Design
The most common advice for building an audience is “just be yourself.” This is terrible advice. Sarah spent 6 months testing it. Posted every real struggle. Every unfiltered opinion. Every messy process photo. The vulnerability everyone said algorithms reward. Result: 247 followers (64 were bots), zero client inquiries, one LinkedIn message asking if she was…
When $50/hour ends up costing more than $150/hour — the math nobody wants you to see. Last quarter, a SaaS company contacted me about their UI design outsourcing disaster. They’d been outsourcing design for 18 months to “save costs.” They wanted to know why their design quality had tanked, development cycles had doubled, and their…
Here’s what works when you use AI for UX research — and what almost made me design for the wrong problem. Late 2023, Deutsche Telekom data hub redesign. 8 interviews, 6-week deadline. After transcribing the first two interviews manually (6 hours), the math broke: 6 more = 15+ hours. Plus synthesis, analysis, recommendations. Would need…
Something broke between February and August 2025, and I have receipts. I was working on client team headshots in August. Ran the first photo through my usual background removal tool — the same one I’d used reliably for two years. The edge looked chewed. Like someone attacked it with a chainsaw set to “drunk.” My…
If you’ve been avoiding social media because it feels like a scam, the algorithms just caught up to your instincts. A designer friend spent six months torturing herself with “growth hacking.” Posted three times daily. Used 47 hashtags per post. Follow/unfollow tactics. Bought engagement to look legitimate. Took every course on social media marketing essentials…
After designing mobile apps that made everyone miserable, I figured out which clients are worth the headache. Some 10 years ago, I’d take any UX/UI design project that walked through the door. Mobile apps, SaaS dashboards crammed into phone screens, e-commerce apps with seventeen-step checkout flows, productivity tools that required a PhD to understand. I…
If you need seventeen different skills just to get an entry-level job, maybe the problem isn’t your qualifications. A designer friend spent eight months “upskilling.” Eleven courses. $6,200. Figma mastery, design systems, user research, prototyping workshops, accessibility certification, motion design fundamentals — learning UI UX design skills from every angle. Zero paid projects. Just portfolio…
Most banking apps look fantastic when the balance is healthy. Sunlit gradients. Confetti for rounding up. Little fireworks when you tap “paid.” Then the number hits £0 (or worse), and the polish falls off. Tricky language, greyed-out buttons, pop-ups with moral undertones. The UI that was keen to celebrate a £3 cashback suddenly becomes shy…
When “make it pop” meets “increase conversions by 400%” — spoiler: math doesn’t work that way either. Last year I turned down a marketing website project. Six figures. Dream client. The kind of work that pays for nice vacations and good therapy. I said no anyway. Four years ago, I would’ve said yes before they…
Your beautiful portfolio won’t survive first contact with a real stakeholder meeting. Here’s what no UX design in education program wants to admit: most of what they teach you is performance art. You’ll spend months learning to create pixel-perfect prototypes, conducting user interviews about hypothetical problems, and crafting case studies that read like design fiction.…
