The secret sauce to a successful Design System
Fine tune your design system’s information architecture to perfectly fit your company’s DNA.
When creating a design system, the temptation to jump right in and get your hands dirty (i.e. jump to the design and development steps) is great. So great that it’s easy to lose sight of a few pivotal milestones along the way. One such easily overlooked milestone, that has a tremendous effect on your design system’s usability and thus long term sustainability, is its information architecture.
When I started working on a Clarity, Worthy‘s design system, I did some research by reviewing multiple design systems. I was looking for common denominators but got lost in the shuffle. Of course almost every system presented the typical design components with code specifications, and fixed sidebar menus, but the biggest thing they all had in common was that I got lost in each and every one of them. While one system was divided by departments and included sections such as Brand, Product and Marketing, another was split into categories like Patterns, Components and Content. That’s when I realised I was on my own. There was no ‘right’ way to do this and if I didn’t want employees getting lost and abandoning my design system I had to create user centered information architecture custom built for my company.
At the end of what I felt was a successful process I refined it into 3 key takeaways:
- Take your time planning, don’t rush it
You might think this is trivial but in fact deciding how your design system will be structured could make or break it as a long term, company wide, solution. Try to look at your design system as you would any digital product — if it’s hard to navigate and understand it doesn’t matter how gorgeous it is or which space technology you used to build it, before long no one will be using it. So really take your time on this and challenge it from every angle until you’re confident you know what will work for your users (in this case, your colleagues).
2. Focus on your target audience
If you are a product manager or designer this next step is going to sound familiar. The best thing you can do when you’re planning a design system is to figure out who your potential users are and put yourself in their shoes. As a designer, what would you be looking for in a design system? Would you be able to find it and use it easily? What about developers, you want them to be using it too. How would they feel when faced with 3 categories called ‘Brand’, ‘Product’ and ‘Marketing’? This could be perfect or a complete disaster depending on your company’s work flows and structure.
3. Pay attention to terminology
Once you’ve decided on a general framework for your design system, for example… you could just use those exact words. Which is fine! A design system has to be first and foremost clear. There is no real need for sophistication. But you do have some leeway for delight. If you do decide to throw some creativity in the mix it has to be done right. Do some user research (= fancy term for go around and ask people if they get it) and adjust accordingly.
At the end of the day when you’re dealing with a company wide project of such magnitude and significance it doesn’t just have to look good. It has to be on point and accurate. And once you do your homework by mapping it out and creating the ideal structure for your users before you actually start designing and building it, your road to success is paved. All that’s left to do is follow it.
