UX Research Portfolios: Format + Examples
I just found a 💎 of a resource about how to put together your UX research portfolio by Karina Hickey. Karina presented this at UX Australia in March 2020. Please send her props for sharing her perspective on this process. 👏
I did not find a format of Karina's content that was easily shareable, so I created one myself and added my own perspective as well. Tada! 🎉
Case Study Format
Being clear and concise is more powerful than being complicated and comprehensive.
What stood out to me was the simple "POWER" framework that Karina recommended for framing each case study (citing David Travis). I have retained the framework and described the content from my perspective. Check out a more detailed description of the framework David Travis' Medium article.
Project: Describe the topic and scope of the project (e.g., research only, research + design iterations). Share who you collaborated with and what your unique role/contribution was. For those of you who work in complex spaces, make this description approachable!
Objective: Describe the problem space you were exploring and what's important about it. Share your research question(s), intended outcome, and decisions you sought to influence (i.e., intended impact)
Work: Describe a SUMMARY your research plan and rationale. Briefly Include methods, constraints, participants, analysis approach, and delivery of insights. If your project had multiple phases, separate each phase by research question. Call out how you collaborated with your team and *gasp* how you invited them into your research process. You focus here is making this concise and digestible because you may feel compelled to go on for days about this. No one wants to read every detail. Sad, but true.
End result: Briefly (again) describe your insights and how you translated them into product opportunities or recommendations. Who did you collaborate with on these? Demonstrate what strategy/product decisions you influenced through your research. In a perfect world, you have access to changes in metrics (e.g., revenue, subscriptions, user engagement, time spent), but we're not all that fortunate.
Reflection: Described what you learned about yourself as a researcher through this project. Knowing what you know now, what might you have done differently? What lesson did you carry forward into future projects?
When sticking to this format, your case studies can be short and to the point. Being concise and clear is more powerful than being comprehensive and complicated. If you are questioning whether you're including too much, then you likely are.
In whatever format you chose, it is important for you to demonstrate four foundational UXR skills in your case studies: research methodology + application, collaboration, communication, and product thinking. What are these skills, exactly? Stay tuned for my perspective on these skills in an upcoming article.
UXR Portfolio Examples
Karina also recommended four UXR portfolios to check out. I've dug them up from the interwebs here:
What I love about this collection is the diversity in format, organization, and style. There is no standard template and yet they all reflect the personality of their respective researcher. QQ: What would your portfolio look like if creating one was both easy and fun to you? What stories would you tell?
Mine would be simple, sketchy, and playful. I would tell the story of me thriving in highly complex domains, like the chemical processing industry and the American education system. My oh my.
Interested in other portfolio examples? There are more in: Breaking into UX Research: Ideas from our UX Community
Other Portfolio Considerations
Karina also discussed the tradeoffs among sharing your case studies on your personal website, through services like Behance, and in customized PDFs. Check out her talk for more details! She cites other UX industry leaders, like Sarah Doody and The UX Portfolio Formula.
Resources
Putting together your UX research portfolio: how to make post-it notes sexy by Karina Hickey - Access to Karina's talk, slides, and notes from UX Australia
How to create a POWERful case study for your UX portfolio by David Travis - POWER method explained in more detail
Breaking into UX Research: Ideas from our UX Community by Me - Find ideas for your UXR portfolios and see more examples
Building a Portfolio - New Layer Podcast - While related design portfolios, there's useful commentary on narrative. Plus, I ❤️ Jasmine Friedl and Tanner Christensen and they are fun to listen to
UX Portfolios by Nielsen Norman Group
Portfolios for UX Researchers: Top 10 Recommendations by Nielsen Norman Group
