Designing at Scale / Design operations tools and techniques

Over the past years, I’ve focused on leading design teams. The goals are simple, clear communication of the desired experience to product managers and developers. Then we create artifacts to test and measure the effectiveness of our solutions. The solution should meet agreed upon goals that provide utility, usability, delight and build trust with our customers.

At scale, design problems need to be solved in a holistic, repeatable way, so these tools and processes are vital to coordinate the stakeholders and team. The goal is a direct connection of drawings and mockups to working code. The tools are important, but not specific, they need to aid in quick iteration, testing, and understanding of how the solution is understood and used to create business value.

Examples shown here are the building blocks of creating scalable architectures. They include:

Defining personas and user journeys through the experience

Using metaphor, stories or heuristics to clarify complex goals

Creating or using playbooks to create consistency in approach

Socializing tools and approaches to key business partners for feedback

Wireframes and prototypes to demonstrate usability