Building a Design System → Part IV: New to working with a design system? Use a Get-Started-Kit!

Designers who are new to a company or fresh from the university may not be able to use the design system to its full potential right away. In “part III: How to structure a design System”, we talked about the structure, as well as what kind of content we can store within a design system. To use the design system effectively, the newcomer must review and learn the system’s contents (style guide, components, ways of working, etc.). It may take time to accomplish this, but the goal of this article is to explain how to create a “Get-Started-Kit” of the design system to accelerate this process.

The problem

The experience of joining a company with a design system and style guide can be quite stressful until you have learned all of the different standards and rules. Many companies hire external employees for a limited amount of time, so designers are familiar with this feeling. Despite designers having a relatively small impact on the product during this period, optimizing the time from onboarding to being a productive member has an enormous impact on the quality of the product. Any optimization that results in fewer mistakes, fewer reviews, more autonomy, self-support, or better decision tools will be beneficial for the organization.