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I know it's almost the second month in 2024 🤯 but I wanted to pause and share some things I've learned from the last year working on design systems. There's more to learn than I could ever hope to grasp, but here are a few things that have stuck in my brain. Enjoy! p.s. the image will make more sense if you read on... #DesignSystems #ProductDesign #GrowthMindset #Collaboration

Ever wondered how designers and developers can join forces to transform the design process? 🤝 My latest blog post is a reflection born from my own experiences with the design handoff myth. In it, I delve into the challenges and solutions in the open design process, sharing insights gained for bridging the gap between designers and developers. #Design #Development #Collaboration #Processes

With Figma’s Config conference kicking off today, we’re looking back at Beyond Design Lead Hadar Ben-Tzur’s takeaways from last year’s Schema conference to ready ourselves to go deep on design. #figma #config2023

During this holiday, I eagerly read Dan Mall’s new book, "Design That Scales: Creating a Sustainable Design System Practice." This comprehensive guide navigates through essential aspects, providing insights on initiating, developing, and advancing design systems—spanning from foundational principles and team growth to processes and effective product management. Here are some key quotes and takeaways that resonate with me: 🌍 “a design system needs to belong to everyone” A design system represents and serves the whole organisation. 🤯 “a UI kit may be the least important part of a design system product ecosystem” Prioritising the UI kit over component library, reference website, guidelines, and design tokens results in poor adoption across the organisation as it can lead to lack of interconnection between all parts of the system. 👏 “a product team’s job is to make product, not contribute to a design system.” On average, for 100 people using a design system, only 2 contribute back to it. Product teams focus on their users. 😎 “front-end engineering is more important than visual design” The final product interface is written in code so code is the source of truth. 📱 “The first things people should see when they come to a reference site are examples of the kinds of things that could be made with that design system.” Showcase products built with the design system, not a list of components! What mind-blowing truths have you discovered about #DesignSystems that left you amazed?💡 #CreativeDiscoveries #DesignAtScale

How many people use Figma’s variables in their design systems? If you don’t that’s fine, they aren’t for every design system. However, if you have considered using variables I highly recommend it. Variables have been a game changer that transformed our design system and made the developer handoff almost a 1:1.

LESSONS FROM THIS VIDEO As a designer, embrace SIMPLICITY and integrate it into your work. "Keep it simple, stupid". It's crucial to ensure that your design is implementable. Developers might interpret SIMPLICITY differently if you fail to envision it in your design and this might potentially affect your work and waste your efforts. While we understand that some developers can be reluctant to put in effort even to implement the simplest design correctly, yet, collaboration is key in building a good product. Keep the developers in the loop, be reasonable with each other and always have good communication for better results. 🤝✨ Is there anything else you think we should learn from this video, let's know in the comment 👇 ? #designanddevelopment #designanddev #productdesign

It’s easy to get lost in the details Don't forget to take your design blinkers off Remember to zoom out and see the bigger picture We’ve all been there: A feature has an urgent deadline You've had about 7 seconds to consider the problem You start quickly making things in Figma You provide a solution. Phew. Next minute, you’re in tech refinement being asked questions you don't know... "What happens to X after the user clicks XX" "If we introduce X, how will we handle XX" "What does the edit state look like?" Eeek. You realise only the isolated feature was designed The rest of the journey / touchpoints were forgotten So, what happens next? - You're hit with a wave of imposter syndrome - The delivery timeline needs to be extended - Or, a half-baked experience is shipped The truth is; Introducing any feature can start a chain reaction Even a small feature can impact multiple touchpoints A small feature can break something later in the journey I.e Adding X → affects XX → which affects XXX When we design, we need to think in journeys We can't design features in isolation Before designing and shipping, pause and ask: → Do we actually know the problem / JTBD is? → How confident are we that this is the problem? → What's the risk if we're wrong about the solution? → What touchpoints are directly and indirectly affected? → Are there different states, e.g read only vs edit? → Are there any unhappy paths? Ideally we'd start in the problem space But unfortunately, design isn't always ideal Sometimes we start at a feature request and work backwards It's easy for teams to get caught up in solutions But it's our job to ask the (hard) questions Plus, you might realise this problem isn't the problem Questions upfront will save time later So, whatever form it takes, always consider the journey Sometimes it might be a screen flow Sometimes you'll map a full service blueprint Other times, a conversation might be enough But no matter how big or small the feature is: Remember to zoom out --- PS I'm officially back after a few weeks off! I hope everyone had a lovely time whatever you were doing 💛

We enjoyed reading this insightful article by Brian Alfaro and Victor Aguilar about their implementation of component sprints within The Washington Post's Design System. Here are some key takeaways: - They significantly reduced the delivery time of new components from six weeks to just around 10 days. - All components are simultaneously available in Figma and code libraries, so no one is designing or building with assets that don’t exist. - Their open approach fosters a sense of ownership among team members, emphasising the importance of collective stewardship. We particularly resonate with their view that "Design systems don’t just deliver components—they act as bridges, facilitating connection and understanding across teams." At Fuller, we firmly believe in the power of early collaboration between designers and engineers, alongside inclusive discussions involving all stakeholders, to achieve outcomes that address everyone's needs. Go read the full article! #designsystems

Design Critiques are helping our teams to learn, rehearse, validate, and bond with each other. It is an excellent tool if used wisely 🧙🏾. Noah Levin is sharing great learnings on the matter; thanks Noah. https://lnkd.in/e9GKKxgS #designcritique #productdesign #userexperience

Ever wonder what a board chair wants to know about design? Dan Makoski and I talked about his experience speaking to Lord Blackwell of Lloyd’s Bank in a recent interview. Dan told me it changed his days dramatically to be in these meetings. And, it sounds like it changed how the highest levels of the company thought about design. To me, the subtext is the time investment it must have taken for Dan and his team to have these discussions. If you listen closely you can hear the prep work required to bring the right customer research forward. Of course there's a little showmanship and theater involved with post-its, but what’s really happening here is a diffusion of knowledge and perspective. The payoff then is that it’s easier to clear the path for the entire team to do the right work. This is all much more possible when there’s permission to have discussions, a willingness to learn on both sides, and the influence to be in the room. Really interesting. Watch the full video on YouTube for more. All this and more in Dan’s new book, Uplifting Design. This is part of FigBrew, a conversational series we do at Figma. The goal is to deepen our knowledge of trends across the industry and we thought others might be interested too. #design