Remember the good old days when being a good UX designer was enough? Nowadays, it can feel like your UX skills are just the bare minimum.
Many of the senior UX designers I work with in my coaching services have a hard time finding meaningful work or taking next steps in their careers.
Every team wants to crank out products at lightspeed with the help of AI. Thoughtful UX processes can feel out of date. Your time-tested UX design skills begin to look like blockers instead of assets.
So where does that leave you? Stuck in the middle of a career that used to move along just fine?
I think the opposite is true!
The opportunities for a fulfilled creative UX career are still here. But it’s time to take control of your career direction instead of following the job market.
Let me explain why.
1. Years of layoffs have flooded the job market with talented designers eager to jump at any opportunity. If you stick to the “if you build a portfolio, jobs will come” mantra, you won’t land a role anytime soon.
Now, investigating your strengths, skills, and values, you can build a profile that makes the difference between being just another designer and being a valued expert.
2. Companies are asking about your vibe-coding experience in design interviews now. That question misses the point. If anyone can build apps (let’s believe the AI marketing for a moment), the key skill is understanding what to build and not how well you can write a prompt.
This is where your UX skills thrive. As a UX designer, you think beyond the feature and understand the system. You’re delivering from the beauty of a simple UI to the impact of usability issues on business KPIs.
The analytical and creative skills that make you a UX designer in the first place will remain relevant in the age of AI.
3. More automation requires more collaboration, not less. Modern tools blur the lines between tech disciplines. Product managers and engineers can prompt UI prototypes, UX designers can build apps, and so on.
Your job as a UX designer has always included the role of a facilitator. We organize and drive the cross-functional collaboration that builds great products.
When it looks like no one “needs” expert teammates, your facilitation skills become superpowers. Being crystal clear about how you help teams align on problem understanding and solution potential and your value to teams will exceed the expectations of your stakeholders.
4. The opportunity might not look like a job post. Our careers used to be primarily defined by and confined to industry demand alone. You’d move through the ranks from junior to senior UX role, and if your company was mature enough, you might have landed a leadership role at some point. At least that’s what it looked like. In reality, UX was in evolution. The tools, methods, and even what we considered to be part of the field constantly expanded and changed.
This is where the crisis holds a chance.
While traditional roles like the “UX/UI designer” might be under pressure, the demand for UX skills remains. You can join a team or go independent, be hands-on or more strategic, become a builder or a consultant, teach and train, or go all in on creative craft.
Instead of fitting into a limiting box, now you can design a career that is truly yours.
Alright, you might be thinking, that all sounds good, but where do I start when I feel stuck in my current situation and imposter syndrome is kicking in?
I know that figuring out your UX career direction can be tricky when you’re struggling to see the light at the end of the tunnel. I’ve been there too.
That’s why I built UXPEERS as a 9-week group mentoring program to help senior UX designers reconnect with their strengths and values and build impactful careers that they are proud of again. When you join the program, you’ll get the support you need to design your career path and actionable advice to reach your goal.
I’m kicking off the new year with a new cohort at the end of January. If this sounds like it could be helpful to you, checkout ux-peers.com
