Using a work journal to create design case studies - Tanner Christensen’s notes by Tanner Christensen
Keeping a work journal is one of the best things you can do for personal development. A diary of work is also an excellent way for designers to build a case study for their portfolio.
In design, case studies are powerful storytelling devices that help others understand how you work and what you can do as a design partner or contributor. If you’re interviewing for a job, there’s no better way to discuss your skills than through a case study format: a real-world example of an experience and what you did throughout.
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The project journal is a valuable part of any work journal because it captures project-specific reflections and notes. Within each work journal, I have multiple project journals: dedicated pages for every defined project at the company. Some projects are short journals—no more than two weeks of entries—while others span months or years. I format each project journal with the following information:
Metadata:
- Project name
- Project start date
- Last updated date
- Completed: yes/no
- Project version (is this a 1.0 project or something like 1.1 or even 2.0?)
- Project status (Draft, In progress, Scrapped, Completed)
- Contributors
- Informed
Outline:
- Project summary, in my own words
- Project goals and key results, again, in my own words
- Daily notes
- Learnings and outcomes
Ever since I read this from Tanner, I’ve adopted it to my work projects in different forms. At Mozilla, I kept a paper notebook for daily journaling and planning as well as a digital collection of notes for different projects I worked on.