What good looks like

The squad

• A designer from day one
• Customer contact every week
• Prototypes tested before build
• One definition of done, across all three roles

The work

• Meets published design standards
• Accessible to WCAG 2.1 AA, not bolted on at the end
• Sits at a known, visible state
• Built inside the design system

Design in practice: refining an interface

Craft is mostly a set of small things nobody asked for. Take an approvals screen with three pending items. Four things are wrong with it, and none of them is a redesign.

1. Inconsistent icon style. The action button is filled; everything else on the screen is outline. Small on its own, but it reads as unfinished.

2. Two competing primary actions. Send back and Approve are styled with equal weight, so the screen doesn’t lead with the action most people are there to take.

3. Status buried in secondary text. Whether an item is overdue only shows up in a grey subtext line. It should be visible at a glance, not on a second read.

4. An edge case nobody tested. A long item name just gets cut off mid-word. It’s a five-minute fix, once someone actually looks for it.

What’s in scope, and what isn’t

Design leads: the design itself, research and synthesis, prototyping, the design system and standards, oversight and trust.

Design contributes: product strategy, intent and the world model, roadmap, evals, engineering of prototypes.

Design supports: the business case, go to market, enablement.

The lines with product and engineering are blurring, and we want that. It works when design has the authority to shape the work, not when it’s cleaning up after the fact.

Not design’s job:

• Project management or PM work.
• Spreadsheets and admin.
• Late-stage pixel and button reviews.
• Making a finished decision look finished.
• Cleaning up AI-generated or poorly built code.

Accessibility as a product requirement

WCAG 2.1 AA is the baseline across products. VPATs and ACRs are produced by IFS Design and are what regulated customers ask for before they can buy.

This is work design owns that decides whether a deal can close.

How we’ll know it’s working

Delivery is measured with metrics adapted from DORA: how long from idea to a tested prototype, and how often design and build move together. Experience is measured with HEART.

Two targets: twice the efficiency on existing platforms, ten times the velocity on greenfield work.