Design system from bookkeeping to championing How an impact measuring tool turned into a stakeholder management system
Varya Stepanova @ Into Design Systems 2021
Me
Varya Stepanova Design Systems Architect engineering manager, frontend architect, independent consultant Contacts What the talk is about
How a design system team asked for more resources Based on a true story team and boss Actually The value of design system is not clear Design system is a great thing! But how much exactly?
Business has no idea how DS is helping Everyone has a deisgn system, so do we. How much it helps us? I dunno...
DS team operates feelings not numbers We are doing great! But this is not knowledge supported by data :-(
Growing from seed Measuring a design system Why? What? How? Measuring production costs to reflect, how easier (and more cost-effective) the life is for the projects Costs and savings w/o DS 1 component, 1 project $ = production time + (support costs * component lifetime)
same component, many projects $ = (
production time + (support costs * component lifetime)
) * amount of projects
Costs and savings /w DS 1 component, in the design system $ = production time + (support costs * component lifetime)
same component, at the projects $ = integration costs * amount of projects
altogether $ = $(design system) + $(projects)
Where to get this data from? production time — survey, tracker, documented time
support costs - estimation
integration costs - survey, tracker, documented, estimation
component lifetime - git history, data from design files
amount of projects - github search, figma data, survey
Example: button component production time = 10 h integration costs = 2h
support costs = 20 h/year amount of projects = 5
component lifetime = 3 years
costs and savings $(without ds) = (10h + 20h*3y)*5 = 350h
$(with ds) = (10h + 20h*3y) + 2h*5 = 80h
SAVED ON THE BUTTON FOR 3 YEARS: 350h - 80h = 270h
How accurate is that? The formulas don't have to be perfect.
They help to start a conversation
with the business.
Together, you will co-create better formulas for your
paricular organisation.
Costs formula, whole system Cost savings: 752 hours = 18.8 weeks = 4 months Measuring the past 1. Production costs 2. Availability of a design system How easy to start? How fast are updates? Quality of documenttaion. Level
of support needed.
3. Involvement and contributions Design system's acceptance. Level of contributions.
Measuring the process of DS to reflect, how DS resources are used and if they correspond to the workload Workload estimation Learn backlog capacity "Compund" number, can be obtained from JIRA, GitHub issues, etc.
Apply given resources With numbers, we can Set up goals Build hypothesis Validate Speak to the business happy boss 🤩
💰 💰 💰 💰 💰 💰 💰 💰
report
Great numbers! Report to me every hour about the dynamics.
Measuring the reality To get instant guidance towards right direction Same data But instantly available Where to store the data? Company wiki Intranet website Documenting system Was not good for the business people Shared office solutions Excel (cloud) / Google Sheets
What DS components are used at the projects Search script (GitHub API) -> CSV -> Excel
Other options Figma stats ->
Surveys -> Excel
Code analysis ->
Workflow examples Library has critical updates in particular components Ask teams about upcoming changes Someone is not using the component. Why? Design system team is searching for contributors Team search for other teams using the same component Stakeholders in teams 💡 Color-coded based on the recent survey Stakeholders on business levels Open in-company solution Data and the tool available for everyone in the company
For the design system team For the teams to connect For business people Get data from people at project in ds at business level how much ds helps? production costs how do we count? integration costs support costs upcoming challenges ui coverage are contributions enough?
Are you sartisfied? How we could help? Can you help us? Design Systems are for people VIDEO Also available in a text version
Why? What? How? For whom? Making design systems successful is just as much about creating a people system as it is about creating a technical or operational one.
Magera Moon, The people part of design systems To build a design system, don’t start by writing code and choosing tools; start by talking to the people who will use the system . Learn about their needs and constraints, and help them solve problems.
Ryan DeBeasi, Design Systems Are About Relationships connect proven with numbers :-)
