Case Study in Navigating the UX Design Job Market

It is my pleasure to share this candid conversation with Lise following her successful job search. Her journey takes her from a contracting role to a full-time position, and from Florida to Atlanta, where she is joining The Home Depot as a User Experience Principal.

Home Depot is the world's largest home improvement retailer and #25 on the Fortune 500. In her new role supporting Merchandising, Lise will bring her expertise in human-centered design and AI to help Merchants make smarter decisions and drive meaningful business impact at scale.

Lise faced an unexpected career transition after being downsized following nearly a decade with the same company. Despite 20+ years of experience, she found herself navigating a dramatically different job market, shaped by economic shifts, fierce competition, and AI-driven hiring processes. The rules had changed, and she had to rethink how to stand out.

When we first started working together, Lise was treating her job search like an exercise in volume, customizing every resume and trying to fit decades of enterprise SaaS, mobile, and AI experience into one overloaded portfolio.

The turning point was shifting from showing everything to demonstrating business impact. By leveraging her contract at NextEra Energy, sharpening her professional positioning, and tailoring her story for both IC and leadership roles, in her own words, didn't just land a job; she commanded the room.

Here is how she did it.

Sally: What drove your decision to shift from consulting and contract roles back into a full-time, in-house leadership position?

Lise: I took the contract role to maintain a steady income and relieve some financial pressure while continuing my search for a full-time position. Although it paid about half of my previous salary and offered no benefits, I was determined to get as much value from the experience as possible.

The work gave me structure, kept me engaged, and helped me manage the stress of the transition. After two decades in enterprise SaaS and Human Capital Management (HCM) software, I also found it refreshing to learn a new industry. I was especially interested in seeing how NextEra introduced AI tools to employees and how its design team used them differently from the team at UKG. It gave me a perspective I hadn't had before.

That contract became an essential stepping stone. Several hiring managers commented on my ability to switch industries, ramp up quickly, and demonstrate business impact in just six months. I intentionally took ownership of end-to-end design work, documented my accomplishments, and built fresh case studies for interviews. Working in renewable energy gave me compelling new projects to showcase, and the smaller, fast-paced UX team allowed me to contribute across the entire design process.

My mindset was that an opportunity doesn't have to offer the highest salary to be valuable. I set goals for what I wanted to learn and accomplish. For example, two of my four work streams involved complex Salesforce CRM workflows, a platform I hadn't designed for before. I learned the Salesforce Lightning Design System and earned my Salesforce Certified Platform UX Designer credential. That was a tangible return on the investment I made in the role.

Sally: What were some of the unexpected mental or operational hurdles you faced early in your search, and how did you navigate them?

Lise: Today's job market is incredibly competitive. Just getting a screening interview can be difficult when a posting attracts hundreds or even thousands of applications. Automated screening and rejection emails can make the process feel impersonal, and candidates rarely know why they weren't selected.

I had to develop a thick skin and treat the search as a numbers game. There are so many factors outside a candidate's control: stale listings, high application volumes, internal hiring decisions, or roles that may not be filled immediately. I learned not to interpret every rejection as a reflection of my abilities.

I went through a few very dark weeks of silence early on. It took several iterations of my resume before I began getting responses. What helped was establishing a daily routine, maintaining momentum, and learning from every interaction. I also leaned heavily on my faith for comfort and motivation. I believed each interview, even one that didn't lead to an offer, had a purpose: it was practice that would prepare me for the right opportunity.

Sally: How did establishing a structured routine help you stay grounded and focused throughout the hunt?

Lise: Having a structured daily routine helped me stay focused and manage stress. While working my contract role, I set aside time to keep my search moving, refine my resume and portfolio, and prepare for interviews. I treated each interaction as a chance to learn and improve rather than a setback. I also took a systematic approach to making the most of my NextEra experience: I set goals, documented accomplishments, gained hands-on experience across the design process, and earned my Salesforce Platform UX Designer certification. That combination of routine, continuous learning, and faith helped me stay motivated and positive until the right opportunity came along.

Sally: How did you integrate AI tools into your search and where did you intentionally step back and do it manually?

Lise: I used ChatGPT extensively as a career advisor, interview practice partner, and writing assistant to help articulate my value in my resume and case studies.

One of my favorite techniques was practicing interviews with ChatGPT Voice Mode. During my commute or while running errands, I used the hands-free connection in my car to answer questions aloud. ChatGPT played the interviewer, and I practiced structuring my responses using the STAR framework. That helped me become much more comfortable with my delivery.

I also used Lovable, one of my favorite AI tools, to build my portfolio website and showcase my case studies. ChatGPT helped me organize raw notes, structure the stories, and create prompts for Lovable. The ideas, experiences, and final judgment were still mine.

For interviews, I built web-based presentations accessible through a live link on my portfolio site. I tailored each presentation to the company's visual brand using publicly available style guides. Hiring managers noticed and appreciated that extra level of craftsmanship and preparation.

Sally: How did you refine your resume and portfolio so your value proposition was instantly clear?

Lise: Working together on your framework, exercises, and encouragement, I was able to reflect on my career, recognize the value I had delivered, identify my most significant accomplishments, and translate them into clear, compelling impact statements.

Before that, I was customizing my resume for every single job posting. It was exhausting and wasn't producing results. Once I learned how to clearly articulate the value I had brought to each organization, I had a much stronger foundation that I could carry consistently across my resume, portfolio, and interview presentations.

Sally: What were the three biggest hurdles you faced just getting noticed or landing that initial interview?

Lise:

Sally:  How did you overcome these three obstacles?

Lise:

Sally: How did you frame your interview narrative so hiring teams saw your diverse experience as an asset?

Lise: Taking the NextEra contract was one of the best decisions I made during my search. It became a critical stepping stone to my next full-time role. Hiring managers noticed that I could move into a new industry, ramp up quickly, and demonstrate impact in a short period.

NextEra's UX team operated in a fast-paced, agency-like model, serving internal business units as clients. That experience gave me strong examples of leading through ambiguity, managing competing needs, and demonstrating the value of UX to stakeholders who had limited experience working with designers.

I also learned Salesforce CRM, designed complex business workflows, and earned a certification in the platform. That demonstrated my willingness to learn new technologies. Having worked at both UKG and NextEra, I could also compare how two organizations introduced and used AI tools, including what worked well and what challenges I observed.

Most importantly, the contract gave me fresh, specific stories for behavioral interviews and showed my adaptability, leadership, and growth mindset.

Sally: In past interview cycles where you came in second, what was missing?

Lise: I learned something from every interview. One experience at [one company] was especially memorable. After a great panel interview, I was invited onsite and assumed I would be touring the facility and discussing an offer. I even brought identification documents, just in case. Instead, I found myself in a small room answering unexpected behavioral questions from the hiring manager. I left feeling deflated when I learned the process was still ongoing.

Sally: What changed in your approach, posture, or framing at Home Depot that finally pushed you over the line to land the offer?

I later had another positive interview, but after a week without a response from the recruiter, I learned they had chosen someone else. It was disappointing, but I leaned on my faith and tried to see the experience as preparation for the next opportunity.

What surprised me was the sense of relief I felt afterward. I realized I had been attracted mainly to the convenient commute and hybrid schedule, not the work or the company itself. That helped clarify what I really wanted. By the time Home Depot came along, I was better prepared for the interview process and much more intentional about choosing a role that genuinely excited me.

Sally: What was a pivotal moment where things really "clicked" for you during the interview phase?

Lise: Real interviews were the most valuable practice. With each conversation, I became more confident and comfortable telling my story. Eventually, I knew my key examples so well that I didn't need to rehearse nearly as much.

I focused first on mastering my 60-second 'Tell me about yourself' introduction. I probably delivered it 50 times. It's often the opening question, and I realized how much that first impression shapes the rest of the conversation.

Another turning point was developing my own approach to interview presentations using Lovable. I created web-based presentations and customized the visual design for each company's brand. It took time to refine, but it became an effective way to demonstrate both my work and my attention to detail. I believe it contributed to the strong results I saw toward the end of my search, which led to three offers.

Sally: What was it about this opportunity that made it worth making the move from Florida to Atlanta?

Lise: The interview process was lengthy, but the way Home Depot handled it gave me a positive impression of the culture. From the first recruiter conversation through the final discussion with the VP, the people were welcoming and the conversations felt genuine. I connected with the hiring manager right away, enjoyed presenting my portfolio to the panel, and appreciated how relaxed and engaging the final leadership conversation was. The behavioral interview was more challenging, but it was just one part of an otherwise excellent experience.

Helping leaders like Lise step into their innate creativity, resourcefulness, and authority is at the heart of what I do. It starts with articulating the unvarnished truth of your value proposition.

Ground yourself in your strengths. Speak to them with total clarity: “This is who I am, this is what I excel at, here is the evidence, and this is the value I build.”

That signal cuts right through the recruiting noise. You stop pursuing roles that don't fit and begin attracting the strategic work you were built to do.

Watching leaders transition from fear and scarcity to quiet, unshakeable conviction, and being a mirror to that shift, is the best part of coaching.