Why should you hire me?

For the information of readers who landed on this post from a direct link, I am a User Experience Research working in the United States.

I first stumbled upon the field of User Experience or UX when I chose Human-Computer Interaction as an elective course during the final semester of my Bachelors program in India. I enrolled in the course thinking it would help me with my project where I was building a software that suggested songs & music videos posted on YouTube based on the user's mood; and I ended up finding what I wanted to do professionally - become a UX engineer (I did not have a concept of UX designs vs research back then). In the India of 2015, where the start-up market was still taking off, UX was not a widely known concept; but somehow I ended up finding a job as a UX researcher at a start-up within 9 months of my graduation. That was some achievement and in my head I had arrived. I worked at the startup for 1.5 years, donned a number of hats, juggled multiple initiatives, and planned and conducted a ton of generative and evaluative research. Sometimes when I look back, it seems nearly impossible to have done all that in such a short span of time and with very meagre resources. It was one of the steepest learning curves of my life and I am thankful for it every single day. And yet it's just 1.5 years of experience which barely counts for anything in the USA. It was at this job that I realized I needed to learn more - learn on Coursera, through books and finally by enrolling myself in a UX-focussed Masters program at the University of Texas at Austin. And yet on a piece of paper, it accounts for the lowest rung in the ladder of experience. This brings us to the larger question of WHY?

Why is it that my experience of growing up, living, learning, observing and working in an entirely different culture and continent which is arguably one of the largest consumers of tech in the world accounts for barely anything in the US job market?

Why is it so that starting in a team of 7 people, working 12 hours, 6 days a week for 1.5 years, growing up to a team of about 100 employees, servicing the entire National Capital Region of India, innovating, improving, learning and unlearning continuously and being the sole UX researcher for an application downloaded by over 10K users on PlayStore compares equally to a well-cushioned 40 hour/week job with set templates, studies and resources in the job market?

Why is the work of a Masters student as a researcher for academic projects & publications at an esteemed University is not considered "real work experience"?

Why is the freelance work of an international student from a developing country for various departments at a reputed University and corporate organization in the city is not seen as professional work experience?

(To give you some context 1 USD = 74.57 INR [Date: Feb 24, 2022]. The fee an international student pays is much much much higher and there are strict restrictions on the hours and place an international student can work for while enrolled at the University)

Why is it that my background in engineering and ability to fluently speak Python, Javascript, HTML, CSS and multiple other languages does not add to my years of experience?

Why does 16 years of practicing meditation and active listening puts me in the same bucket as less than 3 years of work experience for a job that essentially thrives on skills like empathy, observation and listening?

And finally, why things like - who I worked for, where I worked, how many years I put in - is more important than skills like dedication, eagerness to learn, learning capabilities, and punctuality?

You can choose to give me a chance or pass over for a candidate that matches the minimum job qualification of 5 years of experience, but before you do that make sure you understand what you want to and expect get out of that 5 years of work and how important it is in context of the job responsibilities. Because I am sure if Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos weighed their decisions on a scale of years of experience, the face of the tech industry would be looking a lot different today.

P.S. I am far from a professional writer. I wish I was not but I am. So the best I can do with the limited text on my Resume & LinkedIn is to learn, write, edit, update and iterate to improve continuously.