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Summary
As large organizations embed design systems, they'll often find they have multiple systems. A search for the "one source of truth" collides with another truth: change and coordination across business units is hard, alignment is costly and effortful, and sometimes there's good reasons for having many systems loosely coupled. In this conversation, we explored the nature of systems of systems, tiered for participation at many levels across an organization.
Key Insights
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Design systems are complex hierarchies that require careful navigation and understanding of dependencies.
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Adoption is a key challenge; not all products will fully integrate a design system, thereby affecting consistency.
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Efficiency is enhanced when teams utilize a common code base and design language, but manual embedding of design can hinder this.
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Generational changes in design systems necessitate careful consideration of the costs involved in upgrades.
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Viewing design systems in tiers can facilitate better collaboration and allow for customized solutions between different business units.
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Tribalism within large organizations often complicates the implementation of a unified design system.
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Engaging with brand teams is crucial during acquisitions to understand visual and functional integration of new products.
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Creating a guild of interested parties can foster a culture of design system advocacy and development across teams.
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The role of content strategy and voice should be integrated into design systems for holistic user experience.
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Effective onboarding of internal teams to design systems is critical for successful adoption and usage.
Notable Quotes
"I focus on establishing a visual vocabulary that helps us understand how systems fit within a hierarchy."
"Design systems are not just products; they are information products that require careful structure."
"When you have a system, it then relates to a product, and you need to compose those parts effectively."
"Consistency is a strong goal, but what happens when teams choose not to adopt the system?"
"The durability of the connection between the system and products matters greatly."
"None of these systems are the same; each offers different outputs and documentation."
"We need to understand how we're serving the enterprise from a design systems perspective."
"The architecture of design systems affords opportunities to separate and create rooms for conversations among groups."
"Creating one component that's adopted can be harder than making 100 components that are adopted."
"It's about breaking down what you can decide on, share, and tool up into smaller, valuable parts."
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