Why design fails (despite our best intentions)

Everybody wants intuitive design for their product...but why does it sometimes feel out of reach, no matter how much design talent you have?

The problem 

Many companies we’ve worked with over the years have invested in great design teams. Yet their investment did not translate into well designed products. They diagnosed their problem as not having enough designers, or not having good enough designers or even the more malignant, ‘we just don’t have a great design culture’. They had invested in hiring and retaining excellent design talent, but, for whatever reason, their product was just as clunky as it had always been. Nothing seemed to help. 

How did they get to this dystopian pit of poor user experience, and why couldn’t they extricate themselves no matter how much money they spent on design? 

The answer to this problem is anything but simple, but the root cause is usually a lack of investment in design systems and the erosion of trust that follows. To understand why this is the case, it’s important to paint a picture of what happens when you don’t have a design system. 

Early signs of trouble

A company starts out with all the right intentions. They excitedly hire their first designer after months of diligent interviewing. That designer, despite being enthusiastic and highly qualified, quickly finds themselves overwhelmed keeping up with engineers. The push to create a product market fit doesn’t allow the designer the time to create design standards, and, anyways, the target is constantly shifting during these early years of startup rollercoaster. 

Over time, the company grows and eventually hires their second designer. This designer is equally slammed, but tasked with the murky responsibility of figuring out how to rapidly design using some semblance of standards that the first designer hasn’t really defined. The two designers are essentially creating designs by copying and pasting from older mocks. This process is time consuming, keeping the designers further away from the prospect of defining standards. And meanwhile, engineers are now getting mocks from multiple designers which are, understandably, riddled with inconsistencies. 

 

The beginning of the end

From the engineer’s perspective, the designers are moving slower and slower, and the mocks they’re delivering are less and less helpful. Invariably, many engineers, pressured with time constraints of their own, opt to fill in the gaps. Rather than go back to the designers to fix inconsistencies and polish UI, they end up making micro design decisions themselves. And because their trust in design is eroding, they’re less likely to engage design in any sort of design QA process. As this erosion of trust grows between designers and engineers, they become less and less inclined to work together. And once designers and engineers stop working together, it won’t matter how great the designers are…they’ll be ineffective. 

As most people can relate, ineffective designers are likely to be dissatisfied with their jobs.  From their perspective, they are offering solutions that no one is buying. Designers will look at the product and the shortcomings will be glaringly obvious. But because the engineer’s have lost trust in design, they won’t be willing to build exactly according to the mocks. From their perspective, the mocks no longer represent a single source of truth, but rather, a working guideline.

Now back to the leadership

In response to this problem, many leaders will often try to hire more designers in order to ‘fix’ their design culture. However, at this point they might  have a hard time attracting high quality design talent. Designers are in high demand, and nobody wants to work somewhere where their work is not valued. Even if the company does manage to hire more designers, this only adds to the general confusion as more designers means even more inconsistencies in design deliverables. Until design standards are defined, designers won’t be able to dig themselves out of that dystopian pit of poor user experience.

Design Systems are a culture

As an agency who has worked with many different companies over the years, we’ve seen this dynamic play out over and over. Most companies care about design and want their products to feel intuitive and well built. However, few companies manage to pull off a truly well designed product. The core of the problem is a failure to understand that a well designed product requires a robust design system. And this doesn’t just mean documentation of various components and styles, but rather, a clear system for making design decisions that ripples across the entire organization. In short, without a robust design system and therefore design culture, it won’t matter how stellar (or large) your design team is...design will always struggle.

The Solution

So where do we go from here? The most obvious solution is to invest in a design system from the beginning. Even something as simple as standardizing basic styles will pay off dividends. But, as the adage goes, the best time to plant a tree was thirty years ago...the second best time is now. And while it can seem daunting to take design time away from feature work, it’s an investment that will pay off in the long run.

Take time to standardize styles, components, core user flows and information architecture. Make space for designers and engineers to come together and talk about how they could improve their handoff process. Trust and encourage your designers to create an internal system of governance to adapt and grow your design system. In short, always remember to take the necessary steps that will allow your company to scale.