Your work only counts if the people above you understand it.
That’s the part nobody teaches. You can ship the right thing, run the right research, make the right call… and still watch it get reshaped, deprioritized, or quietly handed to someone else. Not because the work was bad. Because the story around it didn’t land.
Getting better at the job, past a certain point, isn’t about getting better at design. It’s about getting better at the work around the work. Making your thinking legible. Building influence without a title. Knowing when to push and when to let it go.
This newsletter is about that.
I write for designers past the basics. Senior, Lead, Staff, Principal. People who’ve shipped real work and now have to explain it, defend it, and get it through rooms full of people who weren’t there. That’s harder than it sounds. Most advice doesn’t help.
What you’ll get
Free essays, every weeks. Practical advice for designers trying to get better at the job in a tricky market. Making your work legible to leadership. Running critiques that don’t waste everyone’s time. Handling pushback. Building influence. Navigating the role as AI changes what design work looks like.
Paid subscribers ($10/month) also get:
Monthly office hours. Live, 60 minutes, small group. Bring a portfolio, a tricky interview question, a positioning problem. We work through it together. Recorded if you can’t make it.
Portfolio and LinkedIn teardowns. Anonymized walkthroughs of real designer work. What’s landing, what isn’t, why.
Full archive access.
Who I am
I’ve been working in product and UX design for over 13 years. I’m a Top Design Writer on Medium with 370+ articles. I’ve talked with 30+ design leaders and 200+ designers about what’s actually happening in the 2025–2026 hiring market, and I run Words by Design, a portfolio writing service for senior designers pursuing senior and director-level roles.
Subscribe below. Paid is $10/month if you want more.
