Stop Mass Applying: How Carlos Got Hired in UX and Promoted to Senior Product Designer

Sarah Doody (00:00)

why don’t we start with you and just tell everyone a little bit about what you do within the world of user experience. let’s say, tell us a little bit about…

the role that you got hired into because we’re gonna go deep into that process of getting hired, but let people know what you do and what you’re doing right now.

Carlos (00:24)

Yeah, good afternoon, everybody. My name is Carlos. That’s it. I’m a senior product designer or UX designer at a small tech company called Covenant Eyes. Covenant Eyes has been around for 25 years, and they basically help people with pornography addictions to ⁓ remove or battle that addiction via accountability. So basically, a technology system that pairs you up with another person and that other person has access to

all of your device activity, cell phone, and they kind of keep you accountable to not go into these adult explicit sites. So it’s a faith-based company, meaning a lot of our demographics or people that are in the market are Christians. So a lot of that has to do with your identity as a Christian. So that’s the…

type of people that we serve. And I am a senior UX designer for this company and I’m in charge of the flows, both apps, design and so forth. So that’s the role I have now. And this is the role I got hired because of, because going through the CSL program. So.

Sarah Doody (01:38)

And that was in 2023, right? That you got hired there as a product designer. Yeah. And now you’re a senior product designer, right?

Carlos (01:42)

Mm-hmm. Yep. Yep.

Correct, yeah, I got it. Within the year, I got promoted. Yeah. ⁓

Sarah Doody (01:52)

Amazing, amazing. All right,

we’re gonna dive into everything related to like, how did you even get promoted, but also get

one question that I think is really important is what were you doing before you joined Career Strategy Lab? ⁓ Whether that was you’d been DIYing your job search or you did some other

Carlos (02:14)

Yep, very similar experience. DIY it. think that I would have anything white would come out of this brand because I was basically applying to this back in 2023.

multiple positions a day. You I even had an app that you could swipe left, swipe right, if you wanted to apply to a specific job. So I had that installed on my phone. I was just going to swipe right, swipe right, just kind of like a dinner game. ⁓ If I ever found something that was kind very, very interesting, I feel like right along my experience, I would actually DM someone within the company and try to get some type of leg up.

through there, but again, that it wasn’t necessarily their approach because what ended up happening is I just looked desperate trying to like asking for a job immediately, you know, go for the job immediately. And that didn’t work out. didn’t even get any responses on him because you know, that’s not meant to work like that. And I was just basically a lot of like busy work. I’m feeling busy and like feeling like I’m doing all these things, but none of it really turned

into an event, a cold black. So that’s the state of the union before ⁓ CSL came across my board and he realized that, maybe I’m doing something wrong. have so much to learn. So I started investigating CSL.

Sarah Doody (03:38)

I’m

curious if, know, in hindsight, right, it’s always interesting, but was there a specific kind of tipping point or moment that kind of just hit you in your tracks a little bit and you were like, wait a second, like what I’m doing is not

Carlos (03:54)

yeah, sure. The, well, the ghosting like applying to a lot. So let’s say if you apply to a hundred and you don’t hear from anybody, but two people and those two people are a reject, letters or automated reject letters that tells you there’s, there’s something here that I’m doing wrong, right? You know, I’m not even hitting a 1 % chance here of even an interview. So that was like a moment for me, like I’m already hitting an interview and I know I have a lot to give. Like I know I’m a good UX designer, ⁓ but I’m not.

really positioning myself in the right manner. that was the thing. Seeing all of these applications just stay dormant or reject them at the get-go, that was for me like, there’s something wrong that I’m doing. It’s not that there are no value in me, it’s that I’m doing something wrong and I need to learn what that is.

Sarah Doody (04:40)

Yesterday, I was just thinking to myself on something that someone had said about Career Strategy Lab, meaning they said it really feels like an operating system for your career. And I’m curious what either of your reactions to that kind of parallel

Carlos (04:55)

Yeah, I think what comes to mind is that is I agree with the operating system, but it’s not an operating system for just applying to jobs. I really think it’s an operating system for selling anything. And basically when you’re applying for jobs, you’re selling your services to another company. And it’s really something that I, I guess took with me and not just apply it to ⁓ job hunting, but actually in my role, like I’m going to

I’m going to do a presentation. think we should pursue some opportunity. Well, how do I, how do I really sell these? How do I send the message out? And a lot of the voices from the coaches back then keep repeating on my head, like, okay, is this schemable and readable? Is this a schemable, a scannable? like, I’m going through the same motions I did, you know, three, three years ago, but now in a totally different area with the same operating system, but now it’s not for job hunting. Now it’s for like, how do I…

sell this better, how do I communicate this better? Sales might be a little ⁓ dirty work, communication is key, right? And that is a game, that’s an operating system for communication, for sure.

Sarah Doody (05:57)

Thank you.

I’m curious, Carlos, to hear a little bit about your journey to getting promoted. Did you initiate that? Did they initiate that? And did anything from what you did in Career Strategy Lab allow you to ⁓ make that happen?

Carlos (06:24)

Yeah, so I initiated that conversation and that was very early on when I got hired. So I got hired as a level two, some technicalities. I got hired as a level two and I joined. immediately realized, I think I can’t, I think I am operating at a level three, but I need to demonstrate that. So I started putting together evidence and the way I collected the evidence and presented the evidence was all just kind of like the same operating system that I learned through the CSL. Like what is…

What are my evidence facts? How do I present those? Where do I organize those? do keep those? Have a spreadsheet, keep in touch on what each evidence is, where I’m at. And these are all of muscles that I’m repeating because of CSL. So it was just initiating and then also gathering the research and then evidence ⁓ of what I’m doing right and how I’m well positioned for a promotion. But it was initiating that and having

the confidence in myself that that was something that I could attain. And that communication part of confidence, I think that was also given to me through CSL.

Sarah Doody (07:31)

I love hearing about that because I haven’t heard the promotion part of your journey at your current company. But I think it’s a really important point to emphasize because one question that comes up and maybe you were thinking about this also, but like, what is the return on investment of Career Strategy Lab? And for you, it was getting hired in 2023, but now you’ve used what you learned and got promoted and feel free to not answer this, but

Did

see a salary increase? You don’t have to tell us what it was, but did it go up at least? Yeah.

Carlos (08:05)

Yeah, yeah, on

both scenarios, on the hiring part and on the promotion part, on both scenarios. yeah, from a financial sense, it already paid off, even within the first transition. But more than the financial, I think there’s also a return investment of confidence and just finding the right spot. I don’t think that the company that I’m at is by far the best company I’ve worked for.

But it’s not in terms of just financial upside, but it’s also in terms of culture and the things that I get to work on and the people that I get to work with. Those are all things so intangible, but I wouldn’t have gotten here had I not gone through the process of discerning what he said that I really wanted to do. Look at the companies, basically the CSL process, even just addressing what you want to work on. Like what are the ideal companies that you want to work with? I wasn’t aiming at COVID and ICE.

when I was doing this, I was aiming at, you know, these high visibility tech companies, but through my way of like analyzing this and doing the work, I realized that, hey, this is actually a good fit for what I want to do. And it was, you know, it was a good return investment. So I’m trying to say both financially and also professionally.

Sarah Doody (09:21)

Yeah.

One question that comes to mind, and I’m asked this all the time

Is Career Strategy Lab for me if I am a mid or senior level UX person? And I think one of the concerns people have is like, how is it gonna be coexisting in Career Strategy Lab with people who have five years of experience and people who have 15 or 20 years of experience? And I’m curious if you…

could you share any reflections or insights about like that community element of Career Strategy Lab and how that was for you.

Carlos (10:01)

So back then, being a mid tier level designer, I think that I appreciated the fact that there were other people, you know, farther along their journey and were even maybe applying for leadership positions because, the community really what you get is a sense of, or you get people to help you. And sometimes I’ll post a question or I’ll even post my case study and then I’ll have someone that was in a hiring capacity, maybe a leader look at it and say, okay, this is what the things that I would change. And this is from a perspective of someone that

is actively hiring and knows kind of the drill. So I really appreciated that. That it was not only you and the coaches helping you, but there are also people with a leadership perspective that are actively hiring or have hired before, give you that additional perspective. And even now, I don’t frequent it as often, but I’m still part of the alumni group. And that’s been super helpful. ⁓ I can go into a little story of Metta knock on the door last year.

And they, they set me up for an interview. And again, I had to do a whole case study, but guess what? The case study didn’t feel as heavy because I already have a lot of the things that I needed thanks to CSL. But to my point, there was, I reached out to some people in the alumni and they helped me revise the case study even years after ⁓ me being in CSL, because I still have access to alumni and you can still find support in those.

in those groups. So I really like the fact that it’s a whole mix of people that are brand new and people that are more experienced. And at the same time, you can also help others. Sometimes I go in there and people are asking for help on their case study and I come in and help them and provide my feedback. So it’s very collaborative and something that still exists. So I think it’s super helpful to have both ends.

Sarah Doody (11:49)

it reminds me of like a college experience. Right. I mean, like you get out of it, what you put into it. And if you choose to be proactive and connect with other people that are similarly motivated or have similar goals or similar career stage or whatever it is, ⁓ you can really make a lot of progress, but also make, you know, potentially

lifelong friends who you might end up working with someday. You never know.

Carlos (12:13)

I agree from time to time, I would post an opening on my company. I say, hey, and I’ll post it on the alumni lunch and also a career lunch. there’s opportunities there. the network that happens is very valuable. The networking alone.

Sarah Doody (12:30)

Yeah, so far we’ve had four people get hired at Liberty Mutual. I didn’t realize this till a couple of months ago and then I looked at the data and I was so surprised. But yeah, like one person gets hired somewhere and then they come back because they know if they can help their company or team hire people faster, that is a win, right? And oftentimes they find like people in Career Strategy Lab ⁓ have more buttoned up.

resumes, portfolios, et cetera, they’re ready to go. And it can reduce that time to hire, which is enormous if you’ve ever been involved in hiring.

I’m curious, again, back to hindsight, but I’m curious, you know, thinking back to your whole experience in Career Strategy Lab, or maybe even after too, is there something you learned in Career Strategy Lab or something you did that kind of just jumps out as being really impactful or something that you’re going to take with you, you know, for years to come at this point?

Carlos (13:31)

the return investment just keeps on coming. I’ve never thought about doing something like this. And now I’m thinking, well, there’s this guy called CB that needs a portfolio, that needs something. And it’s like, he’s such a hard ass, but we’re going to do it for this client. And I never thought about it, putting it that way, but I see it’s so like the application of it. So practical. I’m actually going to keep, and I haven’t done that. To me, kind of the, the strategy is the

Sarah Doody (13:33)

Yeah.

Carlos (13:57)

the ugly first draft and Fortunately, I’m not very What he called perfectionist. So I just like to I just like to do I don’t like to stay on ⁓

on the steel or thinking about things too much. Like if I’m going to do something, I’m going to go do the first drive on the ugly first drive and then send it out into the world and see what happens. And then just give me feedback. I need to write on that feedback and the MVP version, We’re all designers, UX designers here or the majority of us. So MVP version. What’s my MVP version? Okay. Can people read this? It’s a readable. Okay. Send it out. See what happens. All right. Change it.

Maybe it’s more work in the long term, it’s, mean, at least you’re not staying still trying to find that work perfect, which doesn’t exist by the way. So ⁓ just put in that first draft, do it. And actually that, this whole conversation kind of ties back to what Shelley is asking and the question is that if you got crushing imposter syndrome, I think one of the things that work for you is start that momentum.

make that first step, make that first drop, get that momentum going because the only way to beat imposter syndrome is to do something against it and so start walking, take that step.

Sarah Doody (15:12)

Yeah, I love how you you said, you know, the only way to get past imposter syndrome is to just take that step. And it kind of reminds me of another question that comes up almost every time we do these, but it’s like, how can I become more confident? Or people say, I think I’ll wait to do a career strategy lab until I feel more confident. And I always say to them, like, you’re gonna be waiting a long time to feel confident because confidence is the byproduct of like,

making progress on your portfolio, writing a resume bullet point, right? It’s like confidence needs

my next question is thinking back to when you got hired, I’m curious, like thinking about the first 30, 60 days of the role, ⁓ was there anything you did that you felt was really effective in helping set you up for success in that role?

Carlos (16:05)

Yeah, I think that when I joined, there wasn’t clarity into how my first 30, 60, and 90 days would look like. It was just kind of all over the place. I think what I did was, OK, well, this is what my experience going in, kind of doing a couple of HR things, but there wasn’t a clear plan. So what I did was, well,

I don’t want that to be the experience for someone else coming in after me. So here’s what I’m proposing as to what the first 30, 60 days should look like and like each of the checkpoints. And I create a whole document around what the experience should be. And I think that position meant to like this, here’s someone that is not just thinking about the work that they have to do, that we hire them for, but actually thinking of the whole experience of bringing someone else new in. And I think that that actually helped me kind of.

not race through the ranks immediately, it ⁓ put a light on me that I was wanting. that was helpful. But that comes to mind immediately.

Sarah Doody (17:03)

I think the through line is really like be intentional, right? And have a plan. I’m

Jonathan Coen (17:06)

No

Sarah Doody (17:11)

how many hours a week approximately were you spending ⁓ looking for

and how?

Did that compare kind of before and after career strategy

Carlos (17:21)

I think at the beginning, when you just joined CSL, there’s going to be a lot of time that you dedicate to it as you prepare your career materials and your portfolio and your resume. So I’d say, man, I remember I put the kids to bed and then we’ll go to, you know, we’re going to sleep until around 1 p.m. working on this. So it is it can be a lot or it depends. Again, you put in what you get out of it. So you don’t have to do the same way that I do it. But I think maybe it was around

16, 15 hours a week working on my career materials. Then after that, after I got somewhat at a good level, then that drop off to maybe just they get in an hour, an hour and a half to make applications. But like I’ll make maybe one or two applications in that one hour. Because again, you are aiming directly at a tailored resume, a tailored cover letter, a tailored portfolio. And then maybe even messages here and there to people ⁓ of

within your network. So that took a lot of time, but it was less and less each time. that’s around, you started really high on the time, but then it goes down a little bit and then eventually you don’t do it that much.

Sarah Doody (18:31)

And I would jump in there and just so people aren’t scared of how many hours a week this might take, it’s gonna depend for each person, right? So someone that is not working right now might treat Career Strategy Lab like a full-time job, you know, or someone might come in with a portfolio that, you know, is pretty darn good and a resume that’s pretty darn good. And they maybe are not spending as much time as someone who hasn’t touched their portfolio or resume in 10 years or something like that.

All right, another question. ⁓ When you were looking for jobs, ⁓ what did you do to figure out what hiring managers are looking for and how did you get opportunities to ask them questions?

or maybe you never made contact with a hiring manager. But I think the gist of this is really like, how did you make sure you understood what those hiring managers were looking for?

Carlos (19:30)

I think that came a little after on the process. Once you get your first screen, after your screen interview, then you’re usually paired with the hiring manager. And at that point, then you know who this person is. I would go on LinkedIn and just talk him a little bit. Maybe not the right word, but I would just go and look and like, where are they going to school? Where is their career record? And just try to get snippets of information just so that it’ll prompt questions. And then…

Jonathan Coen (19:49)

Mm-hmm.

Carlos (19:58)

if anything, try to tie it back to what the actual product was. Or maybe there was something similar. Like maybe we both like a certain school. So maybe if the opportunity lends itself, bring that up in the conversation. just to make things more casual and to also make things look that like, make sure that people know that I’m prepared, that I didn’t just come in fluff to anybody, but I actually took my time to research. And this actually happened with the CEO of the company that I’m at.

when he interviewed me in the last round, I made sure I went back to his LinkedIn, stalk him. And I realized that he was a UX designer for like 20 years, 20 years ago. So I asked him questions relating to that. Like, how do you think the practice has changed over the years?

but I wouldn’t have known that if I didn’t actually take time to go into it and see what this guy is all about and then bring that into the conversation. And I think that that showed that I care about this role that I wanted, that I planned for the role. And I think that helped me put a little more points on my scorecard that they had.

Sarah Doody (21:08)

Yeah, I think read the job description. sounds so obvious, but as you said, so many people don’t. And when you just take the time to read the job description, that alone could make you stand out. Like this is why I often say the bar to stand out is so low because so many people are just putting like minimal effort in, right? So I cannot emphasize that enough.

Jonathan Coen (21:13)

then

Sarah Doody (21:34)

think we’ll have time for two more questions, but one of them is ⁓ when you were in your last job searches, were you using a portfolio presentation or website? The big debate of hiring these days. So what did each of you do? I may know the answer, but I’m curious. I want everyone to hear from you and not me.

Carlos (21:54)

Your website is an invitation card, but really what needs to be ready and prepared for to present is the case study, the PDF, where you go, what is easier to navigate, their pages, their sections. But so I use my website as like the presentation card. ⁓ And then ⁓ if inquire upon, then I have the case study ready and I have the ability to modify it and, ⁓ and make it.

Oh my gosh, I’m blanking out the words. And customize it for that specific case study for that specific company, put a little name tag with the company and maybe even change some of the wording based on what the company is. So yeah, I do both. And it’s to John-Tan’s point, it’s easier to make the big case study first and then grab that content and use some of that content, distill it down on the website to make it more readable, easy to scan.

Sarah Doody (22:50)

Yeah, yeah, I think you you if you choose to create a website, ⁓ you can just use the content from that presentation, right? And I think the presentation is you said, ⁓ Carlos is is the priority, because that’s also what you’re going to use in job interviews, right? And then I think if you have time to make a website, or if you already have a website, that’s great. But

Also at the same time, there’s been so many people from Career Strategy Lab who only had a presentation and still got hired. So I know we could debate about the pros and cons and strategy of website versus presentation for hours on

the last closing question here is, if someone either was on the fence about joining Career Strategy Lab or they join, ⁓ what advice would you give them? Feel free to take that whatever direction feels right to you.

Carlos (23:49)

Yeah, you’re not, you’re not gonna, if you’re the fence, you’re not gonna regret it. The value that you get out of it besides the, you know, the job and everything else, but the confidence, you know, I tell you, there is a clear distinct difference between my confidence when I interview.

versus of before and after CSL. And I think honestly, that’s what got me the job because my portfolio was okay. My case studies were okay. But I think the way I came in into those meetings, into those interviews, because I had practiced, because I had gone through the steps of CSL, just allowed me to sit down here and just be myself and like crack a joke here and there and just be myself and be, and that’s actually what I think really got me the job. Not the work that I did, but just the fact that I was so comfortable with presenting my work.

and knowing that it was a really well made presentation. So, but I didn’t, I wouldn’t have gotten here if it wasn’t for like the steps to a CSL, that giving the confidence. So if you’re on the fence and you are feeling doubtful that you don’t have the confidence, I think that that’s what is going to give you the confidence knowing full well that your work is great and that you are good at presenting and you have practice or this moment. So that’s what I would say.

Sarah Doody (24:48)

Mm.