#108 Landing a junior job at META amidst tech crisis /w Nitya Kumar
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the world of tech is constantly growing and it's constantly changing. You're just put into situations where you have to learn. You're kind of thrown into like the shocks and you're trying to find your way through and not run. But having mentorship and like learning from designers who've been there longer than I have, that is definitely a key factor. And then working in a bigger company forces you to be both like having certain things where like

you know, you're on top of everything and you have a plan, but then being open to the flexibility and like flow of things, because today is something is a certain way, but tomorrow everything could be changed and you could be in a totally different team and really learning how to adapt.

Hello, everybody, and welcome back to the Honest UX Talks. My name is Anfisa, and today I'm not joined by Ioana. Instead, I'm joined by Nitya Kumar. The topic of today's conversation is how to land a job in a big tech company, especially in the early stages of your career.

And the reason why I have invited Nitya to talk about it is because Nitya is one of those designers who successfully landed a job at Meta in the beginning of the tech crisis in 2022. And today, Nitya is working on Instagram and Messenger at Meta. She's also a product design judge at Boston University and a guest speaker at Columbia University.

And she, I believe, also gives lectures at the Parsons School of Design and UI, Design Mentor and Mentor Cruise and Dedy Pili. So it's pretty impressive how you've been able to achieve so many different things pretty early in your career, right? I've checked your LinkedIn. I mean, you started studying it in 2019, right? Yeah.

Yes, you're right. Okay. So it's pretty recent. And I feel like a lot of people actually try to transition and break into the design job around that time, right? 2019, this is where it was like kind of reaching the peak. And then 2020, a lot of people realized the beauty of working remotely, the flexibility it provides, still working in tech, which...

usually allows nice lifestyle. You're one of those people who actually succeeded doing this really well during the COVID. And since that moment, I guess, after two years, after a couple of internships I see you had in very big companies, you've landed a job in Meta. I would love to dive deeper into your progress so far and what do you feel like enabled you to get where you are? And what could our listeners learn from your story? Because I feel like today on the market, the mood is pretty, pretty depressive. It's really hard to get jobs, especially if you're a junior.

I'm running the design community where I help people land jobs. And I see a lot of people started doing sort of education during the COVID and still till this moment, they're struggling to find even the first job. And so it would be very interesting conversation. Maybe let's kick it off by just giving you the space to introduce yourself and tell us a bit about your story and who you are.

Yeah, of course. Thank you for having me, first of all. Yes, I totally understand about the job market nowadays. I recently watched Inside Out, the movie, and how everyone has jokes about the different emotions. I feel like the job market is more towards the sadness emotion. We're trying to get it to joy.

but a little bit about my journey. Started in a similar job market, I think, like during COVID, during the pandemic. I started my design journey. I like always knew that I wanted to be a creative. So I moved from India, which is where I grew up and I moved to New York. I don't know how I did it. I was 18 years old, but

But I was just too excited to think about anything else. That is where I really started to learn from my professors about like visual design and typography. I took a lot of classes like journalism, psychology, and I kind of realized that user experience design is more a mix of logic and the creative side.

and we get to learn so much about people because at the end of the day, that's what we're advocating for. So it made me transition towards UX design. I think my first internship was out of my first semester in college. And since then, I built it up. I had the privilege of designing for the New York Times for several editorial design systems. The learning curve, it helped me grow so much. From there, I started designing at

meta and when I realized oh I think I know like what makes a good portfolio and I've got to learn so much from people which is when I started like mentoring on ADP lists and like giving portfolio reviews at NYU. Yeah well that was a very brief introduction to a lot of the things you did. I think

You really jumped right away into this topic. So maybe let's address it first and then there will be threats. We'll break it down further. I believe you also had like two or three internships for like three months or so during the COVID right after you finished university. After having those couple of internships...

Let's talk about your way to find a job specifically in the big tech, in meta. What was this that enabled you with the very little experience that you had during the times when there are a lot of designers already, right? Typically, you know, the hardest part is always to get the first junior or associate design job. And you got it right away, right? After a couple of internships. So how did you do this, right? Let's talk about your journey. And maybe you can literally just reflect

on, first of all, how did you get your feet at the door? What was your portfolio like? What were the interviewing process? Let's do this one by one. Okay, sounds good. I can start with the part about getting a job and then hiring and then go over the interview. I started my portfolio

I think one of the things that really helped me create a successful portfolio was realizing that as a student, I don't have a lot of industry experience. And I think the fastest way to learn is to get as much of practical experience as you can. Even though I had those personal projects where I learned to have like wear all the hats from like the research to designing and testing. I

I remember during the pandemic, my first internship that I landed had gotten cancelled and I was really upset about it. So I moved back to India for like three months. And over there, I kind of was like, okay, I need to get industry experience. Let me learn from professionals. And so I reached out and spoke to a lot of people on LinkedIn and really connected with the industry. And

And it was scary to talk to strangers. I liked to reach out to them. But I think everyone was really nice because they've been students too. And I realized, okay, I'm in India. I can kind of global hack my time zones to give me like multiple experiences in three months because obviously I wanted to land a job after college. So I think I got a freelance job at this meme dating agency.

which was a really cool experience. I also got my first internship at Airtel, which is India's leading music app. So very customer-facing. And at the same time, I was kind of working at three different internships. I was able to do one in the United States and one in New York. And yes, it was hectic, but...

I think I learned so much in such a fast pace and I was able to really just fail fast, learn fast and understand where I am right now and like be kind to myself through the process of just learning more and being curious about how can I improve my portfolio. From there, I built out those case studies. I think that was the first step.

actually helped me. Okay, so you said that basically the way for you to land your first internships was to just networking, reaching out to people from whenever you are in the world, right? You said you were back then in India and you were reaching out to people in the US. Also in India, you said another one. And it was like looking for any opportunities essentially in the world. That was during the COVID, so everything was remote. And I guess it was also useful for you because you didn't have to go to the office, so you

could actually leverage all those three opportunities, which is amazing. But I think what I'm very curious about is what did your portfolio look like when you were landing those internships? Three internships is a lot and it's really hard to do this right now, right? What was your portfolio looking like and why do you think it worked for you?

I think that's a great question. I think you have to leverage the work that you have in order to get a real life experience. And so something that I did was come up with personal projects that I was genuinely really interested in. There are so many products in the world. And I think especially when you're younger, you have all of these ideas.

I worked with one of my friends for an Adobe design jam where we had a spin on a dating app. I worked with, I was really passionate about sustainability. So designing like a food delivery app that was more environment friendly. And it really like worked with mentors on ADP list to take my personal experience

projects and built out case studies of like how I was thinking. And I think that's what really helped stand out because it showed like, okay, I might not have an industry experience, but they can see how I think. And I could also shine my visual design skills through like, I loved After Effects. I would prototype videos, but in like a motion plan kind of sense. I'd

At college, I would do classes with my friends and just like groups where one would pretend like we'd be a product designer and one would be an engineer. And then there's like a PM and together we're working. And so with that, you kind of get a few challenges of what it would be like to collaborate. It really helps tell a story even like when you're interviewing. I think that was the first part.

And the second thought was instead of focusing on only online applications where like a robot scans your resume, you don't even know if it's getting there. To just being honest and reaching out to people, even if it's scary, because I'm a human and they're human too. And being like, hey, like just being open to feedback and asking if,

they are hiring. That really helped me because the internships I did get were all through human connection. The first step was never an online application. Wow. So that's really good to hear because I always try to pitch for like, try to be proactive, be outreaching because in a junior design position, you usually need to be proactive. You need to show the perspective you're bringing, the proactiveness, the ability to think outside the box. And

What you're saying is essentially what I love to hear this because it kind of validates what I think is very important for every junior designer. So yeah, the fact that you get all those three opportunities through the proactive outreach is a very big deal, I think. And I like that you mentioned those role-playing games to make it hand that you had this like work environment experience, right? You had some ideas about how it feels working with those different roles. Exactly.

And they're your friends too. And, you know, maybe your friend wants to be an engineer and they want to see how it's like collaborating with a designer. And you never know, maybe your project ends up being a really good app. Yeah.

Yeah. And I also think that the topic you mentioned, the more sustainable food delivery app, what was the second one? It was a dating app. A dating app. What was the angle there? So we just signed for a meme-based dating app. So it was based on like humor. So you would slide on memes and match people based on their like sense of humor.

ended up being called Schmooze. Yeah. Nice. That's very interesting. And I like to hear those specific topics simply because I feel like for a lot of junior designers, what I see in portfolios is out of the bootcamp, there is this tendency of taking a very simple challenges like designing an Uber app, which again, you did the food Uber app sort of, but you thought about the different angle from the sustainability perspective, right? You still improved it, not just yet another Uber app, but thinking about

what can I do differently? And it seems like even if you're going for a simple apps, because obviously in the beginning of your career, you still don't have a clarity and every more complex challenge seems to be too hard to bite for sake of learning. But thinking even like for those new angles on how do you still improve the life? How do you add innovation? How do you change the existing pattern? That's what I feel like is what is valued for a lot of junior or early stage designers. This is a nice idea with like,

dating app, right? I see a lot of people doing the dating apps, but like, again, you have a new interesting angle with the humor. And I feel like you're right. Like the humor is this essential part. A lot of people are considering human as a deal breaker for their relationships, right? So it's a very good idea, I think. If you think about this, like, how did you pick up those topics or problems? Was this your intentional research?

Or was this just, I don't know, you had fun with your friends, you came up with this idea, let's try it out. So what was the process for you to coming up to this first project that you put in your portfolio that then landed you those internships? I think the process for each were very different, but

my main advice would be to really connect with the world we live in because at the end of the day we are designing to make whether it's convenience or you know we're designing to make people's lives better so just talking to your friends talking to family just thinking about okay like what are the problems they're currently facing and that's

way you're not making assumptions you can essentially come up with ideas another fun way is if you're in college just talking with your friends and like collaborating together and your professors because I think those are the most fun sessions where you really come up with innovative ideas for example in the meme based dating app I worked with one of my friends at Stanford and

And we both decided to collaborate on that startup opportunity. And it was supposed to be more of a social media. And as we started working together, we were like, oh, actually, you know, this makes more sense for a dating app.

And we worked with the founders who had the privilege to learn from them. So just being collaborative and having a lot of conversations with people. Those founders, where did you reach them? Where was this touch point, how you could connect to the founders to actually find out more relevant problems to solve? It actually ended up being a very casual situation. One of my friends in college reached out to me, like,

Hey, I'm working on this meme-based dating app with one of my friends who are the founders. And would you like to join? And I was like, sure. It sounded like such a new idea. And I was just open to welcoming it. And as we started working together, that's where we started coming up with how this can be more useful and going through multiple iterations.

What I'm hearing from you is that you also try to just reach out to some local network entrepreneur. How did you find the people who essentially become your partners? My friend already was connected with the founders and they needed a designer on the team. Yeah, still through the network, yet not like cold reaching out, but instead leveraging your current circles. So you started working on those different internships.

What did you take away from this experience from sort of juggling multiple internships? Were there like this gross opportunity or were there more like just I had to go through this as a stage, but, you know, maybe there was something else I needed to learn because maybe the opportunities were not so strong. So if you think about those internships, what did you learn from them? I think each experience taught me so many different things. And I would not lie to you, juggling three things at once is very challenging, but

Definitely improved my time management skills. But I think I needed the learning curve because I came from a graphic design background. Working with the startup really helped me learn about the business funding side of things. Wearing multiple hats because we didn't have a UX researcher, we didn't have a content designer. It was mainly just me coming up with the whole design system.

From the personal projects, I didn't have a lot of constraints. Normally, it's like when you're working with engineers, so this is a great idea, but, you know, we can't fully build this. But if it's a personal project, you can kind of show all the crazy design ideas and just go wild.

I learned a lot from that. In the end, I think the main thing is really just getting better at failing because I was doing so many things that were new. And so it was a lot about focusing on being like 1% better than focusing on, oh my God, I don't know how to do this. And I think that like your mindset kind of improves. What are those skills that you actually gained in those different internships? I guess.

I can think about three main skills that ended up aligning with my next corporate internship. One of the in the mean ways like app and also my personal project. I really got into building design systems and I was learning about components, variants and trying to teach myself Figma. Those two skills came in very handy.

And through my college collaborations, because of the whole role playing, I realized how it would be like collaborating with like SFN partners in some way. And that helped me when I got my first internship, because I wasn't so out of

I think both those soft skills and hard skills are important to both. What was the next step for you in this journey? How did your portfolio improve? What did you add to your portfolio that landed you the next job, if you look back and try to reflect on this journey so far? Putting my case studies out there and having

having that testimonial since I did have people to collaborate with. One of the things I also learned was bringing a little bit of my personality from the dating apps. It was very like humor focused. And so I did fun things in my about me page, like having a coffee button. I think a lot of people commented on that's what kind of wanted them to have a conversation with me.

When I ended up getting my first internship, it happened to be a design system role and I was being asked questions about design systems and I think the only reason I was able to answer those questions is because of the previous experiences that I had.

And also, I think prototyping, like really showcasing how an app could work, building those skills is important too. First job that you got after the internship and the startup, what was the portfolio and what will you believe are the break-even points when you essentially was able to impress the employer and to give you a chance to get the first job? Because I know that it's the hardest part to do usually in the beginning of your career. So during the hiring process, my first big internship,

that I landed was at the New York Times. And over there, I worked in an editorial design system. A lot of case studies I see now, it's focused on like, I did an empathy map and then I tested and then I prototyped. And which is great, I think, as a junior designer to show that you know the process. But yeah,

Changing it to the story that I was telling. We interviewed these users and then, you know, we learned these insights. And from there, the solution kind of improved. This is what I expected, but then this happened. And then this is how I failed. And when I was telling my story, I think that really helped in landing that first role.

Yeah, I love this. I think it's very important. It seems like you were intuitively seeing the gaps on the market and you were filling them in, right? So as in the beginning, you said there was a lot of proactive outreach and it's very scary to do, especially if you're a junior designer. So you realize that's an opportunity. A lot of people doing those cookie cutter type of portfolios following the same process and are challenging the way you're explaining your work.

And then you noticed, oh, you can actually tell a story and stand out in that way. So I love that you actually noticed this before everyone else started talking about this, which is amazing. And then you worked in the New York Times, right? What was after that? I see you worked there for about one year. Tell us a bit about your story after or during this internship. So I think this internship, it was definitely life-changing. It was good.

It was a year long. I got to work with so many amazing designers that I'm still friends with and I adore them so much. I got to collaborate with other interns over there. I think just getting used to being in like a first big corporate communication and like culture style that I wasn't used to because I came from like a very startup personal project world and

And everything, like one icon would take a little time to get approved. And really learning from the senior designers and just being like a sponge and stoking all of the knowledge that I could get. Even reaching out to other teams and other designers whose work I kind of liked instead of only focusing on my close, like five people on my team. That really helped me.

And because internship was for a longer time, I think it's easier to actually see your projects get shipped and tested and learn through that process. Because normally internships end in like maybe four weeks. You can also bring long-term relationships through that. After I interned for a year, I was kind of balancing this with my senior year. So I was in my thesis era and I

I did that alongside my internship. From there, I straight away started. I received a few emails from recruiters at Google and Meta. I started interviewing. It was like a crunch period for me because I was graduating soon and I was trying to juggle different offer deadlines. I had to give, I think, seven interviews for Meta in two weeks. Then the next week, I gave seven for Google.

I can only imagine the hecticness of it. I would say it's very fascinating to hear that in the early stage of your career, you're receiving potential interviews with recruiters from big tech companies. What do you believe happened for them to reach out to you? Was it some visibility, proactiveness, community? What do you think made people notice you and reach out to you consequently? Yeah, I think that's a great question to which I still wonder what happened. Yeah.

I will say it is hard work, but a part of it is also luck. I think during my time interning at the New York Times, I had put in a few LinkedIn posts of my work, even reached out before like, hey, I'm looking to get hired. And after that, I didn't do a lot of outreach apart from like talking to designers at Google and that are getting feedback on my work. I think making your SEO really good helps.

because I love writing about design. I wrote a few articles for like Bootcamp and UX Design Collective. And so my name was pretty out there. I think if you Googled me, you would definitely get like a portfolio link, a few articles. And maybe that's what got recruiters to reach out to me, which I'm grateful for.

Absolutely. It's fantastic that it was almost like the opportunity that came in your way as a reward for your proactiveness in the community, writing the articles. And again, it's still an early stage. You only have been working one year in the company. So I think

A, it's very scary to do in the early stage, but B, you were not afraid to do this. And I think it's a very good thing that you mentioned the CEO and the ability to write. That's a very hidden gem kind of skill that many people don't pay attention to in the early stages. I think that in many junior portfolios, you could notice either like their background, usually more in research, more in behavioral design, such as understanding psychology or marketing or some sort of indirect but similar experiences. But you don't see a lot of great UI opportunities.

Or you see the opposite. You see a lot of great UI, but not so much of the writing and thinking and the process and critical thinking. And what you have been sort of pulling off seems to be the writing. And you mentioned a few times the storytelling, which I feel like would be your secret sort of skill that helped you to boost your career a little bit. And I believe you also mentioned somewhere that, yeah, you said, I've learned storytelling from comedians.

Could you break down also this comedian background? What did you learn as a storytelling from comedians? What do you mean there? I learned so much. Honestly, I think product design is kind of everywhere in the world. And I've taken like salsa dance classes or even at hikes, we learned about like ventries and specifically comedy. And I think every time I do some like new activity, I always think this is basically product design. Yeah.

You're saying you're doing comedy? What type of comedy? Yeah, so I think this was during my college years where I

wanted to do something for fun. I was like, you know, I have all these assigned classes, they are rigorous, and I want to just have like a little break. I randomly decided that I'm going to sign up for a comedy class with a Saturday Night Live professor. She would show us episodes of SpongeBob and like David Chappelle. We started learning about different techniques they use, like euphemism and punchlines. I really

I really started learning about storytelling through that because if you think about a comedian, they need to make a whole audience laugh that they might not even know about. And everyone has such different backgrounds, but they're telling their story in a way that resonates and builds trust amongst all of these people in their audience. When we learned about these different types of techniques,

I realized that, you know what, we should be using this in design. What would you say the punchline in design would translate into? Even like in portfolios, I don't know, or any other work that you're doing, how would you map it in the current design industry? I'm very curious. It's a very interesting topic.

Yeah, that's such a good question and a very tough one. I'm not sure what one punchline to describe the whole industry would be. Maybe not the industry. Maybe what would be your punchline if you were, again, like looking for a job and you said you used some of those techniques. Maybe you didn't use the punchline technique, but what are the other techniques you feel like helped you out? Yeah,

Yeah, I think just resonating with my audience and not being too formal because initially I had that impression I need to be very professional and that kind of eliminated the human aspect. So bringing that back when I was reaching out to people, even in my portfolio, like I mentioned, having that coffee button, I really just being honest about my journey.

I think even in one of my first interview decks I made, before I started with my case studies, I had like a little icebreaker. I think this works as a junior designer, maybe not so much now. But I had like a picture of a strawberry cheesecake. And I said, strawberries are my favorite fruit, but I've been allergic to it. And I just ate so many that my allergy went away. And I cracked that joke, took two minutes of a 40-minute interview. And

And before going into my case study and everyone in the room started laughing. And I think it just brought the room into a more friendly environment and calmed the nerves for everyone there. Yeah, I love those stories. And it's just so true. Even when I do the job hunting and mock interviews with the community members, I can see that people are nervous and they try to put the best face on and trying to be very official, politically correct.

say this kind of the right things. But it's so much more connecting when you can use those. And I like that you said, use a little bit of the humor and about me some sort of a fun fact, because A, it makes you more vulnerable and open and it connects people to you. B, you chose your personality. And C, obviously, it kind of takes away the stress that a lot of people might feel in the beginning of the meeting when they don't know who they're talking to. And I like that you're saying that comedy helped you to be a little bit more

easygoing, more approachable, more like human sort of. That's a great story, I think. And as a takeaway for the listeners, maybe people can remember this conversation and take away from it. What can I tell about myself as a fun fact? Not too crazy, not too complicated, but a fun, even stupid joke or fact about myself that could make people laugh a little bit, take the stress off in the beginning of the meeting.

And I do really love that you said that comedy helped you a lot about design and almost your secret power in your resume. And looking back again in everything you have shared so far, it sounded like not only you would notice those opportunities in the market and fill the gaps for the missing opportunities, but also working in the New York Times using the comedy classes effectively.

from your past using networking as well as writing and using the CEO and leveraging the storytelling where some of your sort of puzzles or recipe ingredients to help you boosting your career early on. We can also talk a little bit about the hiring process. So you have been reached out almost simultaneously by Google recruiters and the Meta recruiters. Was it like beginning of 2022 or is it like earlier? What's the timeline?

I think this was, I graduated in 2022 and it was maybe that spring semester, maybe a few weeks before I was going to graduate, that the email suddenly just came into my inbox and I was like, all the doors are opening at the same time. Oh my God, I've never given a whiteboard challenge in my life. I've never given an athletic in my life and

I only have one shot. How am I going to do this? And so, okay, you talked to the recruiters. You obviously answered their emails. You said, let's talk about it. You started having the conversation with them. What was the process like? You said in one of the companies, was it Meta, that you went through the seven rounds of interviews? I think all tech companies have a pretty similar process. Like both Meta and Google had the initial portfolio review round after your recruiter phone call.

where you go over your case studies and then the interviewers are going to ask you a couple of questions. And from there, you go into like an, I forget the order, but it was like an apothecary, a whiteboard challenge, and then a few like behavioral and technical questions.

contextual interview rounds. Like if this happened, what would you do? Those kinds of questions and your past experience about like a time you had to collaborate with someone, things like that. After all of those initial rounds, I

I think that's when they do a scoring, depending on the company. They will either match you with a team or put you in a kind of a bucket where a team matching process happens. So that's interesting. You're saying that in those big tech companies, what you have experienced is that after

Going through a couple of interviews, they would sort of start to see where you might fit as the candidate, right? So they would look not just like, hey, we're looking to fill this existing kind of open role, but it would be more like, hey, let's talk to those people. We don't have specifically open role for one or another department, but instead we would see where do you fit better. Is that what you're saying happened to you? Kind of. So I think for meta, there are teams already having open role.

and you're kind of for that role. But for Google, they put you usually, I would say the first seven rounds are kind of, okay, now you're qualified to be a designer at Google. And then it's like, okay, these are the teams hiring and these are the pool of people who are qualified. And then hiring managers might have like an interview with you. So it could be one or two, depending on how many teams want you. Yeah.

Oh, wait. So you're saying that you would talk to different teams to see where you might actually work, right? I'm trying to understand this interesting new thing. I've never heard about it. Yeah, I think some companies do that. At Meta, it was different. It was a team already needed a role and it was great.

And then Google, you said you were talking to a few teams before you decided or not decided to continue. Yeah, I think Google goes through team matching. Oh, interesting. That's pretty cool. I love the matching factor because I think we are in the world of the job hunting and team building. We are underestimating the value of the culture and matching people that would work.

work amazingly together. We just sometimes squish people together and see how they work and how we do magic. But it's so important that people go along, people have fun, people have similar characteristics, similarities, are vulnerable and open to work with each other, right? Not always you match on the values. For me, it's weird sometimes when you're just given the team and you don't know them, you never talk to them. And it's great to see that Google actually allows you to sort of go through the matching and see if you could work with one of those teams and pick your direction in a way.

Let's then talk about, like you said, you were juggling in this springtime of 2022 when the world is collapsing because basically the tech crisis, you know, in Ukraine, the war started. So the whole world is like in shock and everything is unsure what's going to happen with the world. And you're juggling right now your theses as well as talking to the big tech companies. And you're still very early stage in your career. So how did you prepare yourself? And why do you feel like you did it well that obviously landed you the job?

Yes, that's a great question. I don't know how I did it. I'm happy I did it. But yeah, I'm sure there has to be something. Of course. Yeah, I think there are a few things for sure. I was juggling my pieces, finishing off my part time internship at the New York Times and then also interviewing. Normally, I think the interviews are spread out across like a few months. But because I didn't have the luxury of a few months, I kind of had to escalate the process with the tech recruiters into two weeks.

I think what helped me through the interview rounds was just the gift of mentorship. I had one of my designer friends who I found through ADP List, actually. And we had been working over a few months on my portfolio. At this point, we had like a really good relationship. I do this day, we still stalk and I love him.

and he helped me through my app critique and whiteboard challenge and I'm so grateful for the people in my life because it definitely takes a bullish to have a young designer kind of starting I remember we would speak in the evening so it's like 8 p.m at night and he would send me his old like app critique frameworks and I did like a mock of a whiteboard challenge I

I think I had maybe four hours or something the evening before to prepare for like an apotheke. And the next day was my apotheke. So...

I took the pressure off in some way because I was like, you know, it's my first time doing this and I have one shot. But either I learn something or I learn something and get hired. So it's like, oh, it's a win-win situation. So might as well give it a shot. And I think because I had so much support in my life and I had kind of removed that pressure of I have to win this, it ended up working out.

This is awesome. I'm so happy to hear you had a partner who could help you with this process because it's hard. A lot of people are just like close themselves in a room, start boiling themselves in those fears like, am I good enough? Can I make it? Why people are inviting me? I know nothing, right? All those imposter syndrome feelings that just...

rush through you and you're saying just allowing yourself to be surrounded by support people who can help you I can give you the feedback practice it taking off that stress of oh my god I'm doing it for the first time and being shaky and being nervous instead you kind of took off that stress by just practicing it

with somebody who already is in the industry so they understand the context and they could probably also give you the feedback. It's great to hear that you were able to find that outlet again suddenly without any probably like hardcore preparations, without reading 10 books about how do you find jobs and like how do you do those upcritiques.

You did it with the right person who gave you the feedback. And the next day you were able to do this and everything happened in two weeks. So this is fantastic, honestly. I hear those stories more and more these days. In my job community, there is this girl who recently found a job. And we have this kind of little habit of writing the story. So how you found job, let's break down what worked for you. In her stories, it was pretty similar. She found...

job hunting partner who would practice with cure and give you feedback every time so it's almost like this like mental support partner in the process and that helped a lot with the confidence and preparation 100 yeah i think that's the fastest way to learn is getting like someone who is like a role model to you who's done what you're kind of doing and

That's one of the reasons why I started mentoring on MentorCruise and also try to help others also through what I'm doing. And fast forward, you started working at Meta pretty soon after graduation. July, I see, right? Yes. Tell us a little bit about your journey so far in the Meta. Yeah.

I think after I graduated, I took like a month or two off. And after that, I started working at Meta. It's definitely been like a roller coaster. And I think I've adapted, just gotten used to the high learning curve. I,

I think you kind of have to love it in order to enjoy working at a tech company. I've learned so much. I think one of the best things is you're surrounded by like the top designers of the world and it's almost overwhelming like how much you can learn from them. And Meta has a lot of different programs that creates like a college environment inside of a company, which is something I've always created for myself.

and where senior designers are kind of put in a position where they teach what their experts in whether it's like storytelling or creating a really good design review deck or maybe visual design things like that it kind of separates your day-to-day work and you can feel like oh you're learning something new I think that's super helpful I will say it's taught me uncertainty how to be adaptable I

I joined and there have been like, you know, going through all the reorgs and multiple layoffs as your first job. And you survived all of them. I hope it's over, but the world is crazy. It's amazing. You survived it. You're there. You were promoted to the product designer just recently, right? Six months ago. Seems like, okay, so I'm very curious. You said there was a lot of growths in this beginning stage of your journey in Meta.

What helped you with this growth? You said there are senior designers surrounded you. So do you usually work or you pair up with a senior designer? What do you feel like enabled the growth for you mostly? And I obviously understand it has a lot to do with the people you're surrounded by. But if you think about those key ingredients that helped you survive in the layoffs, but also being promoted in the middle of this tech crisis.

So what were those key drivers for your growth within Meta? I will say maybe regarding layoffs, there is like a lot kind of plays into it. I don't necessarily think it's like a good or not so good designer because there are so many factors. But I

I think the key factors were one of the things are you're just put into situations where you have to learn. You're kind of thrown into the shocks and you're trying to find your way through and not drown.

But having mentorship and learning from designers who've been there longer than I have, that is definitely a key factor. And then the other thing is you can't really fail as long as you want to do better. There are so many opportunities to help you do better. So I think that was one of the things. And in terms of mindset was understanding that

Failure is kind of inevitable. Keep doing better and then eventually you get there. In your associate role, were you usually working with a senior designer? So did you have someone to lean on during the process or you actually had to take ownership early on right away in your first project as you joined? Yeah, I think you're always working on multiple teams. And some of the teams you might be situated with a senior designer and an engineer.

And in some other teams, you might be the only designer. I think I had the privilege of being in both situations in one of my first teams. But any tech company, I think, has a really big onboarding plan where you are matched with a buddy and a mentor.

I think you are set up for success regardless of the situations you're put with. And do you feel like your skills of what we've talked about, right? Storytelling, the comedy, the writing skills that you've been able to gain earlier, do you feel like they helped you in this journey or?

Or is there something you actually take advantage of? Or do you feel like they were only more useful for your job hunting story, but not always for the actual job? How do you feel those play a role right now? I think knowledge is power. And anything you learn in any field always comes back full circle to teach you more. All of those things helped. I don't think I would have survived even a month if I didn't do all of those things. I think that they were like stepping stones in the right direction.

Like designing like the New York Times design system from scratch taught me how to work with different components and tokens and really learn the nitty gritty of Figma. And that helps me because at Meta, you're working with not only all of these different device sizes and like mobile and web, but you're working with multiple products and each product has a different design system. And so now instead of working on one design system, you're working with like all of these and then everything's shipping to you.

The scale is just a lot larger. Things are changing a lot faster. So that basic knowledge helped me.

And in terms of the writing, yes, I think when you're trying to get designs approved and you're creating decks, it really helps to figure out how are you going to communicate a complex problem in the simplest of ways. So someone who doesn't have a lot of information towards what you're proposing can easily understand. Okay, yeah. So documentation and getting your pitch in is what you feel like is helping.

Makes sense. All right. We will try to arrive to more of a close up for the conversation. But I think what would be also really curious for our listeners to hear from you is to maybe reflect a little bit on your journey so far. What do you feel like you've learned in this experience? Is it like two years you're working at the Meta right now? Yes.

Okay, so what do you feel like your key lessons so far that you're sure you will take further? Like you said, in the previous job, you learned how to build design systems, which helped you to understand the basics. But what are the things that you're pretty sure will make your portfolio more rich moving forward? So if you could reflect a little bit on your lessons. There are so many.

I think in terms of design, just the level of craft is something I always try to improve on. That helps not only in your portfolio, but just as a designer. And in terms of dealing with more on like the soft skills or how the world kind of evolves, I think...

the world of tech is constantly growing and it's constantly changing. And I've not been a person who naturally can go with the flow. I'm definitely more of like a planner, but working in a bigger company forces you to be both like having certain things where like, you know, you're on top of everything and you have a plan, but then being open to the flexibility and like flow of things, because today is something is a certain way, but tomorrow everything could be changed and you could be in a totally different team.

and really learning how to adapt. Another skill I learned was zooming out and seeing like how my designs in one specific thing could then help the broader mission and impact like multiple other teams because everything is kind of connected and sometimes we don't think about oh I would love to do this but then this is how it's going to impact a different team and so thinking about that

that. Yeah, and I think lastly, really just taking advantage of the people that I'm surrounded by, like even junior designers and like other people who started off as like university grads. I

That's a really cool opportunity. You know better, but I'm guessing that the biggest value of working in a big tech with a lot of people is actually learning from those people. You're surrounded by a lot of great people. And I'm guessing that's what is the biggest value you're getting working in a big tech. But if there is anything else you feel like needs to be said about working in a big tech, maybe you can also mention this. Maybe having a higher stress tolerance always helps. Yeah.

It's not an easy job. Yeah, okay. Yeah, I think just, I feel like I've said most of the things, but I'm also happy to like answer any questions that might come up with your audience.

The only advice would be that it's to have fun at the end of the day, as cheesy as it sounds, because enjoying your job and really enjoying even like 20% of maybe the projects you're working on, I think that's so important because that's when your best work comes out as a creative.

For sure. All right. So I guess we can wrap it here. Thank you so much for sharing all your insights, the journey you went through, the things that you believe helped you in this journey and kind of breaking it down for people to learn how it feels a little bit in the big tech, but also what it takes to get your feet at the door at the big tech. I feel like

We can learn a lot and get inspired from being proactive, understanding the blue ocean opportunities where there is not so much competition, how to stand out on the market, but also using the partner in this journey when you practice and take the stress off. When you're being human, using the humor in your journey.

as well as honestly coping with the stress and trying to stay focused and obviously adapting, being agile in this job. Because you said also sometimes you're planning to do the plan, but then something happens and things are unpredictable. So it's a lot of different skills and it's sometimes very hard to make them tangible and sort of put it into words. But I feel like you have been able to share your story and I think a lot of people had to take away from it.

at least the most important pieces. So it's definitely a helpful conversation. Of course, yeah. I'm glad to help. I'm happy that. I hope your audience benefits from it.

Thank you. Yeah, thank you so much again for sharing it and for joining us today. And of course, if somebody has a question for you, if somebody is interested in following your footsteps, we will leave your LinkedIn so people can reach out to you and have a further conversation. Maybe also talk to you on the ADP list. Thank you, everyone. And thank you for listening. See you in the next episodes. Bye-bye.