by anja.kljajic - Interaction Design -

D&R2 BIRGIT – The Human Element 3/6

AI IN THE WORKPLACE
UX/UI DESIGN
DESIGN OPS

For this post I wanted to sit down and do some good old fashioned literature and resource research. I want to understand what I’m talking about, start with building a bibliography and also research into resources I hadn’t thought of before as a junior designer because I didn’t have the time to sit down and research about my profession in such a way. I find research fun!

AI in the workplace

The World Economic Forum reports that UX/UI designers are among the fastest-growing professions globally, with a 45% projected growth by 2030, while Graphic Designers are on the decline . When it comes to generative AI, they state that it “enables users to interact with it as though they were conversing with a human, considerably reducing barriers to usage and the need for specialized technical knowledge”. It also states however, that “without appropriate decision-making frameworks, economic incentive structures and, possibly, government regulations, there remains a risk that technological development will be focused on replacing human work, which could increase inequality and unemployment.” [1].

What I took out of this is that AI isn’t something I can just ignore, especially as someone who works in close proximity of developers. But it also validates my feelings of uncertainty, especially with the lack of government regulations. I’m also conflicted about the ethics of it all as well considering the replacing human work part. This isn’t something I’m alone in.

I found another paper on this topic where the authors state that while AI helps new employees, when it comes to high-skill employees, they tend to see small gains in speed and small declines in quality [2]. This all the more proves that for good quality results, there has to be extra care taken when working with it.

DesignOps + Resources

As I’ve already worked for a while and am currently in my masters, I found it important to take my workflow more seriously and evolve. After some research into streamlined workflows I came across the term Design Ops (short for Design Operations). Kate Kaplan of the Nielsen Norman Group describes it as “the orchestration and optimization of people, processes, and craft in order to amplify design’s value and impact at scale.” [3].

The way I understood this is that it’s the “behind the scenes” teamwork organisation that helps designers do their best work. This means organising files, design systems and taking care of handovers between designers and developers. I only recently noticed just how messy and hard to navigate my file is now to developers, because it grew in size exponentially.

C. R. A. Nisslmüller provided this useful checklist [4] in his article about design system mastery which goes into the organisational value of Design Ops:

  • Are all scalable values defined as variables (no hardcoded values left)?
  • Are variable names systematic, semantic, and globally unique?
  • Are all variables type-correct (Number, Color, String, etc.)?
  • Is there a String variant for every variable that needs direct CSS or output?
  • Are composite/array variables grouped and documented?
  • Is accessibility covered (contrast, motion, focus, scaling)?
  • Are tokens versioned and audit logs maintained?
  • Is there a governance structure and regular review cycle?
  • Are APIs/automation in place for handoff and code sync?
  • Is AI/automation used for linting, doc generation, and compliance?

I also researched for Figma resources for easier implementation. I found this workbook on Figma’s community page which I’d like to try implementing at an appropriate time: https://www.figma.com/community/file/1246508925181507765

I also found this plug-in which automates this process for anyone else who would like to try: https://www.figma.com/community/plugin/1603703295257406223/designops

References

I really like playing games.
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