Portfolios that stand out in the AI Era (aka Hang Xu’s ROAST session)
Reposted from LinkedIn
Soooo... I attended a portfolio ROAST session last weekend. 👀🍿
Still recovering from how savage Hang 🤙 Xu was💀💀💀
His talk at Tokyo Design's“Portfolios That Stand Out in the AI Era” was entertaining, hilarious, chaotic, and genuinely useful.
Here are some of my takeaways:
On templates & structure
Stop opening with "Hi, my name is _____. I'm a UX Designer" above the fold. Gotta be honest, I'm fully guilty of doing this 🥲. Hiring managers have seen it WAY too many times, so go WOW them another way!
On AI & design tools
AI is great but not always faster. Sometimes moving a few pixels in Figma yourself beats asking AI for 15min to do that same task lol
On visuals
Seems like VISUAL is KING nowadays. So more visuals, less text. You have seconds to make an impression... make them count!
On the AI paradox
Use AI... but don't make it 𝘭𝘰𝘰𝘬 AI. (𝘐𝘵'𝘴 𝘧𝘶𝘯𝘯𝘺 𝘤𝘢𝘶𝘴𝘦 𝘸𝘦 𝘢𝘭𝘭 𝘬𝘪𝘯𝘥 𝘰𝘧 𝘶𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘳𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘣𝘶𝘵 𝘭𝘪𝘬𝘦 𝘥𝘰 𝘸𝘦 𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘺?? 𝘏𝘢𝘩𝘢𝘩𝘢)
On interactions
Thoughtful > flashy. If people are wondering what you can 𝘢𝘤𝘵𝘶𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘺 design, you've lost them. Don't go OVERBOARD with the interactions.
On password protection
A BIG NOPE. A hiring manager who stumbles on your portfolio at 11pm isn't going to DM you for the password. We literally watched Hang cringe in real time when he had to open pages that needed passwords. 😂
On standing out
There are maybe 5 AI portfolio templates recycling right now. Your personality is the differentiator, lean into it. EMBRACE YOUR UNIQUENESS!
On taste
AI doesn't have it.... HUMANS DO! Design for your audience, not for the algorithm.
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Absolutely LOVED this talk! 🤩 It's inspired me to finally dust off my neglected (very non-AI) portfolio that hasn't been touched since 2023. 🤡
First step is to probably pay for Claude, buahaha.
𝘈𝘳𝘦 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘳𝘦𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘬𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘺𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘱𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘧𝘰𝘭𝘪𝘰 𝘢𝘧𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘈𝘐 𝘸𝘢𝘷𝘦? 𝘈𝘯𝘺𝘰𝘯𝘦 𝘨𝘶𝘪𝘭𝘵𝘺 𝘰𝘧 𝘮𝘢𝘬𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘢𝘯 𝘈𝘐 𝘱𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘧𝘰𝘭𝘪𝘰 𝘭𝘰𝘰𝘬𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘢 𝘣𝘪𝘵 𝘛𝘖𝘖 𝘈𝘐? 🫣 𝘏𝘢𝘩𝘢𝘩𝘢. 𝘋𝘳𝘰𝘱 𝘢 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘵 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘴𝘩𝘢𝘳𝘦 𝘺𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘭𝘦𝘢𝘳𝘯𝘪𝘯𝘨𝘴!