Design Systems Podcast

Send us feedback or episode suggestions.Jehad Affoneh, Scott Mathis, and Chris discuss the advantages of open-source, the role of content in design systems, the pattern-based approach to building apps, and similarities between music and tokens.Guests:Jehad Affoneh is Chief Design Officer at Splunk (formerly Head of Design at VMware). He’s an experienced design and business leader who writes frequently about user experience, leadership, management, and business. You can find Jehad at mynameisjehad.com, on Twitter as @jaffoneh, and on LinkedIn.Scott Mathis is the Technical Lead for Clarity Design System Web Components at VMware. He has 10+ years of specialization in user experience and front-end development and co-founded a design system that is being used by thousands of developers across a half-dozen Fortune 500 companies. You can find Scott at github.com/mathisscott, on Twitter as @mathis_scott, and on LinkedIn.Host:Chris Strahl is co-founder and CEO of Knapsack, host of @TheDSPod, DnD DM, and occasional river guide. You can find Chris on Twitter as @chrisstrahl and on LinkedIn.Sponsor:Knapsack: design once, build once, use everywhere. Knapsack is a design system platform rooted in code for shipping consistent apps in half the time. Learn more at knapsack.cloud.Links:View the transcript for this episode.

Send us feedback or episode suggestions.Dave Calleja and Chris discuss getting clients to sign off on design systems, strategies for getting executive buy-in, and the role of designer as evangelist.Guest:Dave Calleja is Head of Design at Isobar. He’s been working in digital and UX for over 15 years, from tiny teams to federal government projects. At Isobar he’s pursuing a strong passion for developing insight-aware, hypothesis-led experimentation cultures to empower experience-led transformation. You can find Dave at davecalleja.net, on Twitter as @davecalleja, and on LinkedIn.Host:Chris Strahl is co-founder and CEO of Knapsack, host of @TheDSPod, DnD DM, and occasional river guide. You can find Chris on Twitter as @chrisstrahl and on LinkedIn.Sponsor:Knapsack: design once, build once, use everywhere. Knapsack is a design system platform rooted in code for shipping consistent apps in half the time. Learn more at knapsack.cloud.Links:View the transcript for this episode.

Send us feedback or episode suggestions.Matthew and Chris discuss what’s exciting about design tokens, how APIs streamline communication, the magic of standardized files, and how to spend less time copy-pasting.Guest:Matthew Ström is a Brooklyn-based design leader currently working as Director of Design at SimpleHealth. He’s previously led design teams at Dow Jones, SoundCloud, and Bitly, and he writes about design on his website, matthewstrom.com. You can find Matthew on Twitter as @ilikescience, on LinkedIn, and at matthewstrom.com.Host:Chris Strahl is co-founder and CEO of Knapsack, host of @TheDSPod, DnD DM, and occasional river guide. You can find Chris on Twitter as @chrisstrahl and on LinkedIn.Sponsor:Knapsack: design once, build once, use everywhere. Knapsack is a design system platform rooted in code for shipping consistent apps in half the time. Learn more at knapsack.cloud.Links: View the transcript for this episode.

Send us feedback or episode suggestions.Jennie and Chris discuss the critical role of storytelling for your design system, using learning moments to drive adoption, what comes next after launching your system, qualitative and quantitative ways to measure system success, and content strategies for design systems.Guest:Jennie Yip is a hybrid design engineer with a heart for elegant user interfaces, simple user experiences, and beautifully crafted code. She is currently focused on evolving Atlassian Design System, and previously Udacity’s Veritas Design System. Jennie loves multiplying systems thinking, organizing chaos, community building, and... propagating plants! 🌱. You can find Jennie at jennieyip.design, on Twitter @jenniesyip, and on LinkedIn.Host:Chris Strahl is co-founder and CEO of Knapsack, host of @TheDSPod, DnD DM, and occasional river guide. You can find Chris on Twitter as @chrisstrahl and on LinkedIn.Sponsor:Knapsack — Design once, build once, use everywhere. Knapsack is a design system platform rooted in code for shipping consistent apps in half the time. Learn more at knapsack.cloud.Links:View the transcript for this episode.View Atlassian’s design system at atlassian.design.

Send us feedback or episode suggestions.Avery and Chris discuss lessons learned from design and development partnering up vs. making work an “us vs. them” thing, embracing intentionality and viewing all decisions through that lens, focusing on reuse and trust to help your design system gain traction across your organization.Guest:Avery Oldt is Founder & Chief Design Officer at Blermph, a creative studio that helps organizations build the great teams and great culture that produce great products. He has led design, product, and engineering teams at MTV, Restoration Hardware, LendingHome, LVMH, and Bank of the West BNP Paribas. You can find Avery at blermph.com, @designbeardo on Instagram, @designbeardo on Twitter, and on LinkedIn.Host:Chris Strahl is co-founder and CEO of Knapsack, host of @TheDSPod, DnD DM, and occasional river guide. You can find Chris on Twitter as @chrisstrahl and on LinkedIn.Sponsor:Knapsack — Design once, build once, use everywhere. Knapsack is a design system platform rooted in code that enables teams to ship better, more consistent apps in half the time. Learn more at knapsack.cloud.Links:View the transcript for this episode.

Send us feedback or episode suggestions.Eric and Chris discuss how and why Facebook’s design system has evolved over time, anticipating deviation and its positive impact on adoption and contribution, getting other teams to think like system designers and empowering them to create their own systems, what signals to consider when measuring the success of your system and advocacy work.Guest:Eric Lobdell is a Design Systems Team Lead at Facebook, managing a button that’s touched over 3 million times an hour. You can find Eric at lobdell.me, on Twitter as @lobdelI, and on LinkedIn.Host:Chris Strahl is co-founder and CEO of Knapsack, host of @TheDSPod, DnD DM, and occasional river guide. You can find Chris on Twitter as @chrisstrahl and on LinkedIn.Sponsor:Knapsack — Design once. Build Once. Use everywhere. Learn more at knapsack.cloud about Knapsack and getting your team working in a better way.Links:View the transcript for this episode.

Send us feedback or episode suggestions.Nick and Chris discuss standing up a design system in 2016, serving development teams that didn’t have access to designers at the time, accelerating and amplifying the value of design, freeing up designers to focus on high-value problems, considerations and tactics for driving adoption, how design systems create internal communities that bring design and developers together, building on-brand and UX-compliant apps quickly in a diverse technology ecosystem.Guest:Nick Cochran is the Design Strategy Manager at ExxonMobil, aspiring photographer, baker of artisan breads, and purveyor of dad jokes. You can find Nick on Twitter as @internick, on Instagram as @internick.photography, and on LinkedIn.Host:Chris Strahl is co-founder and CEO of Knapsack, host of @TheDSPod, DnD DM, and occasional river guide. You can find Chris on Twitter as @chrisstrahl and on LinkedIn.Sponsor:Knapsack — Build without rebuilding. Learn more at knapsack.cloud about Knapsack and getting your team to 80% design and code reusability.Links:View the transcript for this episode.

Send us feedback or episode suggestions.Vidya and Chris discuss pathways to becoming a design systems leader, having a content strategy within your design system, personalization considerations, measuring the success of your design system, linking your design system to a broader design strategy, and more.Guest:Vidya Nayak is Design Director Member & Design Systems at SoFi, former design lead at Moody’s, Disney, Fox Digital (News Corp), and Rodale. Coffee, books, and travel lover. Guitar and pixel adorer. You can find Vidya at nayakvx.com, on Twitter as @nayakvm, and on LinkedIn.Host:Chris Strahl is co-founder and CEO of Knapsack, host of @TheDSPod, DnD DM, and occasional river guide. You can find Chris on Twitter as @chrisstrahl and on LinkedIn.Sponsor:Knapsack — Build without rebuilding. Learn more at knapsack.cloud about Knapsack and getting your team to 80% design and code reusability.Links:View the transcript for this episode.

Send us feedback or episode suggestions.Demian and Chris discuss what design tokens are and why they are a critical part of any design system, getting developers more involved in the design system discipline, an exciting new way to integrate design tokens between design tools and VS Code, and how surfing relates to design tokens.Guest:Demian Borba is a Product Manager on Adobe XD (working on XD since 2015!), UX & Design Thinking advocate, and speaker. You can find Demian on Twitter as @demianborba and on LinkedIn.Host:Chris Strahl is co-founder and CEO of Knapsack, host of @TheDSPod, DnD DM, and occasional river guide. You can find Chris on Twitter as @chrisstrahl and on LinkedIn.Sponsor:Knapsack — Build without rebuilding. Learn more at knapsack.cloud about Knapsack and getting your team to 80% design and code reusability.Links:View the transcript for this episode.Learn more about Adobe’s Design System Package (DSP) and XD plugin for VS Code.

Send us feedback or episode suggestions.Jina and Chris discuss the inception of design tokens and Theo during Jina’s time at Salesforce, the correlation between design systems and community building, shared ownership instead of governance, why “design systems are not a thing,” and more. Guest:Jina Anne is the Founder of Clarity, Creator of design.systems, and Co-Chair at Design Tokens W3C Community Group. You can find Jina at jina.design, on Twitter as @jina, and on LinkedIn.Host:Chris Strahl is co-founder and CEO of Knapsack, host of @TheDSPod, DnD DM, and occasional river guide. You can find Chris on Twitter as @chrisstrahl and on LinkedIn.Sponsor:Knapsack — Build without rebuilding. Learn more at knapsack.cloud about Knapsack and getting your team to 80% design and code reusability.Links:View the transcript for this episode.