I work with a lot of developers who assume their GitHub profile is their portfolio. It’s not. Or rather, it can be part of your portfolio, but a list of repositories with default READMEs isn’t doing the heavy lifting you think it is.

Here’s what tech hiring managers in Australia have told me they actually want to see.

The Difference Between Code and a Portfolio

Your code demonstrates that you can build things. Your portfolio demonstrates that you can solve problems, communicate your thinking, and deliver outcomes. Hiring managers care about both, but the portfolio context is what separates good candidates from great ones.

A repo showing a full-stack application is useful. A case study explaining why you built it, what architectural decisions you made, what trade-offs you considered, and what you learned is compelling.

What to Include

1. Project Case Studies (Not Just Code)

For your three to five best projects, write a proper case study:

• The problem: What need or challenge drove this project?
• Technical decisions: What stack did you choose and why? What alternatives did you consider?
• Architecture overview: A simple diagram showing the system’s structure goes a long way
• Challenges and solutions: What was the hardest technical problem you solved?
• Results: Performance metrics, user adoption, uptime stats, anything quantifiable

2. Code Quality Demonstrations

Instead of linking to entire repositories, highlight specific code that demonstrates your strengths:

• A well-structured component or module
• An elegant solution to a complex algorithm
• A comprehensive test suite
• Clear documentation and comments
• Before-and-after refactoring examples

3. Technical Writing

Blog posts about technical topics demonstrate both your expertise and your communication skills. You don’t need a prolific blog. Three or four well-written technical articles about problems you’ve solved, technologies you’ve evaluated, or lessons you’ve learned are enough.

4. Contributions to Open Source

If you’ve contributed to open source projects, highlight those contributions. Link to merged pull requests, especially ones that involved significant technical work or collaboration with maintainers.

5. Side Projects With Purpose

Personal projects are great, but they’re more impressive when they solve real problems. A weather app tutorial project is forgettable. A tool that automates a tedious process you actually use daily is interesting.

Structuring Your Developer Portfolio Site

Here’s a structure that works well:

Home page: Brief introduction, core tech stack, links to your best projects

Projects page: Three to five featured projects with case studies. Each should have a dedicated page or section.

Blog/Writing: Technical articles demonstrating expertise

About: Your background, what you’re looking for, and how to contact you

Links: GitHub, LinkedIn, any relevant profiles

The GitHub Profile README

While your portfolio site does the heavy lifting, your GitHub profile README matters too. It’s often the second thing technical hiring managers check.

A good GitHub README includes:

• A brief professional summary
• Your primary tech stack with experience levels
• Links to your portfolio site and best repositories
• Current projects or learning focus
• Contribution activity (the green squares grid)

Pin your best repositories. Make sure they have proper READMEs with setup instructions, screenshots, and architecture descriptions.

What Hiring Managers Skip

Tutorial projects. Todo apps, weather apps, and calculator apps built by following a tutorial don’t demonstrate independent thinking. If you must include them, at least add unique features or improvements.

Unfinished projects. A half-built app signals poor follow-through. Either finish it or don’t include it.

Repos with no README. If someone can’t understand what a project does without reading the code, it’s not portfolio-ready.

Excessive projects with no depth. Fifteen repos with minimal documentation is worse than five repos with thorough case studies.

The Tech Stack Question

Some developers worry about showcasing the “right” technologies. My advice: focus on depth rather than breadth. Three projects demonstrating deep expertise in React, Node, and PostgreSQL are more impressive than ten projects each using a different stack at a surface level.

That said, showing versatility is valuable when genuine. If you’ve worked across multiple languages and frameworks in real projects, that breadth tells a story about adaptability.

One More Thing: Keep It Live

Your portfolio site itself is a project. Keep the code clean, the design current, and the content fresh. A portfolio built with a modern framework, deployed with CI/CD, and hosted on a reliable platform demonstrates your engineering practices better than any bullet point on a resume.

Treat your portfolio as your most important side project. Because it is.