Implementing Design Systems in Agile Development | Best Practices and Challenges

Implementing design systems in agile development has its benefits and challenges. In this article, you will learn about the best practices for implementing design systems and the challenges that product designers might face throughout product development. But first, what does a product designer do for the business?

A Product designer is a problem-solver. It creates digital products that are useful and functional for consumers or target audiences. The Product Designer works with the stakeholders, software engineers, or web developers and with the product owner from the initial phase up to the final stage of product development.

If you’re looking for website design companies, continue reading and learning more about the role and importance of outsourcing a product designer for the success of your digital products and your business.

The Roles of a Product Designer in Business

Important roles are given below –

1. Product design

A Product designer is responsible for overseeing the entire process of product design and development. One’s job role includes providing solutions to pain points, creating prototypes or mockups for new products, and understanding the needs of the target audience and the requirements needed to achieve product goals.

2. Conceptual design

It is the Product Designer’s role to brainstorm or to lead the team in brainstorming ideas and overall concepts for improving a product. Methods like brainstorming, analogies, body-storming, brainwriting, and mind-mapping are just some of the few effective strategies for generating ideas to be successful in setting goals in the initial phase of product development. 

3. Design Validation

After the product testing, comes the validation stage, which is performed by a product designer. The design validation’s purpose is to check the product’s parameters if it complies with a set of criteria defined during the initial phase–whether the product works the way it was intended to. This validation comes in a series of tests that will test a product’s usability and functionality. It will determine if the product meets the requirements of clients. 

4. Design Support

The product designer is the go-to person and the liaison among developers, software engineers, and product owners. Their role is to facilitate others and help them make decisions. Through collaboration, they provide solutions, facilitate ideation and reframe problems. 

The Best Practices in Implementing Design Systems in Agile Development

3 best practices are given below –

1. Customer-centric

The principles behind agile development include focusing on a customer-centric approach. The highest priority is the customer and user experience. The Iterative design approach is also incorporated to further improve the product design. 

2. Iterative Usability Testing

To promote the best user experience, the design system should always conduct usability testing. In order to deliver usable, functional software or web design, usability testing is important to conduct anywhere from the initial to the final stage, even after product release. 

3. Open and clear communication 

Consistent communication and collaboration on a project are essential in designing systems and successful product delivery. Collaboration allows clients to provide feedback regarding abrupt needed changes in the design, and the designer, on the other hand, should always be all-ear and receptive to constructive feedback. It is one of the principles in agile development to welcome changes according to the client’s specifications, for the customer’s advantage. 

8 Challenges That Might Be Faced As A Product Designer

Challenges for product designer –

• Frequent or Sudden Changes in Product Requirements
• Lack of Test Coverage or Missing Out on Some Critical Tests Due to Changing Requirements
• Finding Bugs or Defects at an Early Stage
• Providing Feedback Sometimes Get Slow
• Lesser Documentation
• Applications Are Complex, Leading to the Need to Write a Lot of Codes
• Frequent Need to Test for Technical Errors
• Written Codes Sometimes Break, Resulting in Problems with Some of the Product Features Source

Where to Find the Best Product Designers?

Whether you’re a project manager or a business owner planning to run a startup soon, if you’re looking into outsourcing the best product designer, you should hire the professionals at Limeup. 

Limeup is a team of experts who aim to create impactful digital products for clients worldwide. Aside from product design, they also offer services like product development, UX design, Web applications, and Mobile App-integrated design. 

Takeaway

A design system is essential to help agile teams create the best, most useful, and most functional digital products. The Product designer’s role in business is to design the product, generate ideas and conceptualize how to improve the design or the product as a whole, test/design validation, and provide support and answer queries about design on the team. 

Though there are challenges that the product designers might face during the development, the best solution is to stick to the principles of agile development and apply the best practices: customer-centric product, iterative usability testing, and consistent, open, and clear communication with your team and the client.