Here's how you can diversify your product design portfolio with new skills.

Dream Team! UX = how it feels, UI = how it looks! Show both in your portfolio! Solve user problems with beautiful interfaces. Clients love function & fashion!

Instead of UX/UI, I think it should be UX & UI. Because the market is slowly moving towards a more generalised state where companies are looking for designers with both UX and UI skills.

Be a 3D Design Master! VR & AR are exploding! 3D skills make your portfolio pop! Show off spatial design & cutting-edge tech. Land the job & design the future!

3D Design skills are a must of couse! However, when it comes to product development and engineering, the designer must be aware that the final manufactured product will never ever come out perfectly as it was theoretically designed. The designer must learn the skills of proper product tolerancing based on the manufacturing methods selected to produce the part. The designer must be able to communicate the design intent and tolerances through engineering drawings.

After the introduction of Apple's vision pro, the spatial design sector has boomed. Having an basic idea of designing in a spatial space (AR & VR) can take your career a long way!!

Learn to Code (a bit)! Basic code = prototyping magic! HTML, CSS & JS open doors. Speak developer & create killer prototypes! Clients love seeing design come alive!

Storytelling in product design is key to showcasing your strategic thinking and empathy. Start by framing the problem with supporting data, using statistics or user feedback to highlight its significance. When presenting your solutions, integrate data that shows the effectiveness of your approach, such as usability test results or user engagement metrics. To emphasize the impact, showcase measurable outcomes with before-and-after comparisons and key performance indicators (KPIs). Maintain a human element by explaining how your design positively impacted real users' lives, combining quantitative and qualitative insights for a compelling narrative.

Designing is lot more than just shapes, colors, spacing, effects, typography, and shadows. It is how you use these tools in your arsenal and come up with a great experience and storytelling!

Expanding your business acumen will enhance your ability to communicate with stakeholders and clients. If you can “speak the language” of business as a designer, you will better understand your clients’ perspectives and can articulate how your design decisions align with business priorities. Moreover, when you effectively demonstrate the link between user experience and business outcomes, gaining stakeholder buy-in becomes easier. By illustrating how your designs impact key metrics like customer satisfaction and revenue growth, you validate your work and position yourself as a valuable partner in achieving business goals. Developing this skill set elevates your role, making you a more influential designer and strategic partner.

Business is the most important skill/language a product designer can and should learn. It's no longer a good-to-have if you want to advance in your career. I have struggled with it during my first couple of years (and am still learning, bit by bit), but as long as you are curious, you'll get the hang of it. Additionally, any skill you add to your portfolio should be driven by interest and curiosity. No one wants to see a list of items that hold no interest and, hence, no value to you.

Take Courses or Workshops: Enroll in online courses, workshops, or attend conferences to gain hands-on experience and learn from experts.