[stephencoyner]

There’s many things you can do outside of work that others have suggested.

In terms of making your UX skills better, try doing some UX work and ensure you have a complete story.

Share a crisp problem you’re solving that’s focused in scope. Share an audit of similar experiences that inspired you (they shouldn’t just be competitors). Share insights that you gained from that audit.

Then after all of this, share your mock-ups and reinforce them with how and why you landed there.

Overtime, you will start to get really good at thinking of parallel experiences that will inspire your work.

As a designer, I’ve found all teams to be really receptive to this process (especially eng that can review those audited experiences and agree or disagree with your points).

Edit: this should be obvious, but talk to your users as often as you can and always ask why to get to the heart of their points