Portfolio Guide
The playbook for turning your projects into an interview-generating portfolio.
Why career changers need a portfolio
A PM with 5 years of experience is judged on their track record. You don't have one — so you substitute evidence. A portfolio converts 'trust me, I can do this' into 'look, I already did this'. It's the single highest-leverage asset for a career-change candidate, and fewer than 10% of them have one.
The structure that works
Use Notion or a simple site. Five parts: (1) a two-sentence intro — who you are and the PM flavor you're targeting; (2) 2–3 case studies (see format below); (3) your product teardowns; (4) a 'how I think' note — your product principles in ~200 words; (5) contact links. That's it. Design polish matters far less than clarity.
The case study format
Each case study answers, in order: What was the problem, and how did I know it was real? (evidence, not opinion) — Who was it for? — What did I consider and reject, and why? — What did I build/propose? — What happened, in numbers? — What would I do differently? That last question is where senior reviewers decide you can actually think.
Where the content comes from
You don't need permission from an employer to have material. The Projects page here generates it: a teardown, a research sprint, and a PRD are three complete case studies. If you can reframe work from your current job (with numbers anonymized), even better — real stakes beat side projects.
Mistakes that kill portfolios
Ten shallow items instead of three deep ones. Feature ideas with no evidence of the problem. No numbers anywhere. Describing what the team did instead of what YOU did. And the most common: never publishing it because it isn't 'ready'. A live, imperfect portfolio beats a perfect draft nobody can see.