Rosenverse

This video is only accessible to Gold members. Log in or register for a free Gold Trial Account to watch.

Log in Register

Most conference talks are accessible to Gold members, while community videos are generally available to all logged-in members.

“Ask Me Anything” with Dan Mall, Author of Upcoming Rosenfeld Title, Design that Scales

Gold
Monday, October 2, 2023 • DesignOps Summit 2023

This video is featured in the Rosenfeld Authors Answer Your Questions playlist.

Share the love for this talk
“Ask Me Anything” with Dan Mall, Author of Upcoming Rosenfeld Title, Design that Scales
Speakers: Dan Mall
Link:

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."

Ask the Rosenbot
Sarah Kinkade
Design Management Models in the Face of Transformation
2022 • Design at Scale 2022
Gold
Jaime Creixems
Best Practices when Creating and Maintaining a Design System
2023 • Enterprise UX 2023
Gold
Cara Maritz
The Art of Extrapolation
2023 • Advancing Research 2023
Gold
Louis Rosenfeld
How AI will Change DesignOps Tooling
2023 • DesignOps Summit 2023
Gold
Steve Sanderson
Discussion
2015 • Enterprise UX 2015
Gold
Sofía Delsordo
Public Policy for Jalisco's Designers to Make Design Matter
2021 • Civic Design 2021
Gold
Mary-Lynne Williams
Exit Interview #4: From Product Design Leadership to Sound Healing
2026 • Rosenfeld Community
Iulia Cornigeanu
QuantQual Book Club: Small Data
2024 • QuantQual Interest Group
Holly Cole
Understanding Experiences: When you have to do more than work
2018 • DesignOps Summit 2018
Gold
Jemma Ahmed
Theme 2 Intro
2022 • Advancing Research 2022
Gold
Milan Guenther
A Shared Language for Co-Creating Ambitious Endeavours
2023 • Enterprise UX 2023
Gold
Uday Gajendar
Theme One Intro
2023 • Enterprise UX 2023
Gold
Gina Mendolia
Therapists, Coaches, and Grandmas: Techniques for Service Design in Complex Systems
2024 • Advancing Service Design 2024
Gold
Sarah Barrett
The "How" of Enterprise Information Architecture
2023 • Enterprise UX 2023
Gold
Deanna Washington
Connecting the Ops: Plenary Panel and Closing Circle
2022 • DesignOps Summit 2022
Gold
Gregg Bernstein
Opportunistic Research with Gregg Bernstein
2019 • Advancing Research Community

More Videos

Tamara Hale

"I traded my butch boots for kitten heels when interviewing scientists who adhere to biblical beliefs of creationism."

Tamara Hale

War Stories LIVE! Tamara Hale

March 30, 2020

Joanna Vodopivec

"Slack channels with live feeds and tagging let busy developers catch key observations asynchronously."

Joanna Vodopivec Prabhas Pokharel

One Research Team for All - Influence Without Authority

March 9, 2022

Saara Kamppari-Miller

"Adoption is the only thing that matters in innovation. If you’re not changing behavior, you haven’t innovated."

Saara Kamppari-Miller Nicole Bergstrom Shashi Jain

Key Metrics: Comparing Three Letter Acronym Metrics That Include the Word “Key”

November 13, 2024

Nalini P. Kotamraju

"Research run rampant — anyone feeling empowered to do research can sometimes cause quality challenges."

Nalini P. Kotamraju

Two Jobs in One: Being a “Leader who is a Researcher” and a “Researcher who is a Leader"

March 10, 2021

Ian Johnson

"Downloading and playing with local open source models gives a different experience than using faceless APIs mediated through interfaces."

Ian Johnson

Latent Scope: Finding structure in unstructured data

June 11, 2025

Greg Petroff

"I get bored super easily; that’s why I’m super into the AI stuff right now."

Greg Petroff

Exit Interview #1: Greg Petroff: From Silicon Valley Executive to Sonoma County Possibilitarian

September 24, 2025

Frances Yllana

"It’s really hard when all that tacit knowledge walks out the door every time someone leaves."

Frances Yllana Jorge Arango Maria Taylor Briana Thomas

The Big Question about Impact: A Panel Discussion

September 24, 2024

Maria Giudice

"You have to ask yourself, are you ready for the messiness, the hard choices, and the chaos that come with change?"

Maria Giudice

Remaking the Making Company: Moving from Product to Experience

June 9, 2016

Louis Rosenfeld

"Evergreen content needs a strong perspective on why the topic matters along with practical examples on how to apply it."

Louis Rosenfeld

Coffee with Lou: Should You Write a (UX) Book?

March 7, 2024