What is a Design System and Why Does It Matter?
In the evolving world of digital product development, where consistency, speed, and scale are paramount, a design system is no longer a luxury—it’s a necessity.
Whether you’re building internal reporting tools in Power BI, customer-facing platforms, or enterprise-grade applications, a well-crafted design system is the connective tissue between design, development, and user experience.
What Is a Design System?
A design system is a centralised source of truth that combines UI components, design principles, usage guidelines, and code standards into a reusable framework. It exists to create consistency across digital products, streamline collaboration between cross-functional teams, and support scalability across platforms and devices.
At its core, a design system ensures that what your team builds is not only cohesive and accessible but also efficient and sustainable.
The Anatomy of a Design System
Design Foundations
Colour palette (primary, secondary, neutrals, states)
Typography (font families, sizes, line height)
Spacing and grid systems
Elevation and shadows
Motion and transitions
Accessibility standards (e.g. WCAG compliance)
UI Components
Reusable interface elements include buttons, inputs, modals, dropdowns, tabs, and data visualisations.
Built as live components in code (e.g., React, Vue, or Angular) and paired with design tokens.
Design Tokens
Platform-agnostic variables such as colors, spacing, font sizes, and radii are stored as JSON or SCSS variables, making applying consistent values across design and development environments easy.
Patterns and Templates
Best-practice UX flows for forms, navigation, authentication, filtering, or dashboard layouts.
Documentation
Clear guidance on when and how to use components, including usage do’s and don’ts, code snippets, Figma assets, and contribution guidelines.
Why Design Systems Are Essential
1. Consistency at Scale
As teams grow and products expand across platforms, inconsistencies surface—different colours, fonts, UI behaviours, and interpretations of design patterns. A design system enforces alignment, making every product feel like it belongs to the same ecosystem.
2. Faster Delivery
Reusable components mean teams can move from idea to implementation more quickly. Developers don’t need to reinvent the wheel, and designers aren’t solving the same problems repeatedly.
3. Cross-Team Alignment
Collaboration improves when product, design, and engineering teams operate from the same playbook. Shared vocabulary and expectations reduce friction and increase team velocity.
4. Improved Quality and Accessibility
Design systems embed accessibility, responsiveness, and performance into their foundations. When governed properly, these standards become part of every feature by default—rather than an afterthought.
5. Better User Experience
Users experience your brand through interfaces. A consistent, predictable, and accessible UI enhances trust, reduces cognitive load, and leads to better engagement.
Design Systems in Practice
Design systems play a critical role in product governance and risk management at an enterprise level—especially within banking, healthcare, or government sectors. Components often undergo rigorous approval workflows with embedded accessibility and compliance checks.
Internally, they power platforms such as:
Analytics dashboards in Power BI, standardising visual language across reporting teams.
Scalable UI libraries for custom CRM or workflow tools.
Custom components within Salesforce or low-code environments like Appian.
Tools That Support Design Systems
Design: Figma, Adobe XD, Sketch
Component Libraries: Storybook, Bit, Zeroheight
Documentation: Docusaurus, Notion, GitHub Pages
Token Management: Style Dictionary, Tokens Studio