Your First 90 Days as a [Baby] UX/CX Writer

Welcome, bb! Congrats on the new gig ❤ Before we begin, do me a favor — Close your eyes, take a deep breath, and say these words: I belong here.

Whether this is your first content role or just a fresh start at another company, I’m excited for you. I know how overwhelming it can be to feel like a “freshman,” all over again, but can tell you that newness is often the best seed for creativity. Insert more inspirational hogwash [here].

If we’re really lucky, we reach a point in our careers where we get to design our own experience. While there will be many voices and existing initiatives influencing your tasks as a new content or UX hire, organizing your own goals and ideas into a 30/60/90-day plan is a great way to make an impact and establish yourself as an expert communicator.

TLDR Version: I advise you to take your first week on the job to draft a 30/60/90-day plan: a document that maps out what you’ll be up to during your first three months of employment.

I’ve done my best here to both outline the purpose of each phase, as well as provide examples of content initiatives you may find helpful. Follow along, and build out your own with any examples you find relevant or useful!

(No, seriously. Copy it. Edit it. Make it better)

The 30/60/90-Day Plan

Whether you share a proposed 30/60/90-day plan during your interview or the first week on the job, this plan outlines focus points and goals that you expect to achieve by the end of each phase.

It’s a fantastic opportunity to:

• Take ownership of your onboarding experience
• Learn your role
• Learn about the business or product
• Develop new skills
• Meet your teammates
• Set the tone for any future initiatives you may want to take part in

Keep in mind that this kind of plan should include both performance-specific goals and learning goals. Be sure to include both!

UX/CX Writer-Specific Goals

As a content specialist or UX writing team of one, you will likely work across various departments — especially if your company is a relatively small one. With this in mind, consider diving into the following while drafting your first 30/60/90-day plan:

• The user journey and experience
• Any existing brand voice guidelines
• User research
• All existing content on the site, Help Center, blog, and app
• Existing collaboration processes
• Any design or collaboration software you will use in your role
• Learn how to navigate your role as a UX/CX content team of ONE

Trust me– your manager will appreciate visibility into your day-to-day as you feel everything out.

Starting With a Plan

I hear you — content design and UX writing are still relatively new disciplines within the tech and copywriting space. Some of us are brought on with just a general idea of an organization’s needs, while the lucky ones are saddled with a “kick-off” project of some kind.

Spoiler alert: In this case, I was one of the lucky ones. While presented with many opportunities for growth and future writing projects in all forms, our first priority involved an overhaul of the Jiobit Help Center. This was communicated to me during my initial interviews and informed how I decided to map out my first 90 days of work.

Your First 30 Days: Be A Sponge

Your first 30 days are about asking questions, meeting those you’ll be working with, and learning about the product.

Expect to —

• Schedule and attend 1:1s or shadow sessions with key team members
• Absorb the company mission and core values
• Study the brand voice and how to speak to customers
• Get access to the tools and documentation you need to do your job
• Begin learning how to use the product (from an end-user perspective)

My first 30 days as a CX Content Specialist for Jiobit looked a lot like this:

• Meeting with all members of the CX team, our UX Researcher, Head of Product, Product Manager, Marketing Specialist, and Lead Product Designer
• Requesting access to Jira, Miro, OneSignal, and Figma
• Reviewing all NPS feedback
• Reading and watching all relevant materials available to me on the Blog, Help Center, team Confluence space, and any available slide decks
• Reading two new books on content and UX writing: Nicely Said: Writing for the Web With Style and Purpose by Kate Kiefer Lee & Nicole Fenton and Content Design by Sarah Richard

Be kind to yourself. There’s a lot for you to absorb within this first month. Establish trust and healthy work relationships with your people. Anticipate a lot of conversations. Is it too smothering to tell you to stay hydrated?

Day 30–60: Find Small Projects & Review Existing Content or Processes

After the initial 30 days, it’s time to ease into little, tiny, baby wins. These will likely be small projects that allow you to assess the current state of the product and existing content processes. You should feel comfortable enough to start sharing ideas.

During this time, it’s recommended that you:

• Actively use company systems
• Audit existing content and identify areas for improvement
• Put together a content strategy
• Talk to customers or observe user interviews
• Read and take any courses to build on gaps in your current knowledge

During Days 30–60 as Jiobit’s first CX Content Strategist, I found myself:

• Reading all blog posts, Help Center articles, and copies of all customer communications
• Outlining a full content hierarchy and proposal for the Jiobit Help Center
• Editing existing content I had access to (i.e. Zendesk macros, existing Help Center articles)
• Scheduling blocks of time for educational deep-dives (I prefer free courses offered through the software you’re trying to use or LinkedIn Learning)
• Completing any ad-hoc copy requests from the CX, Marketing, and Product teams
• Reading one book on content writing: Strategic Writing for UX by Torrey Podmajersky

I find that this phase does a lot to inform your goals for days 60–90. Don’t become too attached to the planning of your next phase until you see where days 30–60 are headed.

Day 60–90: Contribute to Existing Roadmap

Feeling comfortable yet? It’s time to start making more of an impact. Now is the time to share out your strategy and how you think you’ll be able to contribute to the existing roadmap.

I also highly recommend taking time to participate in culture-building activities or clubs.

During this phase, I focused on:

• Owning the Jiobit Help Center overhaul through publishing new content on a weekly basis
• Creating a Jiobit brand voice and writing style guide
• Creating a content plan for the upcoming quarter
• Kicking off the biweekly Content Club– a cross-functional jam session for any and all content discussion

If you get to the end of the process and feel like you could have done things a little differently over the last few months, you’re right. You could have. I can think of a dozen things I wish I would have folded into my last onboarding experience, but now have the context to try this all over again with my next opportunity.

And again.

And again.

And again.

Own The Work

While the first 3–6 months will feel a little like you’re being chased (just me?), it’s your time. Stay specific, stay on task, and be prepared to adjust your goals as you progress through each phase.

Above all else, celebrate yourself! You deserve to be here — own it.