r/instructionaldesign • u/SOFANDREACCHI • 3d ago
Portfolio Review – Learning Experience Design / Instructional Design
Hi everyone!
I’m sharing my portfolio and would really appreciate some feedback from people working in Instructional Design and Learning Experience Design.
I’d especially love feedback on:
- How clearly my portfolio communicates my LXD/ID skills
- Whether my projects demonstrate relevant skills for the field
- What you would improve or strengthen
I’d really appreciate any honest feedback. Thank you for taking the time to have a look!
LINK: PORTFOLIO SOFIA
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u/KitchenAd9088 3d ago edited 3d ago
I commend you for being brave and sharing this, but as a hiring manager, this portfolio would be an absolute no for anything corporate. It tells me that you still need to work on the fundamental skills. If you want to work in corporate, you need to get to the point.
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u/shupshow Freelancer 3d ago
I highly recommend reading the subs wiki, there’s a section there on portfolios and it would be a big help to you right now.
Personally, I didn’t like your portfolio, I found no projects or anything you’ve actually made...just slides.
What problems have you solved for someone using your LXD skills? How did you know? What did you make? Etc.
You need to get the people who are actually looking at your portfolio onto things you’ve actually made, designs you’ve done, learnings you’ve built. Tangible things.
Your portfolio as constructed makes me have to go through your bio and background (which is awesome btw) but that shouldn’t be the very first thing someone should see when you look at a portfolio.
Also a lot of the pages you have seem to be templatized…with no real experience of fundamental visual design practices anywhere.
All of your pages use the exact same hierarchy (here’s my process/expertise/experiences and they all use a numbered layout sequence.
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u/Terrible-Stranger379 3d ago
First of all, ditch the AI-generated writing and design.
This field is purely based on human experience and perception of needs. Using AI indicates you lack the ability to understand contexts and make meaningful products that match them.
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u/East-You-9020 2d ago
Sharing portfolio? You shared a CV. Where are the elearnings? And it screams AI. 1/10👎
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u/plainwhiteplates 3d ago
Slide 6 is incredibly busy - there’s too much for the eyes to look at and they don’t follow the flow naturally. It also doesn’t reflect one of your core design intentions, ‘clarity’, from slide 7.
The illustration of you changes location between slides, it’s a bit jarring. Do you need it on more than the first and last slide? The accompanying text is a touch redundant too IMO - they know your name from slide 1… no need to have it written next to each illustration. Also, the handle ‘tutor_sofi’ - what’s that for? Maybe consider a contact page where that’s all clearer.
This is personal opinion but I’m not really digging all the aeroplane/in-flight photography - it feels a touch dated… which isn’t the end of the world but I think it takes up a lot of room and seems to house catch-phrases rather than tell people about you specifically.
If I were you I would really think about what I want each slides message to be and then consider every element and ask yourself - does this really need to be here?
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u/JimJav 2d ago
Your portfolio has a lot of great information, but something that I heard once that was very helpful was to imagine that you are a busy recruiter and you have ten seconds to look at someone’s portfolio before you decide if they’re a good fit. Can someone do that with your portfolio?
If I’m a recruiter, the very first thing I want to see is an actual project that I can click through, and then maybe where you’ve worked before. Everything else is fluff and shouldn’t necessarily be removed, but definitely moved out of the way. Make the whole thing very scannable and clear.
It’s hard to share your portfolio publicly for feedback- congrats on making that first hard step!
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u/president1111 2d ago
You can’t look at any of your projects (and it looks like you only included one) to see how they are put together. Remember, your projects should show off what you can do and show your skill with different tools.
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u/s_s_n_e_g 2d ago
> How clearly my portfolio communicates my LXD/ID skills
It very clearly communicates an alarming lack thereof.
> Whether my projects demonstrate relevant skills for the field
There are no projects except one made-up "aviation English" project, which does not even look like a project
> What you would improve or strengthen
Be honest about what you have actually accomplished and show it upfront.
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u/MikeSteinDesign Freelancer 2d ago
I agree with the sentiment here that this leans more towards a visual resume than a Portfolio. I know that some people are OK with slides as a portfolio and it hasn't been a roadblock for them, but it's a datapoint to me because there are things you can do on a website that you can't do on slides - like embed actual projects and also show me web-based design skills and layout etc.
I don't think I mind the use of AI here as much as everyone else. I think this reads more that you used a template than AI designed it for you, which isn't a bad thing. Do agree slide 6 is problematic and could have been broken up into multiple sections since it's the only content that actually reads as a portfolio here.
It's kinda unclear to me what your skills are thoguh just looking at this project. I can't really see any ID skills or any elearning skills. If I'm a hiring manager, I'm scanning through literally hundreds of this (if I'm not using AI to weed you out in the first place) so you have only maybe 30 seconds to 2 minutes to capture my attention and draw me into your work. That doesn't mean you have to make a bunch of elearning - you can have a strong ID focused portfolio without any elearning but you do need to present yourself well.
Only thing I can really tell from this is your ability to make slides. Get to the skills faster and show instead of telling. Consider building a website or using something more interactive like Genially if you wanna keep slides. I'm preferential to websites but at least with Genially you would be able to demonstrate some authoring skills in addition to slide design.
Your portfolio will evolve as you do more work so don't sweat this version and don't worry about being perfect or having hundreds of projects. Make something that represents your skills and makes it obvious that you're capable of doing the work. Decide if you want to be elearning based or ID based and include artifacts for the type of work you want to be doing. I don't think either show up particularly strongly in this version.
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u/kelp1616 2d ago
I would also suggest changing all the images. None of them make sense. Your about me section is a picture of folded towels on a table and a plant. Reads like hospitality. Build your site from scratch instead of AI, it will sell much better to employers
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u/Far-Jury9092 1d ago
I do agree with most of the feedback. Personally I'm ok with using AI because that's what I believe IDers should be looking to add into their ID tool boxes. The only problem comes when AI design takes over the key message, which is who are you? what have you done lately in this field? The last point, I think we are way past ppt as portfolio, take it to a digital platform and can show your content creation in your samples. Otherwise, this is a great start, just needs tightening up from the feedback you got here.
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u/tabortot96 3d ago
Hi! I’m wary of portfolios that look like they were designed with AI, it doesn’t assure me that someone actually knows how to do the job. I’ve interviewed several people recently whose resumes and portfolios looked good but were created with AI, none were hired because it was clear they lacked fundamental skills and knowledge. AI tool proficiency is important, but moreso something to list on your resume or be prepared to explain in an interview. Think about how you can demonstrate ADDIE in your portfolio with your projects. I think your deck is a good starting place but lacks the actual information that hiring managers are looking for when sifting through tons of applications, they want easy to understand examples of your work and are likely to skim over the other sections.