Three Ways to Update Your Portfolio
Posted on Tuesday, November 21st, 2017
The portfolio is a key part of your job hunt toolkit. It’s a way of showing employers what kind of work you do and the accomplishments you’ve made. We’ve written a guide to building your first portfolio here. The main takeaways from that article? Think about your audience, think about the work you want to be doing, and make it look good.
But a portfolio is not a static item, and like all your job search materials, you should update it regularly. How do you bring your portfolio up-to-date and make it extra shiny for employers? Read on!
Save your best emails.
Not the emails you write, but the emails people write to you.
Think of any emails you’ve received from teachers, bosses, or anyone in an authoritative role. Were any particularly praise-worthy of you? Did any indicate your talents or professionalism? Those are things you definitely want to keep.
Praise from supervisors is especially excellent to include in your portfolio, as it shows how professionals view you: as a successful, reliable worker. When you’re job searching, that is exactly the kind of thing you want potential employers to know.
Keep a stash of praiseworthy, complimentary emails from your supervisors, and print out the very best ones. Stick them in your portfolio, hand that to employers, and let your old bosses tell your potential new bosses just how awesome you are.
Seek out some great reviews.
When you’re job hunting, it can be helpful to think of yourself as a business. You offer a service (programming, for example) and a company pays you for that service. If you think of yourself in these terms, it becomes much easier to market yourself.
And what is one of the key tricks to marketing a small business? Seek out positive reviews, of course.
Get in touch with supervisors and professionals that you had a positive working relationship with, and ask them if they would be willing to write you a letter of recommendation. Letters of recommendation are great, because supervisors can write about what exactly makes you such a good hire. They’re specific and trustworthy, and look super good to employers.
Once you get a letter of recommendation, print it out and stick it directly into your portfolio.
No work experience? No problem!
When building a portfolio, you want to remember that every single thing you include should have the goal of telling employers how awesome you are. You want to show them what kind of technical skills you have that make you a great hire.
But that can be difficult to do if you’re just starting out. So, what are you supposed to do?
The answer is to use your school work. Don’t underestimate the power of a really well-done school project. If the work you did in school is something to be proud of, why wouldn’t you show it off to employers? In fact, by showing employers that you can apply what you’re learning in a practical way, school projects can be the key to building a strong student portfolio.
Just be sure that you’re not sharing anything confidential or taking credit for someone else’s work, and you’ll be just fine.
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