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Don't be Shy, Your Dribbble Profile Matters

For me it works like a delightful book cover

Basketball ring viewed from the bottom

Back then, I was invited to be a member of the recruitment team, looking for potential candidates to fill the UI Designer role.

Once I got the sorted CV list from the HR team, the very first thing I did was look for the candidate's online portfolio profile. It could be their Dribbble, Behance, Medium, Instagram, etc.

Mostly, UI designers share their works on Dribbble. And I start checking candidates’ profiles by visiting their Dribbble.

Why did I do that?

It’s like looking for a book with great content but also a delightful cover. I treat any candidate’s Dribbble profile like a book cover: an opening door to hook for the content.

I have my criteria of what kind of Dribbble shots counted as worth proceeding.

  1. Rationality
    The design presented is based on real-world design work. So, when I found the profile mostly shared something like “Master Yoda abilities home screen”, I will skip it and moved to the next candidate.

  2. Proper Visual Style
    Proper here means the designer understands and applied basic good visual style like proper color choice, good typography combination, precise white-spacing, and component consistency (icon style, button style, illustration style).

  3. Cover Many Possibilities

    If the Dribbble shot showed a fitness app home screen, it would be great if it also showed the proper detail like the number of steps, distance traveled, heart rate, and any other screens related. Why it’s important? It shows that the designer understands the problem they need to solve and gives the solution in the design.

Need some examples? Here I attached the Dribbble shots from one of my favorite designers.


Credit: dribbble.com/james


If those 3 criteria pass, I will continue the exploration by checking their other online portfolio profile. It could be their website, Medium article, or anything they explained their works in more detail.

By doing that way, so far I can get many candidates with good capabilities, proven by their work when working together with me.