A smarter way to get hired as an entry level designer

Karthi Subbaraman -

by Karthi Subbaraman

The world of designer hiring is evolving rapidly.

Companies are starting to realize that inbound methods of hiring is somewhat outdated. Putting out a job post in LinkedIn and other job boards to attract the right talent is turning out to be slower and inefficient compared to the growing design talent needs of a blitzscaling organization.

It is interesting to note that hiring managers are using internet to hire great talent in outbound ways. This method is turning out to be more efficient and effective compared to the inbound ways (atleast in the short term). And this is a great news for talented designers who are looking for a breakthrough.

The approach is simple: Make yourself visible and credible in the eyes of hiring manager who is looking for a right entry level talent. Using this method, the long cumbersome search process is cut short and the access doors open faster.

Here are 5 tips to make yourself visible and credible in the eyes of a hiring manager:

  1. Internet is big. As a designer you can leverage the internet in unprecedented ways. Build permissionless projects in public. Showcase your valuable skills in public and tag the hiring managers who should take a look at your work.
  2. If you cannot sell your skill for zero, you cannot sell it for 10K or 100K. So create an asset that showcases your design skills and hit publish. No matter what, you win. The body of work shows up in the social feed and many hiring managers take notice of your work.
  3. If nothing, you get to practice your craft and offer value to people who are interested in your skills. You are exposed to potential hiring opportunity,  network growth and a public portfolio. There is no downside and the upside is infinite.
  4. Internet makes it easy to get to the DM of anyone or show up in the feeds. You can deliver value to people in a permissionless way no matter who they are, where they are or whatever levels they operate in.
  5. By consistently publishing valuable work on the internet makes hiring managers pay attention to your work. To make it more valauble, choose a problem statement that will interest the hiring team and keep cracking.

You never know, you might end in your dream job without going through any queue. In this process, you might not be paid in money but your credibility grows, visibility grows, social clout goes up and above all your public portfolio compounds. You don't need anyone's permission to work on a permissionless project my friend!

🥂 to permissionless projects!