“Ask Me Anything” with Dan Mall, Author of Upcoming Rosenfeld Title, Design that Scales
This video is featured in the Rosenfeld Authors Answer Your Questions playlist.
Summary
?Design systems are becoming more prevalent in how digital teams design sustainably at scale. Join Design System University founder Dan Mall in this “Ask Me Anything” session about design systems and learn more about his soon-to-be-released book, Design That Scales: Creating a Sustainable Design System Practice.
Key Insights
-
•
Design systems often fail when treated as one-off projects rather than ongoing organizational practices.
-
•
Embedding design systems in-house leads to stronger sustainability than transplanting from external consultants.
-
•
The best analogy for mature design systems is Agile: a way of doing work, not a project.
-
•
Effective design systems integrate all disciplines, including content design, language, and taxonomy.
-
•
Organizations typically have a mix of design system parts, processes, or neither and struggle to connect them at scale.
-
•
A key early metric of design system success is how soon design system personnel are included in product conversations.
-
•
Managing change improves when teams proactively communicate roadmap plans and expected design system evolutions.
-
•
To meet diverse teams at scale, focus design system efforts on components needed by a critical mass rather than all requests.
-
•
Use an 80/20 rule in design systems: 80% standardized components, 20% custom design to encourage innovation.
-
•
AI tools should be used to explore multiple design alternatives rather than producing a single solution to maintain creativity.
Notable Quotes
"A lot of people think about design systems as a project, but they’re really about how an organization gets work done."
"The goal is that design systems become the way that we do work, just like when you do Agile, you don’t talk about it—you just do it."
"Design systems should capture the reality of your organization, documenting how you work now and where you want to go."
"Sometimes you need to connect the people before you can connect the parts in a design system."
"I give every team I work with an 80/20 rule: 80% of your UI can be standard components, and 20% must be custom designed."
"If you use AI tools, ask for five different ways to do something, not just one, to force exploration."
"A key metric for a successful design system is how early the design system team is invited into project conversations."
"You have to know what the development roadmap is to ensure design system changes are properly integrated and prioritized."
"Change isn’t disliked as much as the surprise that comes with it—managing expectations makes change more palatable."
"Design systems teams are most effective when they focus on serving the components and processes needed at scale by many teams."
Or choose a question:
More Videos
"Everyone wants to see themselves reflected in the research questions and findings."
Jerome “Axle” BrownHow to Use Self-Directed Learning to Ensure Your Research Insights are Heard and Acted Upon
March 11, 2021
"Our design language gives broad ditches on either side of the road with some nuance, but no rigid libraries at first."
Phil GilbertA Consistent Culture of Design
May 14, 2015
"If research is going to slow down the product process, most companies will end up releasing those products without doing the research."
Kate Towsey Basel Fakhoury Oren Friedman Graham GardnerParticipant Recruitment and Management Tools
March 12, 2026
"Skipping a song is one of the most common user behaviors and is often assumed to be a bad thing."
Sohit KarolDesigning Delightful Listening Experiences: Mixed Methods Research in the Age of Machine Learning
March 31, 2020
"Seeing the dots connected so clearly reminded me why I was doing what I was doing."
Christopher Taylor Edwards Valerie RoskeDesign as a Team Practice, A Practical Guide to Cross-functional Collaboration
September 30, 2021
"Systems thinking can help us design more explicitly for resilience, as seen in distributed manufacturing of PPE during the pandemic."
Sheryl CababaExpanding Your Design Lens with Systems Thinking
February 23, 2023
"You need to come up with your own definition of design maturity based on your team’s understanding and context."
Francesca Barrientos, PhDYou Need Your Own Definition of Design Maturity
June 8, 2022
"If your purpose is just getting through 2020, that’s okay — survival can be the goal right now."
Allison SandersOperating with Purpose
January 8, 2024
"That's not a prototype."
Saara Kamppari-Miller"Prototype" vs "Prototype"--Breaking Down and Rebuilding Our Understanding of What We Do
October 24, 2019
