The DesignOps Starter Kit
Summary
Starting DesignOps at an org feels exciting and daunting at the same time. People who’ve given you the green light are as excited as you - so there’s a bit of pressure to make this work well! In this talk, Michelle will provide a “starter kit” of 10 tips for beginning a DesignOps program—the 10 foundational things she's learned from establishing DesignOps at her org. Michelle includes how to prepare the program, manage expectations, ensure your success, and keep things sustainable for the long term.
Key Insights
-
•
Centralizing design ops responsibilities can alleviate decision fatigue among design managers and increase focus on operational initiatives.
-
•
Explicitly defining who makes decisions and who provides feedback prevents unclear expectations and supports smoother project execution.
-
•
Communicating design ops work frequently and across varied formats builds understanding and trust in an often ambiguous practice.
-
•
Starting with small pilots before scaling allows room for iteration and reduces risk when introducing new processes org-wide.
-
•
Maintaining a public and collaboratively editable backlog helps manage expectations, prioritize effectively, and capture emergent ideas.
-
•
Creating reusable templates and frameworks accelerates workflows and standardizes communication of complex operational concepts.
-
•
Regular one-on-one meetings with key stakeholders foster open communication lines critical for driving horizontal change.
-
•
Balancing urgent ad hoc work with longer-term goals requires careful prioritization techniques like story pointing and breaking tasks down.
-
•
Design ops responsibilities typically cover horizontal initiatives affecting multiple teams, while design managers handle team-specific operations.
-
•
Celebrating team wins strengthens relationships and encourages adoption of new processes during times of frequent organizational change.
Notable Quotes
"Everyone was doing a little bit of design ops here and there, which created a lot of gray area around decision making."
"Organic decision making doesn’t always work for high stakes efforts because design ops initiatives are often horizontal and require alignment."
"Communicate as much as possible and in different formats, because different formats resonate differently with people."
"Pilots give you flexibility to mess up and figure out answers as you go, instead of needing all answers upfront."
"A backlog helps pace and define the design ops practice, managing what’s in scope and what’s aspirational."
"Templates don’t have to be masterpieces; even simple reusable checklists and diagrams can save time and effort."
"As a design ops manager, I try to alleviate decision fatigue for design managers so they can focus on the decisions that need their input."
"I’ve found that being approachable and providing space for Q&A helps build trust and confidence in the design ops practice."
"Design ops is a lot of change management, and asking people to change again requires appreciation and celebrating wins."
"My prior experience as a tour manager helped me operationalize and mobilize teams, anticipating risks and preparing for everything."
Or choose a question:
More Videos
"You could never do all this marketing alone—it’s all hands on deck, relying on different strengths and creativity across the team."
Molly FargotsteinMultipurpose Communication & UX Research Marketing
September 12, 2019
"I call this the moment of I’ve been doing this all along—people realize they were practicing research before they knew the name."
Mackenzie GuinonM.C. Escher’s UX Research Career Ladder
March 9, 2022
"Design ops people need to be seasoned for the role. There’s experience you can’t learn in college or a bootcamp."
Angelos ArnisState of DesignOps: Learnings from the 2021 Global Report
October 1, 2021
"Space has meaning in a map — moving components changes the map's meaning, unlike diagrams where space is arbitrary."
Simon WardleyMaps and Topographical Intelligence
January 31, 2019
"Empathy sticks with you; if I tell you an inspirational story about what a customer has done, you’ll remember it."
Ross SmithBreaking Barriers with Empathy
June 9, 2017
"Governance participation isn’t optional if you want to avoid reactive impositions down the line."
Lisa WelchmanCleaning Up Our Mess: Digital Governance for Designers
June 14, 2018
"We found a greater variety and depth of questions that require richer methodologies, so BYO works better for us."
Benjamin Wiedmaier Annie MayfieldRedefining Toolkits: Unbundling to Create a Perfect Match
March 11, 2025
"The CEO wanted rapport, not just productivity, and the collaborative poster created that from scratch."
Elizabeth ChurchillExploring Cadence: You, Your Team, and Your Enterprise
June 8, 2017
"You can see how this is an absolutely fantastic way to get any UX question answered quickly at any time of day without bothering your instructor or your boss."
Louis RosenfeldHow to use the Rosenbot
March 16, 2026
