How to Stand Out as a Senior Product Designer Candidate

If you’re searching for your next senior product design role, you already know the competition is steep. As someone who’s hired designers at fast-growing B2B startups, I want to share what I look for in candidates—not as universal truths, but as practical advice based on my experience.

Resume Tips

Be ATS-friendly, not buzzword-heavy. Use clear, scannable formatting, but skip the jargon. Focus on substance over fluff.

Highlight outcomes, not just outputs. Instead of saying “Designed a new onboarding flow,” try: “Redesigned onboarding to reduce drop-off, resulting in a 20% increase in conversion.”

Avoid progress bars. They don’t help. If you’re rating yourself 5/5 on ‘Figma’, what does that really mean?

Make it look good. Your resume is a design artefact. A well-structured, readable resume shows that you understand visual hierarchy and communication.

Portfolio Best Practices

Clarity > polish. I’m not looking for motion graphics. I’m looking for how you think and what you shipped.

Frame your work with a business lens. Start with the problem, not the UI. For example: “Users were abandoning the signup flow, costing the business potential revenue.”

Own your contribution. Specify your role. “I led user research and prototyped solutions” is more useful than “We designed…”

Context matters. What constraints were you under? What trade-offs did you make? Who did you work with?

Show impact. Use metrics if you can. If not, qualitative feedback or process wins still count.

Structure matters. A great format:

• Problem
• Role
• Process, constraints, and decisions
• Outcome/Impact
• Timeframe & collaborators

Interview Advice

Tie your answers to stories. Don’t just answer “Have you done X?” with a yes. Share a relevant example: what you did, why, what happened, and what you learned.

Tailor to their business. If you’re interviewing at a SaaS company, mention how you improved retention, trust, or onboarding.

Speak to your impact. Think of STAR format (Situation, Task, Action, Result) with a design twist.

Design Walkthroughs

It can be intimidating to present your work, especially if you're unsure whether it's visually impressive. But remember—what matters most is relevance. Focus on showing how your design choices solved similar problems to those the company is facing.

Bring real files. I’m not judging your presentation skills—I want to see your decision-making.

Talk through constraints. What made the problem hard? What trade-offs were required?

Reflect. What would you do differently now? This shows maturity and a growth mindset.

A scrappy solution that drives real business results is more compelling than a pixel-perfect interface that fails to deliver value.

For example, imagine showing a quick internal dashboard that reduced customer support tickets by simplifying a confusing process. It might not be visually impressive, but if you can walk through the problem, your rationale, and the result—that’s what stands out.

Take-Home Exercises

Know what they’re really testing. A good take-home should reflect how the company works and avoid feeling like free work. If it doesn’t seem fair, that’s worth considering.

Just do them—if you want the job. Completing the exercise is part of showing your interest. If you’re serious about the role, commit to it whether you agree with it or not.

Record a timelapse. Regardless of time limits, screen record your process. A timelapse demonstrates your workflow and thought process beyond the final deliverable.

Explain your thinking. Add a short video or written summary. Share your assumptions, highlight design decisions, and relate your work to business goals. If goals aren’t specified, create plausible ones.

Consider the broader system. Don’t design in a vacuum. Ensure your solution integrates well within the larger user journey or product ecosystem.

Tailor your focus. Align your solution with the role:

• UX-focused? Emphasize research, flow, and clarity.
• Visual-focused? Spend time on layout, interaction, and polish.
• Product-focused? Demonstrate end-to-end thinking, from problem framing to outcome.

Final Thoughts

Hiring isn’t just about talent; it’s about fit. Show how you think, how you work with others, and how you solve real problems. That goes further than a flashy mockup ever could.

Have questions or want help reviewing your portfolio or resume? Reach out!