Hey and welcome back to a new week!

Not too many jobs at the moment. You can tell that it’s summer. On that note, a short notice that I’ll be on vacation the first week of August and I won’t send out an issue that week.

In this issue:

• Apply to Fewer Design Jobs: Why role fit matters more than application volume, and how to make better matches count.

• Madhurima’s Portfolio: A not-so-junior-anymore portfolio that has tons of things done right.

Thank you for reading!

🧠 GET SMART ON AI

The AI Work Handbook That Cuts Your Workday in Half

The 8-hour workday is becoming a 4-hour workday for people who know how to use AI.

Everyone else is still catching up.

This AI work playbook shows you exactly how to cut your work hours in half using AI.

Sign up for Superhuman AI and get:

• 50+ step-by-step AI tutorials to cut your workload in half — covering every part of your workday, from emails to strategy, used by 1M+ professionals at Google, Microsoft, and NASA

• Superhuman AI newsletter (4 min daily) so you keep discovering new AI tools and skills to stay ahead in your career — the playbook is just the start

Claim your AI playbook

Apply to Fewer Design Jobs. Make Them Better Matches 🧭

One of the most common job-search problems I see is not that designers are applying to too few roles.

It is that they are applying to too many roles where the fit is weak.

Not always because they are unqualified in some absolute sense. Often the problem is more specific than that:

They are applying to roles that ask for proof their portfolio does not show.

A role clearly cares about high-end visual craft, but the portfolio is mostly rough UX flows, generic components, and unfinished presentation. A role mentions prototyping, front-end collaboration, or technical systems, but there is no evidence of interaction work, design systems, live prototypes, developer handoff, or technical thinking. A startup wants someone comfortable with ambiguity and product strategy, but the portfolio reads like polished school projects with no messy constraints. An enterprise role needs someone who can handle complex workflows, permissions, edge cases, and dense information, but the work shown is mostly clean consumer app concepts.

And at the same time, those same designers may ignore roles where they would actually have a much stronger story.

That is the painful part.

Because the answer is not always "apply more."

Sometimes the answer is:

Apply less, but apply to better matches. Then make those applications count.

Not every design role is asking for the same designer

It is easy to treat "product designer" or "UX designer" as one big category.

You see a job title, skim the requirements, notice that the company seems interesting, and apply. Then you do the same thing again. And again. And again.

But design roles can be very different underneath similar titles.

Some roles are very visual. They need someone with strong taste, polished UI, brand sensitivity, motion, and interaction detail. These companies may care deeply about the first impression of your portfolio because visual quality is part of the product expectation.

Some roles are more systems-heavy. They need someone who can work with design systems, complex components, information architecture, edge cases, permissions, admin tools, dashboards, or internal workflows. The work might not look as glamorous, but the thinking needs to be very solid.

Some roles are research-heavy. They need someone who can frame problems, talk to users, synthesize messy input, and turn ambiguity into decisions.

Some roles are startup-heavy. They need someone who can move without perfect briefs, make tradeoffs, prototype quickly, and communicate clearly with founders or small product teams.

Some roles are technical. Not always "you need to code", but you may need to understand front-end constraints, states, APIs, data structures, AI workflows, or how your design behaves once it becomes real software.

These are not the same role.

And if your application treats them as the same role, you make the hiring team's job harder.

The job description is telling you what kind of proof they want

A job description is not perfect. Some are vague. Some are inflated. Some are written by people who do not fully understand the role. Some junior roles ask for too much because companies copy-paste requirements without thinking.

Still, most job descriptions give you clues.

Look for repeated signals.

If the description keeps mentioning visual design, brand, high-quality UI, polish, craft, motion, or consumer experiences, they are probably going to judge your visual level quickly.

If it mentions complex workflows, B2B, SaaS, enterprise, data-heavy interfaces, design systems, or cross-functional collaboration, they probably want to see that you can handle complexity without making everything vague and pretty.

If it mentions prototyping, technical feasibility, engineers, front-end, AI, or implementation, they probably want evidence that you can think beyond static screens.

If it mentions discovery, research, customer conversations, problem framing, or strategy, they probably want to see how you make decisions before the final UI.

This is where many applications break.

The role asks for one kind of proof, and the candidate sends another.

Not because the candidate has no skills. But because they did not slow down enough to ask:

"What would this company need to believe about me?"

That question changes how you apply.

Match the role against your evidence

Before applying, do a quick fit check.

Not a long worksheet. Not a complicated scoring system. Just a brutally honest comparison between what the role seems to require and what your portfolio actually proves.

Ask yourself:

• What are the top three skills this role seems to care about?

• Do I show those skills clearly?

• Where is the proof?

• Would someone understand the fit in 30 seconds?

• Am I relying on the hiring team to infer too much?

That last one is important.

Hiring teams do not have much time. If you are applying for a visual-heavy role, they should not have to hunt for your strongest visual work. If you are applying for a technical product role, they should not have to guess that you can work with engineers. If you are applying for a B2B role, they should not have to interpret a simple mobile app concept as proof that you can handle complex workflows.

You can still apply if the match is imperfect.

Most matches are imperfect.

But you should know where the gap is.

If the role wants strong visual craft and your work is not visually competitive yet, applying to twenty similar roles will probably not fix the problem. You may need to improve the work first, choose different roles, or frame yourself around a different strength.

If the role wants technical collaboration and your portfolio has no prototypes, no states, no handoff details, and no examples of working through constraints, then the application has a proof problem.

If the role wants business thinking and your case studies only describe process steps, then the application has a positioning problem.

This is not about disqualifying yourself too quickly.

It is about seeing the application from the other side.

Use AI as a fit-checker, not just a cover-letter machine

This is also where an AI-native job search can be genuinely useful.

Not because you need an LLM to write every application for you. That often makes applications sound more generic, not more specific.

But you can use it as a fit-checker.

Give an LLM a clear summary of your skills, background, projects, portfolio links, resume, and target roles. Then paste in a role and ask it to assess the match factually:

• Which requirements do I clearly prove?

• Which requirements are weak or missing?

• What should I move higher in my resume or portfolio for this role?

• What signals should I mention in a short application note?

• Is this role a strong match, a stretch, or probably not worth prioritizing right now?

The useful part is not letting AI flatter you.

The useful part is forcing a more structured comparison between the role and your evidence. You can disagree with the output. You should. But it can help you notice when you are applying based on hope, not proof.

Your background can be an advantage, but only for the right roles

Many early-career designers have backgrounds that could help them stand out.

Maybe you came from healthcare. Education. Finance. Psychology. Architecture. Marketing. Customer support. Engineering. Data. Hospitality. Gaming. Fashion. Operations. Research. Community work.

That background can be useful.

But it is not automatically useful everywhere.

If you have a healthcare background and you apply to a healthtech company with a case study that shows patient onboarding, accessibility tradeoffs, or complex consent flows, that background can make your story stronger.

If you have a front-end background and you apply to a design systems or prototyping-heavy role, that can be a real advantage if your portfolio shows technical judgment.

If you have customer support experience and you apply to a B2B product team, you may understand messy user problems, internal tools, edge cases, and operational pain better than someone who has only designed clean portfolio concepts.

But if your background is only mentioned in one sentence on your About page, it will not do much.

You have to connect it to the role.

The question is not:

"Is my background interesting?"

The question is:

"Does my background make me more believable for this specific role?"

That is a much sharper lens.

There are roles you should probably stop chasing for now

This is the uncomfortable part.

Some roles may not be worth your energy right now.

Not forever. Just right now.

If a company is clearly hiring for elite visual craft and your portfolio does not yet show that level, you can still admire the company. You can still learn from their product. You can still study their designers. But applying over and over without improving the visual evidence is probably not a good use of your time.

If a role is basically asking for a design engineer and you have no technical work, no coded prototypes, no interaction detail, and no curiosity about implementation, then you may be competing in the wrong lane.

If a role is asking for deep enterprise SaaS experience and your only projects are simple consumer apps, you may need to build or reframe one project that shows complexity before that lane makes sense.

This is not pessimism.

It is strategy.

Every application costs attention. Even quick applications cost something. They create noise, disappointment, and false signals. You start thinking, "Nobody wants me", when the more accurate truth might be, "I keep applying to roles where my proof does not match the ask."

Those are different problems.

And the second one is much more fixable.

At that point, you have two honest options.

The first is to accept where your current proof is strongest and aim there for now. That is often the smarter move if you need momentum. It may shift your direction a little, but it can get you into better-fit work faster.

The second is to decide that you really do want the harder lane and build the missing skills deliberately. You can level up visually, technically, or in systems work. You can create projects that move you closer.

But be honest about the tradeoff. That path takes time. It may prolong your job search. It may still not land you the exact role immediately. The reward is that your next application, and maybe the role after that, will be pointed in a better direction.

You get to steer this. Just be clear about whether you are optimizing for getting hired sooner with your current proof, or for moving toward a different lane even if it takes longer.

Better-fit roles are not always less ambitious

A better-fit role is not necessarily a smaller role, a less exciting company, or a lower standard.

It is a role where your strengths have a clearer path to being valued.

If your strongest work is complex UX, information architecture, and problem solving, a visually flashy consumer app role may not be your best first target. A B2B SaaS role, internal tools team, healthtech product, fintech workflow, or enterprise platform might give you a much stronger fit story.

If you are strongest visually, do not hide that inside long process-heavy case studies that make your work feel slower and less confident. Look for roles where visual quality, interaction detail, brand/product expression, and UI craft matter.

If you are strongest technically, show it. Look for roles where prototyping, design systems, AI workflows, implementation, or close engineering collaboration are not just "nice to have" lines, but part of the actual job.

If you are strongest in research and problem framing, look for teams that talk about discovery, customer insight, product strategy, or complex decision-making.

This is where applying to fewer roles can actually increase your chances.

Because you are no longer trying to convince every company that you are generally good.

You are trying to make a smaller number of companies think:

"This person makes sense for us."

That is much more powerful.

Make each application do more work

Once you have a better-fit role, the application should become more specific.

You do not need to rewrite your whole portfolio for every job. That is usually a waste of time and quickly becomes chaotic.

But you can change the emphasis.

Your resume summary can point toward the role. Your cover note can name the relevant strength. Your portfolio order can put the most relevant case study first. Your LinkedIn headline can stop being generic. Your case study intro can make the fit clearer.

For example:

"I am especially interested in this role because your product sits in a complex workflow, and my strongest project focused on simplifying a multi-step approval process with different user needs."

That is better than:

"I am passionate about creating user-centered experiences."

Or:

"This role stood out because it combines product design with implementation detail. In my latest project, I turned a Figma flow into a working prototype to test states, empty screens, and edge cases."

That is better than:

"I am excited by innovation and collaboration."

Specificity creates trust.

It shows that you read the role, understood the ask, and connected it to proof.

A simple weekly application reset

If your job search feels scattered, try this once a week.

Look at the roles you applied to recently and group them by what they actually wanted:

• Visual craft

• UX/process depth

• Research/problem framing

• Technical/prototyping

• Design systems

• B2B/enterprise complexity

• Startup ambiguity

• Domain background

Then ask:

Where did my portfolio actually match?

Where was I stretching?

Where was I applying because I liked the company, not because the role made sense?

Where did I have a strong story but fail to make it obvious?

This can be a little painful, but it is useful pain.

You will probably notice patterns. Maybe you keep chasing visual-heavy roles when your strongest proof is actually systems thinking. Maybe you keep ignoring B2B roles because they sound less exciting, even though your background makes you a better fit there. Maybe you keep applying to AI product roles without showing any AI-native workflow or prototype. Maybe you keep saying you are multidisciplinary, but the application never explains what that means for the role.

Once you see the pattern, you can adjust.

Not by applying to everything harder.

By applying to the right things with more intention.

The goal is not fewer applications. It is fewer weak applications.

I do not want this to become another extreme rule.

Sometimes you need volume. Sometimes you need to take shots. Sometimes a role that looks slightly outside your lane is worth applying to because your background, project, or timing gives you a real angle.

That is fine.

The point is not to apply to five jobs and then wait by your inbox.

The point is to stop treating all applications as equal.

A weak-fit application sent in two minutes is not the same as a strong-fit application where the portfolio, resume, and short note all point in the same direction.

The second one has a much better chance of being understood.

And being understood is half the battle.

Because hiring teams are not just asking, "Is this person talented?"

They are asking:

"Do they make sense for this role?"

Your job is to make that answer easier.

Not by pretending to be a perfect match for everything.

By choosing the roles where your skills, proof, background, and direction actually line up - and making those applications count.

💌 THE MOST TRUSTED EMAIL PROVIDER

Free email without sacrificing your privacy

Gmail tracks you. Proton doesn’t. Get private email that puts your data — and your privacy — first.

Ditch the Gmail data grab

👀 Portfolio Showcase

Today: Madhurima Chatterjee

Madhurima Chatterjee’s portfolio is a bit different from some of the recent portfolios I’ve shown.

She is technically not a junior designer. She has worked in design for almost five years, originally in India, and is now studying HCI at the University of Washington. So yes, there is more experience behind this portfolio than you might see from someone coming straight out of undergrad or with only internship experience.

But that is exactly why it is worth studying.

The execution is strong, but the patterns are not out of reach. The way she uses motion, structures case studies, presents data, and guides attention is something many students and recent grads can learn from directly.

What also stood out to me immediately is how human the portfolio feels.

It is not overly quirky or loud, but it has personality. The orange palette, the doodles, the slightly imperfect shapes, the about page, the references to music, movies, and sites that inspired her. It all makes the portfolio feel deliberate and personal without losing polish.

That’s it for this week—thanks so much for the support! ♥️

Do you want your own portfolio reviewed in-depth with a 30-minute advice-packed video review? Or do you require mentoring to figure out a proper strategy for your job search?

I got you!

• Book an in-depth portfolio or resume review with me

• Book a mentoring session with me

• Book a quick 15 min chat to ask a question and see if we vibe

Keep kicking doors open and see you next week!
- Florian