Where’s Bethany?
A few months have passed since my last update. With my last blog post, we were in the throes of Snowpocalypse Valentine’s Day weekend here in Texas with intermittent heat and electricity. I had just launched my research study a few days before but not obtaining much feedback from my volunteer participants. One of my ideas while ruminating through typing my last post ended up having a good result; I was able to get the founder of the organization to allow me to provide two $25 gift cards to encourage our participants to drive action. (Lesson learned; make the simple 10 minute investment worthwhile to participants!).
I also had personally begun interviewing in February for a UX Strategy role at my current company and continued networking as well, which lead to another job lead internally. While neither panned out, the UX Strategy role in particular was a huge blow to my confidence. I began questioning whether or not I should pursue UX as I kept getting to the final stages but ultimately didn’t have the related experience or right skills. When pivoting into a new career, it’s not easy to have the experience up front. The feedback was too general and not truly helpful, thus I felt pretty helpless and rudderless. Honestly the image I kept seeing of myself was being a small boat stranded in the middle of an ocean. It took a good two weeks for me to pick myself up off the ground and trudge on. I knew I couldn’t focus appropriately on my UX research without making sure I was ok first. So I put that project on pause, updated my client, and was thankful for her kind understanding.
I found a book, You Turn by Ashley Stahl, that helped really bring clarity to my situation. Within the first 10 pages, I underlined these 3 nuggets that gave me that fire I needed to get back to it.
“I realized my experience had nothing to do with my capability, that I wanted to be more, have more, and do more.”
“(People) don’t want to take leaps in their career because they think they have “little experience,” but that’s a story many of us buy in to in order to stay small.”
“...when you feel fear in a situation that’s otherwise good for your growth, do it anyway. It’s a muscle you build.”
Failure happens. I get it. With two failed interviews back to back, it was a huge blow to my confidence. I needed these words to find the wind in my sails and reset my direction, my career, in UX.
Since then, over the past month, I’ve made some amazing strides:
1) I was contacted by an individual in our group: Teaching: A Path to L&D who noticed I was working on UX and wanted to learn about my process. During our conversations, I decided the best thing for the both of us was to have her join me on my UX project. Rachel will be a great asset but this project will catapult her learning in UX as well. I’m looking forward to learning together and bouncing ideas off of one another.
2) I synthesized the UX research collected. It took awhile to figure out all of the cool metrics that Optimal Workshop pulls together. I have to be honest, I’m a data nerd but the stats were overwhelming. Again, I’m teaching myself EVERYTHING so this took a bit of time to digest and figure out what actionable next steps needed to occur.
3) I provided a recommendations report to my clients (the director and founder of Teaching: A Path to L&D and the Social Media Manger). I obtained feedback on the actions to take as well as obtained insights about new areas to focus on for round two of user research.
4) I solicited for another round of participants last week and within two days, already had 19 volunteers of 25 desired. I enticed them with the opportunity to receive one of two $25 eGift cards to be raffled once the study is concluded. (Money talks!).
5) I began what’s been the most fun part of the process so far, wireframe prototyping! I put together my first sketches and linked them together on the Pop app to do some quick and easy moderated testing. My partner, Rachel, works with teachers and can use our mockup as a way to test whether the new path is intuitive. You can find my first attempt here and my first wireframe sketches below.
6) And of course, I got back on the proverbial horse and submitted my application for HubSpot’s AUX Rotational Program last month. I restructured my resume (I’ve had 4 resumes in 5 months; always be iterating!) and submitted my cover letter. Last week, I received a notification that I was being moved forward to their video interview round. Here we go again! I submitted my responses last Friday and am eagerly checking my phone for updates. I have a sense of validation now in all that I’m doing isn’t for nothing. Someone sees my self-directed learning in UX as valuable. They recognize my drive, that I’m all in. I’ll work a full day as a recruiter, then log on at 6p until midnight crunching away on my UX project. I’ll wake up and wish I could get back to where I left off. The desire to do something that is extremely gratifying is what keeps me going.
So that’s where I’ve been for the better part of two months. I’m definitely on a path now to finalize this project for TPLD by the end of May. As for HubSpot, if I am moved forward to the third round of interviews, I’ll be ready. I’ll take this info I’m learning and apply it to my interviews. But if I don’t make the cut, I won’t be deterred. I will get there. It may not happen within my targeted time frame but in time. And that’s all that matters.
Until then, I keep moving forward.