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Summary
When asked, I’m sure many people would point to something visual about design systems. In reality, most of the work and so the effort that can make these projects succeed or fail is unseen – the people bit. For many organisations, design systems present a challenge in terms of structure, delivery, and how to define value. Designing these unseen structures and pipelines can enable the great work everyone always wanted to do – while being communicative and collaborative in ways we’ve not done before.
Key Insights
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Design systems are about the relationships between people, components, and contexts, not just UI artifacts.
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Many teams adopt design systems by default without clearly defining the problems they intend to solve.
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Measuring design system success by consistency or efficiency is challenging without baseline metrics.
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People and interpersonal communication are the hardest and most critical part of design system success.
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Centralized, federated, and hybrid design system team structures each have unique challenges around responsibility and resourcing.
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A design system requires continuous community engagement and feedback loops to stay relevant and valuable.
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Governance through documented decisions (like architecture decision records) prevents repeated mistakes and confusion over time.
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Design debt is inevitable and must be intentionally managed and communicated within the context of the design system.
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Design systems enable creativity by offloading repetitive work, freeing teams to solve higher-level problems.
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Successful design systems depend on humility and a focus on empowering users rather than the ego of creators.
Notable Quotes
"Design systems aren’t just artifacts, it’s about the relationships between people and those artifacts."
"Everyone seems to have a design system, but it’s rarely clear why or what problem they’re really solving."
"You can’t just drop a design system in and expect everything to magically get better."
"The hardest part of design systems is always the people bit, the interpersonal stuff."
"A centralized design system team further removed from product teams creates difficult resourcing and responsibility questions."
"Communities around design systems need ongoing engagement; it’s not a one-off project."
"Your job with a design system is not to make the best components, it’s to help your peers do great work."
"Design debt is not a dirty word, but it must be recognized, managed, and paid off."
"Governance means capturing decisions transparently so you don’t repeat the same mistakes."
"If the people using your design system aren’t enjoying it, the system has already failed."
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