🤓 My design systems experience
For over a decade, I’ve worked with design systems in many capacities—as an IC designing and documenting components, as a manager building and leading teams, and as a DesignOps practitioner shaping governance and strategy. I’ve started small design systems from scratch and scaled enterprise ones, giving me a broad perspective on what it takes to establish, scale, and sustain them.
As a Senior Design Advocate at zeroheight, I helped enterprise teams navigate complex design system challenges. This role gave me a front-row seat to what teams experimented with—what worked, what didn’t, and why. Through my experience, I was invited to lead the Ambition Empower track on Design Systems (2022-2024).
While at zeroheight, I created dozens of resources and hosted several community-based webinars. Much of my work is freely available online. Here are some highlights:
- Design System Roadmaps – How to create one
- Governance is a design system’s friend
- Design system checklists – Vetting components and patterns
- Starting, restarting, or refreshing your design system without burning out
- Stop calling your design system a “product”
- How to structure your documentation’s information architecture (IA) with a Figjam template
- Evaluate a Design System Tool in 5 Days!—A complete guide with templates
🎧 Podcast: Design Systems WTF
Since 2023, Luke Murphy and I have tackled a design systems question and humorously provided our thoughts and spicy takes. We’ve contemplated questions from “Should contributions be rewarded?” to “Is there space for fun and delight in your design system?” In January 2025, we reached a milestone of 25,000 downloads!
We record sessions as a live webinar, which has been a fun way to engage with people on these topics. Design Systems WTF recordings are available on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts.
🎧 Podcast: Design Systems: Beyond the Button
In this podcast, my colleague Nef Dukes and I explored everything about design systems once you get past that first button. Spoiler: There’s so much more that people don’t tell you about—but we do! Design Systems: Beyond the Button recordings are available on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts.
📊 Report: How We Document
From 2022 to 2024, I led the How We Document survey and report project (since renamed to The Design Systems Report). This evolving report provides insights into the state of design systems and is a valuable resource for teams to benchmark progress, set goals, enhance workflows, and stay ahead of the curve. Alongside the report, I’ve hosted webinars to share these findings and insights further.