Boost Your Personal Brand (Part 2 of 3: Portfolios)

Your personal brand will make or break you in your job search. It’s so important to ensure that you are utilizing every opportunity to tell your own authentic story consistently and effectively. Recruiters and companies actually really do want to get to know you and determine whether or not you’d be a good fit culturally and technically for the role. You should want that too! The tips below will help you boost your portfolio.

Portfolios

Portfolios are a great storytelling tool to fill in gaps and elaborate on experiences you mentioned on your resume. If you’re applying to any type of role where you’ve worked on different projects (like design, product management, marketing, development, etc.) then I HIGHLY recommend you create a portfolio, especially if you're seeking an entry level role.

If you’re applying to a role where a portfolio doesn’t make sense, then you don’t necessarily need to have one, but you can also just create a personal site to give recruiters a better sense of who you are and what you bring to the table.

Here are my top Do's and Don't's of creating a portfolio:

Do's

• Use a website building tool like Wix, Squarespace, or WordPress
  

• Add a professional headshot (preferably your LinkedIn photo)
  

• Add a bio/about section or page to share more background on who you are, your passions, and what you want to do with your life
  

• Add past projects that you’ve worked on sharing a project summary, problem, solution, and highlights/lessons learned
  

• Add a page with your resume (make it as easy as possible for recruiters to review info all in one place)
  

• Make sure it’s responsive on mobile devices (hiring managers will often look you up on the go, so make sure you'll present well on their phones)

Don't's

• Develop it yourself (unless you can match the quality of common website builders - remember unless you're going for a software engineering role, no one is judging your coding skills)
  

• Add everything you’ve ever done (rule of thumb if the project is 10+ years old, you might not want to include it)
  

• Share too much personal information/history or write books to explain your projects (keep it brief and light, say just enough to communicate your story - remember you'll have time to answer any questions they might have in interviews)

Read Part 1 of this personal branding series for additional tips on resumes and Part 3 for LinkedIn profiles!