Welcome to this series on portfolios, glad to have you here!

This first post will be background on what this series is about and what brought me to this point. This is the first step in my plan to update or possibly completely remake my portfolio for instructional design work. Straight up, I am not sure I will do anything with this, but it is something I have been thinking about for a long time. I guess I never STOPPED thinking about it, tbh. Portfolio continuous improvement, I guess. The difference this time is a more sincere effort and more significant update.

The rest of the series looks something like this, but is subject to change:

1. Background [YOU ARE HERE ]
2. Brainstorming
3. Organization of Content
4. Update Plan
5. Summary and Update final

Background

Actions for this Step

• Consider the background surrounding what was done with previous portfolios
• Documenting lessons learned to guide future work

Previous Portfolios and Tools Used

I have had several portfolios and used several different platforms for them. eFolio, Google Sites (now something else), Behance (kinda), and another one from Adobe that is no longer active. I tried a few others out but either they were only a free trial or did not have the functionality I was looking for…It is interesting to think about how when I first started looking at how to display a portolfio, how few options some had and how some (like that Adobe one) are no longer around. On the other side, those that are still around have more advanced and/or more user-friendly features. Reflecting on this, it is no wonder I was frustrated at times that I could not find what I was looking for…What I was finding was (in general) that if you were just creating a static portfolio based on your resume/CV information, you could use just about anything that was available. OR, if you were a photographer/videographer or other artist there were several options for you. Those looking for something to house eLearning or any type of interactive content, however, had few options. Most involved a significant cost and/or more time creating and maintaining a server to host it all, and that was more work than made sense to for a portfolio project.

Or, I just completely missed an opportunity but tbh I am confident I was very thorough and took adequate time to consider options.

Portfolio Progression

As my role/job changed and I ventured deeper into my career area, I dedicated time to update my portfolio when I was updating my resume. My resume received regular updates, but over time my portfolio did not see as much progress since,imo, the overall design and function was not where I wanted it to be. Over the last few years, I have seen more options to accomplish the vision I have had for my portfolio. So, onwards and upwards with more progress!

Next Steps

Since preparing for a brainstorming session somewhat defeats the purpose, I will limit work to outlining what main area or areas I want to brainstorm about.