While reflecting on the last year, I realised that the thing I’ve struggled with the most is explaining what I do. Talking to individuals outside the digital product sphere highlighted that I didn’t have a simple way to explain what I do.
Over the years, while in employment, I’ve relied on the label afforded me by my job title. Everything from Junior Illustrator to Head of UX for [insert company name]. This has worked nicely by providing an easily understandable level, verb and some context.
As a freelancer, I can no longer rely on an organisation to create labels. I have to do this myself. Often, I’ve tried not to box myself in, removing any descriptor, such as UX/Product/Graphic, using the generic term Designer. It’s a catch-all, easy to understand, or so I thought. Introductions normally go something like…
Hi, I’m Dereck.
“Nice to meet you, Dereck; what do you do for a living?”
I’m a Designer.
“Great, what do you design?”
How I answer that depends on who I’m talking to. This was a good way to tailor my description to the situation. However, I’ve designed many things over my 35-year career across print and digital. Large things, small things, digital things like websites and apps, and even people things like events and educational services. Too many things for a simple one-line answer. I know I don’t need to explain everything I’ve ever done. I should focus on what I do now, what I want to be doing, and how I can help the person I’m talking to.
At best, I share a couple of muddled sentences, including buzzword phrases such as user-centred product designer, user experience or UX designer. All the time, noticing the interest drains from people’s faces. I’ve lost them, and there’s no way I’m getting back on-side.
What’s the best way to clearly and succinctly explain what I do to others?
I’m a designer, and designers solve problems. What would happen if I treated this problem as a design project? I could interrogate the problem, explore ideas and prototype possible solutions to find a simple way to describe what I do clearly. With a quiet start to the new year, I had the luxury of some time to focus on just this.
My starting point
The need to update my LinkedIn profile and announce to the world that I was rejoining the world of freelancers set me off with a quickly written introduction and bio. Throughout 2023, that evolved through various iterations, including:
“Dereck is a user-centric design leader with a proven track record of building and leading design teams. He has helped build digital-first organisations, led digital transformations, and supported teams to navigate the inevitable change that comes with large projects.”
“As a user-centric design leader, Dereck helps teams create and work towards possible futures by helping them develop experience strategies and product visions that guide them through uncertainty and change.”
“Dereck is a Product Design Consultant focused on User Experience and Product Design, Strategy and Vision. I help teams and organisations unlock the potential of messy ideas that require exploring and defining.”
All are unclear, trying to say too much and fairly pretentious too. I read articles about elevator pitches and self-promotion. Followed by looking at several other people’s LinkedIn profiles. Patterns were emerging, and I was starting to see where I had been going wrong.
Creating a personal positioning statement
I needed to develop a clear, personal ‘value proposition’. Something that clearly explains what I do and who I work for. Exploring problems with a product mindset, I usually start out asking simple questions such as;
- Who does this product serve?
- What does this product do?
- How does this product work?
- Why does this product exist?
Turning these questions on myself, I created the following headings;
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Who do I work for? (Who are the types of clients that I work for?)
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What do I do? (What do I actually do to help those clients?)
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How do I do my work? (In tangible terms, how do I help my clients?)
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Why do you do this? (What emotional, intangible benefits do I create for my clients?)
I ended up with a whole set of sticky notes under the headings, which I narrowed down to a maximum of three in each. The idea was to use the selected notes to complete the following statement;
I help [type of client]
To [adjectives + what]
By [verbs]
So that [result or impact]
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This took quite a few attempts. Constantly going back and forth through the different questions. Grouping and theming notes under the headings. I also moved whole themes between the questions as sometimes they felt more suited to a ‘what’ than ‘how’.
Framing my value proposition
Things became clearer as I played around with these virtual sticky notes. During a break, I stumbled upon a fortuitous post on LinkedIn from Diane Wiredu about elevator pitches. In it, Diane mentions “3 ridiculously simple and effective elevator pitch frameworks you can use to explain what your business does in 45 seconds or less”.
- The ‘one-breath’ pitch (<10 seconds)
- The ‘value prop’ pitch (<30 seconds)
- The story-led pitch (<45 seconds)
Brilliant, I thought, I can incorporate these into my value proposition. This would also allow me to test my new words for different situations. With three new frames created, one for each elevator pitch type, I transferred my incomplete value proposition and adjusted it to each frame’s requirements. This exercise made creating individual, descriptive sentences easier based on the original I help… To… By… So that… format.
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Finalising my thoughts with newfound clarity
After a few attempts, the sentences started to come together. They made sense, were simple and clear, and appeared well-structured. However, even after all this, they didn’t quite read well. Showing my work to a critical friend, they pointed out that I had written individual sentences and not as a whole due to the framework I had used. Their suggestion was to rewrite those sentences as a paragraph. Then, read it out loud and rewrite it as I would say it to another human. This was brilliant advice. I finally had a simple way to explain what I do.
I'm a Product Design Lead who works with purpose-driven organisations to explore and define digital products, services, and UX strategies. I help to turn ideas into tangible, testable prototypes and create UX frameworks that provide clarity, inspire action and set an agreed direction.
My LinkedIn profile has been updated with my new copy, as has my website and social media bios. I’ve already had people reach out and comment on these. One conversation even led to another interesting project. As freelancers, it’s important that we clearly articulate what we do. It helps to attract the right kind of clients and makes introduction conversations so much easier.
I’d be interested in your thoughts on this process or if you have any frameworks you use for similar processes. Also, how do you introduce yourself and what you do for a living?