What to look for when hiring a UX designer

The confusion usually starts here. UI designservice×User Interface DesignCreate clearer interfaces, stronger visual hierarchy, and more consistent product UI without adding unnecessary complexity.Open service→ and UX design are related, they often overlap, and in smaller teams one person might do both. But they are not the same thing, and treating them as interchangeable is where hiring decisions start to go wrong.

UI designservice×User Interface DesignCreate clearer interfaces, stronger visual hierarchy, and more consistent product UI without adding unnecessary complexity.Open service→ is concerned with the visual layer: how something looks, how it feels to interact with, the consistencyglossary×ConsistencyConsistency is the use of uniform patterns, behaviours, and visual elements across a product to create familiarity and predictability. It helps users learn once and apply that knowledge throughout the experience.Open glossary term→ of components, the quality of the visual language. It is a skilled discipline and it matters. But it operates on the surface of an experience.

UX design is concerned with how that experience is structured underneath. Why a journey exists in the form it does. Whether the right decisions are being surfaced at the right time. Whether the product is solving the correct problem for the user in the first place.

It involves researchservice×User ResearchUnderstand user behaviour, validate ideas, and make clearer product decisions with evidence you can act on.Open service→, analysis, systemsglossary×SystemA system is a collection of interconnected components that work together to achieve a specific function or outcome.Open glossary term→ thinking, and an ability to challenge how things are currently set up, not just improve how they look.

A UI designer who is excellent at their craft can still produce something that does not work, because the problem they are solving is a visual one. A UX designerglossary×UX DesignerA UX designer focuses on creating effective, usable, and meaningful user experiences.Open glossary term→'s job is to make sure the visual layer is solving the right problem before it is designed at all.

This is the part that catches most hiring managers out. Visual design skill is visible and easy to evaluate. You can look at a portfolio and immediately form an opinion. UX thinking is much harder to see, because the most important work happens before anything is created.

A good UX designerglossary×UX DesignerA UX designer focuses on creating effective, usable, and meaningful user experiences.Open glossary term→ will have spent significant time understanding why a journey is structured the way it is, what the user is actually trying to achieve, where the experience creates unnecessary effort, and what would need to change to fix it.

None of that shows up in a polished screen. It shows up in how someone talks about their processglossary×ProcessA process is a defined sequence of steps used to achieve a specific outcome.Open glossary term→, what they challenged, what they pushed back on, and what they changed as a result of researchservice×User ResearchUnderstand user behaviour, validate ideas, and make clearer product decisions with evidence you can act on.Open service→ rather than instinct.

If a portfolio is full of beautiful interfacesglossary×InterfaceAn interface is the point of interaction between a user and a system, where inputs are made and outputs are received. It can be visual, physical, or conversational.Open glossary term→ but the candidate struggles to articulate the decisions behind them, that is a signal. If they can describe how something looked but not why it was structured that way, that is a signal too.

To hire for UX properly, it helps to be clear about what the role actually requires.

A UX designerglossary×UX DesignerA UX designer focuses on creating effective, usable, and meaningful user experiences.Open glossary term→ should be able to map and critique existing user journeysglossary×User JourneyThe full path a user takes to complete a task, including every step, decision, and interaction along the way.Open glossary term→, not just redesign them visually. Identify where frictionglossary×FrictionFriction refers to anything that slows users down or makes it harder for them to complete a task. It can be caused by poor design, unnecessary steps, unclear messaging, or technical issues.Open glossary term→ is coming from and whether it is a design problem, a process problem, or a product problem. Conduct or synthesise user research and translate it into decisions, not just deliverables. Challenge briefs and ask whether the right problem is being solved. Work across stakeholders to align understanding before a single screen is designed.

What UX design is not: making interfacesglossary×InterfaceAn interface is the point of interaction between a user and a system, where inputs are made and outputs are received. It can be visual, physical, or conversational.Open glossary term→ look good, adding animations, creating a design systemglossary×Design SystemA design system is a collection of reusable components, guidelines, and standards for building consistent products.Open glossary term→, or producing high-fidelity mockups. Those things may be part of the work, but they are not what makes someone a UX designerglossary×UX DesignerA UX designer focuses on creating effective, usable, and meaningful user experiences.Open glossary term→.

Someone who is primarily focused on those outputs is likely a UI or product designerglossary×Product DesignerA product designer combines UX, UI, and product thinking to design end-to-end product experiences.Open glossary term→, and there is nothing wrong with that. It is just a different role.

The most useful interview questions are the ones that move away from what someone made and towards why they made it, what they questioned, and what they would have done differently.

Ask them to walk you through a project where the original brief turned out to be wrong. How did they identify that? What did they do about it? A strong UX designerglossary×UX DesignerA UX designer focuses on creating effective, usable, and meaningful user experiences.Open glossary term→ will have a clear answer here. Someone primarily focused on deliveryglossary×DeliveryDelivery is the process of building, testing, and releasing a product or feature.Open glossary term→ will likely struggle, because challenging the brief was not part of how they approached the work.

Ask them what they do before they open a design tool. The answer tells you a lot. A UX-led answer will involve understanding the problem, mapping the existing journey, talking to users, identifying where things break down. An answer that jumps quickly to wireframes or sketching suggests someone who defaults to output rather than understanding.

Ask them about a time when their researchservice×User ResearchUnderstand user behaviour, validate ideas, and make clearer product decisions with evidence you can act on.Open service→ changed the direction of a project. What did they find? How did they present it? What changed as a result? If they cannot point to a specific example, it suggests research is something they document rather than something they use.

Ask them to critique your current product or a journey they have encountered recently. Not how it looks, but how it works. Where does it create unnecessary effort? What decisions are being pushed onto the user that should not be? A strong UX designerglossary×UX DesignerA UX designer focuses on creating effective, usable, and meaningful user experiences.Open glossary term→ will have an instinctive answer to this. Someone who defaults to visual feedbackglossary×Visual FeedbackVisual feedback is the visual response a system provides to user actions, such as highlighting, animations, or changes in state.Open glossary term→ is showing you where their thinking sits.

A portfolio that leadsglossary×LeadA lead is a potential customer who has shown interest in a product or service, typically by providing contact information or engaging with content.Open glossary term→ with visual quality alone should raise questions.

The strongest UX portfolios show processglossary×ProcessA process is a defined sequence of steps used to achieve a specific outcome.Open glossary term→ as much as output: the researchservice×User ResearchUnderstand user behaviour, validate ideas, and make clearer product decisions with evidence you can act on.Open service→ that shaped a decision, the earlier versionglossary×VersionA version is a specific iteration of software or a product at a point in time.Open glossary term→ that did not work and why, the constraint that changed the direction of the work.

If a case study is mostly screenshots with captions about visual choices, you are looking at a UI portfolio. If it is mostly about how a problem was understood, defined, and resolved, you are looking at something closer to UX.

Pay attention to how they talk about users. Are users something they interviewed and referenced in decisions, or something they mentioned in passing to add credibilityglossary×CredibilityCredibility is the perceived trustworthiness and authority of a product, brand, or system.Open glossary term→ to a visual direction? The difference is usually clear within a few sentences.

Hiring the wrong type of designer does not just slow things down. It changes what gets built.

A team without genuine UX capabilityglossary×CapabilityCapability refers to an organisation’s ability to perform a specific function or deliver a particular outcome.Open glossary term→ will default to making existing journeys look better rather than questioning whether those journeys should exist in that form at all. Products improve visually but the structural problems remain, and those structural problems are usually what is driving the conversionglossary×ConversionA conversion is any action a user takes that aligns with a defined goal, such as making a purchase, signing up, or completing a task.Open glossary term→ issues, the drop-off ratesglossary×Drop-off RateDrop-off rate is the percentage of users who leave a process at a specific stage without progressing further.Open glossary term→, and the user complaints.

The most expensive versionglossary×VersionA version is a specific iteration of software or a product at a point in time.Open glossary term→ of this is discovering it after six months. A UX designerglossary×UX DesignerA UX designer focuses on creating effective, usable, and meaningful user experiences.Open glossary term→ who is actually a UI designer will produce good-looking work, and that can delay the realisation that the underlying problems have not been addressed.

By the time it becomes clear that the experience is not improving meaningfully, a significant amount of time and budget has already been spent.

Getting the hire right at the start is considerably cheaper than getting it wrong and realising later.