Preparing a Portfolio
Showcasing Your Strengths  |  back to tip sheets

A portfolio is your best foot forward—a representative sample of your work that demonstrates through language and image your greatest strengths and accomplishments. Formerly reserved for artists, models and architects, today’s portfolios are used by a variety of job seekers as a way to demonstrate to prospective employers their particular skills, achievements and professional goals.

The Importance
In some ways, your portfolio is more illustrative of you and your work than the resume and cover letter. It should be:

•    Polished      •    Creative
•    Honest         •    Organized
•    Cohesive     •    Accessible
•    Customized

Portfolio Styles
As you put together a portfolio, you will need to make two critical decisions: 1) what to include and 2) how to present it. Below are several styles of portfolio you might consider.

The Chronological Portfolio—The chronological portfolio can be an effective way of demonstrating growth and improvement over time, especially important when you have a limited work history. You might include transcripts of early coursework and extra-curricular activities related to your field. For instance, if you are looking for work in the marketing field, you might include the handbill, promotional photos and advertising copy you produced for a campus theater production, etc. Anything with your name on it that demonstrates an active and conscious commitment to your chosen profession and goals is perfect for a portfolio. You might follow with any certificates of accomplishment, commendations and awards related to your line of work. Then you might move on to a more specific discussion of your career goals, including any letters of reference.

The Functional Portfolio—Functional portfolios, like functional resumes, allow you to assemble artifacts around specific skill sets related to the work you are seeking. This type of portfolio is ideal when you lack significant long-term experience or if you are changing career fields or are a recent graduate. If you are a looking for a job as an Editor, you might group your artifacts in the following manner:

• Evaluations (Transcripts, Dean’s List, letters of reference, SAT scores, etc.)

• Publications (campus newspaper article; yearbook or literary magazine; samples from an internship at a local newspaper, other writing samples, either from coursework or an assignment)

• Awards/Honoraries (Lists of honoraries, special commendations or awards, including any certifications or letters of commendation; award-winning essays, etc.)

• Related Communications Skills (Skills assessment test results in editing; typing speed; library and Internet research skills, such as scholarly essays; volunteer work at a literacy organization, etc.)

The Targeted Portfolio—Targeted portfolios are used when you have a specific position or interview in mind. To make this presentation effective, you will need to have a thorough understanding of the company and/or department you may be working for. What are the company’s specialties, values, and accomplishments? General Internet searches can yield articles and factoids on the company, and the company’s web site will often reveal, both in tone and in content, what the company is about. If you know someone who works at the company, ask that person what the company’s priorities are. If you know someone from the department you will be working in, find out what clients and projects the department has been involved with in the last year. Have they received any industry awards for work in a particular area? Once you have this information, it is simply a matter of picking and choosing those artifacts that best complement the values and goals of the company with whom you are interviewing.

Hiring departments will always have a steady flow of materials they produce, such as newsletters, magazines, web pages, brochures, etc. It’s fairly easy to obtain samples and to “adapt” your portfolio pieces to specific department needs. Remember . . .  employers have little interest in your fine art or your creativity unless it will help them get their projects done. Before an interview, don’t hesitate to ask interviewers what they would like to see, and then develop a presentation strategy around those pieces.

Especially for Graphic Artists & Writers
Graphic artists and writers have unique considerations when putting together a portfolio. They must balance creativity and aesthetics with an awareness of functionality and client satisfaction. Most employers will see right through a portfolio that has a lot of pizzazz, but little substance. Prospective employers will certainly be impressed by your style and talent, but they will also be interested in seeing how you addressed and solved a particular client problem or challenge. They will want to see that you are able to compromise and collaborate to achieve a particular objective. There are a number of ways you might organize your material:

• Storytelling. Each portfolio piece tells a story. 1. How was it conceptualized? 2. How was it communicated to you? 3. Who was on the team?  4. What part did you play?  5. Was the piece successful? Tell the story of each featured item clearly and as efficiently as possible, almost like a 30-second commercial. Don’t drone on about each and every piece. Review your portfolio regularly to eliminate outdated pieces—always keep it current and fresh.

• Chronological (your most recent job or project first)

• Functional (according to specific types of assignments, for instance:
• Print vs. Web products
• Promotional vs. educational
• Corporate vs. non-profit

• Objective-based (according to a particular challenge or problem solved.) For instance, “Client A needed to generate a 5% increase in membership. This postcard was the first in a series of direct mailings in a successful six-month recruitment campaign.”

• Product-specific (group brochures together as one unit, print ads as another, magazine covers as another, etc.)

• Achievement-focused (feature or spotlight award-winning work or work that generated high sales or leads, etc.)

Some Final Words on Portfolios

1. Always make a clean presentation. Loose, sloppy or disorganized portfolios show a lack of attentiveness and professionalism.
2. Don’t overload the portfolio with too many samples. As proud as you are of your work, you must recognize that “less is more” when sharing a portfolio. It is far better to have a few impressive samples that leave a vivid impression, than hundreds of samples that leave the interviewer overwhelmed and bored.
3. If you are leaving a portfolio behind, be sure to provide a self-addressed, stamped envelope so that the portfolio can be returned to you at no cost or inconvenience to the employer.
4. Always include a business card with contact information. Direct the interviewer to your web site if you have one . . . this is your online portfolio and a great way of reinforcing your professionalism and legitimacy.
5. If you are simply presenting the portfolio at an interview, it’s always a good idea to have a few extra writing or print samples to leave behind. For writers, this is particularly important, as it is unlikely that the interviewer will have the time to give more than a cursory reading of your portfolio samples during the interview.
6. For graphic artists, leaving behind a postcard with a sample of your work printed on the front and contact information on the back, can be more effective and memorable than a standard business card. Some designers will even leave behind a CD-ROM with examples of their work. This is a great way to address the “out of sight, out of mind” problem with portfolios.
7. Prepare and practice a narrative to accompany the portfolio presentation. Don’t just drop the portfolio in the interviewer’s lap and sit there. Explain what the interviewer is seeing. Who was the client, what was the objective, what was the result, why did you especially like this assignment, how did you answer a particular challenge? etc. And remember, your excitement about a project and pride about your work will be attractive and compelling to an interviewer.
8. When you’ve finished showing your portfolio, you might ask the interviewer if there is anything he or she is looking for specifically that might not have been provided in the portfolio. If there is, you might plan to mail some additional samples to the interviewer separately.
9. Finally, always be honest about your work. When you include items in your portfolio that are not legitimately yours, or when you claim credit for work you were involved in only tangentially, you are misrepresenting yourself and your credentials. Inevitably, this will backfire. Employers in the creative field place a high value on integrity. They should be confident that what they are seeing is what they will be getting.

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