Career Strategy Podcast with Sarah Doody | UX, Product Design, UX Research

123: How a 25-Year UX veteran rewrote his career story & reclaimed his confidence


Listen Later

Applied to 50+ UX or Product jobs & still no interviews or offers? Get UX job search help.

Welcome to the Career Strategy Podcast with Sarah Doody, a UX Designer & UX Researcher with 20 years of experience who founded the UX job search accelerator, Career Strategy Lab. She's been doing UX career coaching since 2017.

Follow Sarah on: LinkedIn | YouTube | Instagram

In this special open house episode, Sarah Doody chats with Joshua, a UX design leader with over 20 years of experience, about the reality of navigating a job search after a long career in enterprise environments. Josh opens up about the challenges of staying relevant in a shifting industry, rebuilding his confidence after burnout, and reframing what it means to craft a compelling portfolio—even without flashy Figma work.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

✔️ How Josh is positioning himself for a new chapter after 20+ years in UX

✔️ Why your portfolio doesn’t need to be visual to be powerful

✔️ The mindset shift that helped Josh regain clarity and momentum

✔️ How asking former colleagues for feedback transformed his self-perception

✔️ What it looks like to find leadership roles that align with your values

✔️ Tips on managing your time, energy, and expectations in the job search

Timestamps:

00:20 Welcome to the Career Strategy Podcast

00:58 Episode Overview and Listener Engagement

01:43 Meet Josh Vaughn: UX Design Leader

02:33 Josh's Career Journey and Challenges

04:53 The Importance of Storytelling in Portfolios

06:45 Building Confidence and Career Strategy

11:55 Reflecting on Career Strategy Lab

13:23 Final Thoughts and Advice

14:51 Conclusion and Farewell

16:05 Podcast Outro

Support the show! Leave a rating on Spotify or a review on Apple Podcasts to help more UX professionals find this podcast.

🔔 Follow & Subscribe for weekly strategies and stories to help you grow in your UX career—without the burnout.

🎬 Watch our free UX Job Search Workshop and learn how to stand out in 2025

👉 Join Career Strategy Lab, a UX job search accelerator for UX and Product people.

👋 Say hi and follow our host, Sarah Doody, on LinkedIn, Instagram, and YouTube.

...more
View all episodesView all episodes
Download on the App Store

Career Strategy Podcast with Sarah Doody | UX, Product Design, UX ResearchBy Sarah Doody from Career Strategy Lab

  • 5
  • 5
  • 5
  • 5
  • 5

5

36 ratings


More shows like Career Strategy Podcast with Sarah Doody | UX, Product Design, UX Research

View all
Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me! by NPR

Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me!

38,555 Listeners

Freakonomics Radio by Freakonomics Radio + Stitcher

Freakonomics Radio

32,118 Listeners

Decoder with Nilay Patel by The Verge

Decoder with Nilay Patel

3,149 Listeners

Hidden Brain by Hidden Brain, Shankar Vedantam

Hidden Brain

43,471 Listeners

10% Happier with Dan Harris by 10% Happier

10% Happier with Dan Harris

12,619 Listeners

The Daily by The New York Times

The Daily

110,870 Listeners

Up First from NPR by NPR

Up First from NPR

55,897 Listeners

Fiction - Comedy Fiction by The Sunset Explorers

Fiction - Comedy Fiction

6,447 Listeners

Future of UX | Your Design, Tech and User Experience Podcast | AI Design by Patricia Reiners

Future of UX | Your Design, Tech and User Experience Podcast | AI Design

19 Listeners

The Prof G Pod with Scott Galloway by Vox Media Podcast Network

The Prof G Pod with Scott Galloway

5,410 Listeners

NN/g UX Podcast by Nielsen Norman Group

NN/g UX Podcast

106 Listeners

Hard Fork by The New York Times

Hard Fork

5,479 Listeners

Huberman Lab by Scicomm Media

Huberman Lab

28,551 Listeners

Honest UX Talks by Wix Studio by Anfisa Bogomolova & Ioana Teleanu

Honest UX Talks by Wix Studio

41 Listeners

The Headlines by The New York Times

The Headlines

507 Listeners