Six common portfolio mistakes, and how to fix them
Chapters
If you’re wondering what really gets noticed in a portfolio, this advice comes from people who review them every day. Design director and senior lecturer at Camberwell College of Arts Lynn Kiang, influential designer Craig Oldham and recruiters at Represent break down what holds portfolios back, and what works.
Lynn Kiang
Design Director and Senior Lecturer for BA Graphic Design at Camberwell College of Arts
Mistake: Showing too much work
More is not better. Three relevant and strong projects are better than twelve mediocre or tangential ones.
How to fix it: Curate for craft and fit
When reviewing early candidates, employers are looking for craft first, then fit. Craft is polish and attention to detail – typography, systems, imagery and composition. Fit is whether your skills align with an organisation’s needs or current projects.
Employers have limited time to decode portfolios. A curated set of projects that are visually relevant to what a company makes, or that fill clear gaps in their team, makes a big difference.
Mistake: Forgetting the portfolio itself is a design project
Part of the portfolio is the design of the portfolio itself — whether that’s a PDF or a website. It’s a free project and an opportunity to demonstrate skills in typography, composition and pacing.
The same applies to your CV. A well-typeset résumé can reinforce your ability to handle complex information, but font choices should be kept to two or fewer.
How to fix it: Raise the baseline everywhere
There’s no room for poorly documented work. Use good lighting and photo-editing tools, short video reels for motion work, and screen recordings or animated GIFs for interactive projects.
Remove unnecessary ornament — no meters, stars or rating graphics. Choose a functional typeface, be confident in your hierarchy, use a grid, make sure links work, and spell-check everything. Then spell-check again.
Lynn's final piece of advice
Have someone who hasn’t seen your work proofread your portfolio before you send it – ideally a former mentor, design friend or teacher. Extra points if you curate a specific selection of projects for each employer, rather than sharing everything at once.
Craig Oldham
Designer, writer and publisher
Craig's note on “mistakes”
When it comes to early-career designers, Craig is cautious about framing issues as mistakes. He argues creativity doesn’t really work that way – and a portfolio is a deeply personal thing.
Mistake: Only treating your portfolio as an archive
Many designers treat their portfolio as a place to catalogue finished work. That can be valid – but even how work is stored and presented is expressive in itself.
Too often, portfolios default to neat, grid-based layouts that are “lovely, but bland”, expressing very little about who the designer is, how they think, or where they want to go.
How to fix it: Make it an expression of who you are
A portfolio should be an embodiment of the designer – both the designer you are now, shaped by your experience and approach to briefs, and the designer you want to become through self-initiated and authorial work.
Clarity still matters. It should be easy to understand the work and what you brought to it. But designers should also ask whether their portfolio expresses their interests, outlook and principles — and whether it reflects the direction they want to move in. How work is displayed and communicated always carries meaning beyond the work itself.
Mistake: Letting the work speak without you
Portfolios aren’t just for looking at — they’re for talking around. Many designers struggle to articulate their thinking, decision-making and context.
How to fix it: Design it to be narrated
Being able to express your approach, insights and process is an invaluable and often overlooked part of the portfolio process. Just as a book is designed to be read, your portfolio should be designed to be narrated as well as viewed.
Craig's final piece of advice
Rather than thinking in terms of mistakes, see outcomes that fall short of expectation as opportunities for growth, experimentation, learning and reflection – all of which have value.
James McLearie and Joe Cooper
From design recruitment agency, Represent
Mistake: Only showing the final outcome
If you don’t show process or research, it’s impossible to understand how you arrived at the work. A short portfolio with no process only shows the final thing.
How to fix it: Add context that reviewers can grasp quickly
Including one or two slides before a video with top-line context can help reviewers understand what they’re about to see — especially when they don’t have time to watch everything in full.
Mistake: The presentation letting the work down
When a deck has a clear identity – a system and consistency – even personal work feels professional. Low-resolution images or video content can quickly undermine strong work. The difference when something is pixel-sharp is stark.
How to fix it: Invest in finish
Image quality often separates good portfolios from great ones. Taking time to document work properly – rather than relying on rushed phone photos in poor light – makes a noticeable difference. Free mockups can work well, but investing in one or two paid options can help work stand out. For the price of a coffee, you can use something fewer people have.
A reminder from the Represent duo...
There’s no such thing as a perfect portfolio! It’s always changing and evolving.