Presenting Your Work

Whether you are going on a job interview to work at a company, presenting to an internal client, or presenting your work to your freelance clients, keep the following techniques in mind when assembling and presenting your portfolios.

Assembling a portfolio

Here are some tips for assembling your portfolio:

• Build an online portfolio Web site. Often, a client asks for a list of URLs to Web sites you have designed. Rather than just e-mailing a list of URLs to the client, assemble samples of your work in one nicely designed online portfolio site and e-mail just the URL of your portfolio site.
  
  By making your own online portfolio site, you can also show work that is no longer live on the Web. Rather than providing a link to a nonexistent site, you can show images from the site and provide a little blurb about the project. In fact, we like to show images (scaled down to about onequarter size) of the Web site and include a little paragraph that describes what we did, what design challenges we encountered, and how we solved those challenges. Providing a little background on the project helps clients and employers better evaluate your designs.
  
  
• Build an offline portfolio book. In addition to your online portfolio Web site, you should assemble a book full of printed editions of your work. You can buy any one of a number of cool-looking portfolio books at your local art (not craft) store for about $80. These usually have black paper in a binderlike book, so you can take the pages out and rearrange them as needed.
  
  You may be surprised to find out that a lot of employers at design agencies ask you to send your portfolio to them, rather than ask you to bring it in personally. If you are not present, your book is your only representation, so you have got to make sure that it is polished, consistent, and professional.
  
  Take screen shots of your work and print them at full size in full color on glossy paper. My feeling is that glossy paper gives you better color results than matte paper. You can decide whether to leave the browser interface in the screen shots, but whatever you do, do it consistently. Use a light spray adhesive, such as 3M Spray Mount, or double-sided removable mounting tape to adhere your prints onto the black paper of the book. Finally, make sure that your book is not too big and not too small - 14 by 17 inches is a good size to shoot for.
  
  
• Put together a biography. If you are an independent consultant, a client does not want to look at your résumé to get a sense of your qualifications. A client looks mainly at your portfolio of work. Still, providing a short paragraph that outlines your professional experience and accomplishments is a good idea. Remember, after you sell a client on your services, the client has to turn around and sell you to the other people he or she works with. If the client can rattle off a few fun facts about you to grease the skids, his or her job is a little easier.
  
  In addition, a bio is helpful to include at the top of your résumé when you’re seeking a design job at a company. A bio is like an executive summary that sums up your experience and gives you a chance to sell yourself before the potential employer drills into the job-history listings.

Presenting your work

When you are ready to present your work, keep the following points in mind:

• Have presence. Presentation is half the battle. For the meeting itself, dress the part, have your material ready in all its forms - online and offline - and be bright, positive, and confident. Speak clearly and convincingly, make eye contact, and read and respond to the body language of the room. The worst thing you can do is come off nervous, soft-spoken, and unprepared.
  
  
• Be positive and informative about your work. The biggest mistake that new designers make is being too humble about their work (or even making excuses for - or berating - their work). “If it is good enough to show, it is good enough to support.” Talk positively about your work. Discuss design challenges you may have faced and how you solved them. This approach shows the thinking behind your design treatments, giving them context and relevance so the client is better able to judge them.
  
  
• Do not be married to your work. Do not be upset if your work is not well received, or another designer’s work is chosen instead. As soon as you produce a design candidate, remove yourself emotionally from it. Present it objectively and never defensively. It is bad form, and it is not going to advance the project. Discuss the feedback and, together with the clients, think through ways to change it more to their liking.

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