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Storyboarding a design system project plan
While onboarding with the Ascensus UX team, I wanted to understand the team's vision for their design system initiative. Right away, I set up working sessions with designers, developers, and management to collectively devise a transparent strategy for the months ahead. As a result, we were able to take inventory, interpret challenges, prioritize short-term efforts, and identify long term goals.
Short term charter
A phased aproach in support of Ascensus's Retirement line of business - Rules of use for 10-15 frequently used components
- Rules of use for 3 foundational assets- Universal templates for consistent documentation and familiar problem solving- Proposal of logical hierarchy and groupings of componentsNote: It was agreed to house all documentation on confuence; based on minimal maintenance, version control and easy access for all audiences.
Long term charterPush the design system to deliver experiences across lines of business that are:
Compelling | Cohesive | Easy-to-deliver
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Building a shared design language
The UX and front-end development teams were both proponents of design tokens to bridge design styles with development code. Unfortunately, there wasn't an implimentation plan in place to move that inititive forward.
Coming onboard, I organized and facilitated weekly design token working sessions to gain a deeper knowledge in:
- Tactical decisions to relieve technical debt moving forward.
- Token categories making it easier for both teams to know what kind of token they are working with.
- Configuring a naming taxonomy that aligns with the existing CSM - (Umbrocco).
- Breaking down the values and tricks of the trade using Token Studio for Figma.
Foundational and component guidelines
The Ascensus rebrand was a reinforcement in elevating all experiences across our new merging platforms with Newport Group. As a result, I was tasked to document standards and guidelines for net new components and foundational assets.
Before
After
Ascensus unification effort
The Ascensus unification was based on maximizing the benefits of both Ascensus and Newport by adapting the best (experiences) of both worlds. Subgroups were pulled together to evaluate the overarching information architecture.
Additionally, I was asked to research client branding, identify accessibility discrepencies (specific to front-end design), and explore foundational assets (colors, spacing, fonts) we could utalize to maximize the overall DCA experience.
DCA FRONT DOOR EXPERIENCE: SHORT-TERM GOALo Plugging Ascensus plans into the DCA experience and vice versa.o Looking at ways to improve the overall experience; adopting some of Ascensus’s design methods (clean modularization).o Technology changes (merging Ascensus experience with Newport legacy).
TWO YEAR MVP: "ONE ASCENSUS = ONE EXPERIENCE"o All users to be accessing through the DCA.o Incremental builds with more users coming through DCA across all platforms and experiences. o Need to control the messaging with our vendors.o What will our information architecture and integration look like?
TWO YEAR MVP: "ONE ASCENSUS = ONE EXPERIENCE"o All users to be accessing through the DCA.o Incremental builds with more users coming through DCA across all platforms and experiences. o Need to control the messaging with our vendors.o What will our information architecture and integration look like?