a few key improvements that are visible across the versions. Some to note are:
Less crowding, more space given to images and drawings
Clearer hierarchy, intention behind viewing order
Being more selective with images and drawings that are included
Adding colour and personality without being overpowering
Upskilling and showcasing it
If you'd like to have a look at the full versions of each of my portfolio iterations, you can have a look here.
3. Doing the Work
Looking back at my time at uni, I’m kicking myself for the number of times I ended up working on a part in a project for hours, only to realise I was wasting my time. It’s like that bad habit you can’t get rid of – I was focusing far too much on parts that were insignificant or wouldn't even be seen in the final presentations. I was stuck with tunnel visioning on details rather than looking at the bigger picture, convincing myself that I was being productive and doing the work, when in fact the effort I was putting in was not proportional to the result.
What I needed was a framework to work efficiently, i.e., working smarter not harder. Working efficiently can come as a result of all the effort that we put in prior to this stage, establishing the direction and reflecting on how to improve. These earlier stages guide us to the areas that need attention.
To hone in on what areas to prioritise, I used the 80-20 rule. This is applicable in many other circumstances (if it interests you, you can read more here), but for our purposes, I look at it as: 80% of results come from 20% of efforts. The numbers themselves don't really matter as much as the intent behind it - tackling the areas that will have the greatest impact towards the direction we want to head in.
In the case of my portfolio, having done all the thinking work, I could much more easily identify what parts were necessary, as well as what key areas I needed to prioritise to make the biggest improvements.
It's also important to continue reflecting during this stage to make sure we're still on the right path. It's easy to get caught up in the details when we need to focus on the bigger picture.
A big challenge I was facing at this stage was making sure I was setting deadlines for myself. Up until recently, deadlines were established by the uni or by work, but outside of those, the consequences are not as immediate. “If I don’t finish the work I set for myself today, there’s always tomorrow.” I’d keep reasoning with myself. Next thing you know, a couple of weeks would pass and there’d be little progress.
The lack of both strict deadlines and immediate consequences can be a deadly combination.
One way I overcame this was to ensure accountability, for example, by implementing a strict deadline through job applications or showcasing to friends, I would need my work to be at a complete stage, giving me a clear goal to work towards. Additionally, the mere act of telling someone else about my work provided accountability and a level of immediate consequences if I didn’t meet the deadline.
With these strategies, I ensured that I was working to completion. This was especially the case when it came to design work that lacked specific milestones for completion. Time constraints are the ones that push us to completion.
Another key lesson I found (which links back to my point about reflection), was that it’s difficult to reflect on work that is in progress. This is why I think it’s better to have defined completion points rather than ambiguous stages that flow into the next.
At some points it's just as important to have something that is complete, than working to perfect it, especially in my case where I wasn't even 100% sure if I'd keep it the way it was or want to change it more. This brings me to the final step.
4. Iterate, Iterate, Iterate
I prefer the idea of 'Iteration' over repetition. Repetition implies doing something over and over again, whereas iteration is a process of improvement – Looking to previous versions to improve the current version. For me, there's more of an emphasis on learning from previous attempts.
Throughout this journey, I've learnt that for the purpose of improvement, it's better to have a mediocre completed project/outcome than an incomplete 'perfect' project.
Taking advice from Ali Abdaal, a productivity YouTuber, when talking about making improvements, at the early stages, it's more about quantity over quality. With enough quantity, quality will naturally improve (given you're following all the previous steps).I agree with this; it's unlikely that the first attempt will be the best, and it's from the attempts you make that you learn the most, as I have seen throughout this process. When having complete attempts/iterations, it's also easier to see the progression and improvements you make between each version. It's more tangible than if you have a single project that you're making changes to.
Closing Remarks
For me, it was through each iteration, implementing the new lessons, ideas, and information I had gathered, into my portfolio, that I was able to get it to a point where I was happy with it.
Curation is something I neglected more than I should have throughout my uni subjects, but have been focusing more on since. I've recently been reading a book that relates to this called 'Subtract: The Untapped Science of Less' by Leidy Klotz, who writes about how we are typically focused on adding, and neglect the process of subtraction and the value it has.
This won't be the last iteration of my portfolio either. As I learn and grow, so should my portfolio. After all, it's a reflection of me and my work. Even if the projects might not change, there are other aspects to it that can be improved, like how it’s presented. In design especially, presentation plays such a crucial role. Portfolios are more than just a collection of projects or work we've done; it shows how you think, organise and present information.
In saying this however, it is also important to acknowledge that we should be continually working to develop new projects to include. That's what I'll be working towards; developing more projects that can demonstrate the range of my abilities in my portfolio.
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