Built company-wide systems and processes for sustainable and scalable growth
Services Design
Leadership
Understanding the Landscape
I was hired to lead a lean design team scalable for growth
I observed the dynamics between the designers. To gain external perspective, I kicked things off with an open conversation with one of the Partners - coffee in the balcony. These discussions helped me map out pain points, strengths, and opportunities ripe for improvement.
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Key Results
Using Service Design principles and a collaborative mindset, we tackled inefficiencies to build a stronger, more cohesive team that had intentional company-wide impact. Here’s what we did:
1. Evolving process and guidelines that has everyone’s input
We co-created a flexible design framework that evolved through continuous feedback loops. By involving the entire team in its development and refinement, we fostered ownership and ensured the process was robust, scalable, and responsive to project demands.
2. Played to Our Strengths Over Uniform Skillsets
Rather than pursuing a "full-stack" designer model, we capitalized on individual expertise. This approach allowed every team member to lead projects while contributing their unique strengths—such as UI specialization or user research—to collaborative efforts, resulting in more innovative and efficient outcomes.
3. Aligning Goals and Pursuing Recognition
To instill purpose and direction, we defined clear objectives at the individual, team, and company levels for the fiscal year. This not only unified our efforts but also positioned us to compete for industry accolades, securing design awards that boosted morale and external visibility.
4. Streamlined process by auditing and offloading paid subscriptions
We canceled subscriptions to a number of apps and extended the use of high-usage apps. We elevated our design tool to Figma from Sketch + InDesign + Zeplin to support collaboration among many reasons.
5. Weekly syncs across the board
There was no proper line of communication within teams. Team members hesitated to seek help for minor and major issues. I established a weekly catch-up for my team for task updates, road blocks and team sharing. Seeing its success, Development and Clients team adopted the practice and now hold weekly catch-ups.
6. Advancing component-based design systems
One of my key findings was that project timelines balloon at development stage. I scheduled meetings with the Technical Director to see how the design team can help. We came up with component-based designs and design systems - item on his wishlist that the previous Design Leads refused.
7. OKRs for everyone
As part of the design team transformation, I introduced my team members to OKRs. I helped define their goals and do check-ups during my one-on-ones.
I presented this in my catch-up with our Founder. That same day, he asked me to present it to the entire team. We implemented it across the board.