The industry moved. I'm still figuring out where I fit.

Too many rooms, not enough doors

Here's the honest version. Seventeen years across five different titles means I've sat in a lot of rooms. Dev rooms. UX rooms. Marketing rooms. Creative rooms. Leadership rooms. In every one of those rooms, I was solving the same problem: how do we connect with the people we're trying to reach?

The tools changed. The language changed. But the work was always about understanding the audience and building something that lands with them. The problem is, the industry doesn't reward that thread. It rewards the label.

Every job listing I see wants me to pick one. Brand designer or UX designer. Strategist or maker. In-house or agency. What if the honest answer is "I've been doing all of it for seventeen years, and the range is the point"?

The industry loves specialists. I respect that. But I've never been one, and pretending to be one has never produced my best work. My best work happened when I could pull from all of it. When the UX brain informed the brand decision. When the marketing instinct shaped the creative direction. When the development background kept the design grounded in what's actually buildable. That's not scattered. That's connected.

The identity question

This isn't really about job titles. It's about identity. When someone asks what you do, you're supposed to have a clean answer. "I'm a UX designer." "I'm a creative director." "I'm a brand designer." Mine has never been clean. It's always been a paragraph. Web developer turned UX designer turned digital marketer turned director of communications turned creative director. Try fitting that on a business card.

I used to think the lack of a clean answer was a weakness. Like the varied background made me harder to place, harder to hire, harder to trust with a specific thing. But the older I get, the more I realize the varied background is the thing. The reason I can solve problems others can't is because I've seen them from five different seats. I know what the developer is worried about because I've been the developer. I know what the marketing team needs because I've run the marketing team. I know what the creative director wants to protect because I've been the one protecting it. That cross-fluency isn't common. And I'm done underselling it because it doesn't fit in one LinkedIn headline.

Where I'm at right now

I'm in a figuring-it-out year (times 3…lol). Rebuilding my portfolio to reflect the full range of what I actually do, not just the role that's easiest to categorize. Writing articles like this one because I think out loud better than I think in private.

Saying yes to the projects that light me up and being more honest about the ones that don't. I'm not looking for the perfect role. I'm looking for the right room.

A team that sees someone with seventeen years across development, UX, marketing, and creative direction and thinks "that's exactly what we need" instead of "pick a lane." A team that needs someone who can solve the problem and make it resonate. That's always been the job. Every title, every room, every client. The core never changed.

If you're a mid-career designer or developer reading this and your career doesn't fit in one box, if you're tired of shrinking yourself to match a job description that only wants a piece of you, I want you to know: you're not unfocused. You're fluent in more than one language. And the right team will see that as the asset it is. This is where I am. Seventeen years in. Five titles deep. Still figuring out where I fit. And for the first time in a while, I'm okay with that being the answer.