The Co-op Experience Library
Overview
The Co-op Experience Library is the latest iteration of the design system for all who work at Co-op.
Historically, there had been multiple versions of a design system at Co-op but never had there been a team dedicated to a design system as a product and service.
A lack of a dedicated team naturally creates inconsistencies in our products. For example, teams would design and build multiple versions of the same component. This has created significant cost in time and money over the years.
The team formed in September 2020 with a view to creating a design system that could allow product teams to focus on innovation in their business area.
My role in the team
I had been at Co-op since 2016, so, I'd observed and experienced the problems created by the lack of a dedicated design system product team.
I was asked if I would join the team as I could lead the visual and interaction design, user research and build HTML+CSS prototypes.
We started off as a team of 4 due to budgets so my skillset crossing multiple specialisms was valuable for progress.
In this team, my responsibilities included:
- Leading the interaction design
- Arranging and facilitating multiple research interviews with users
- Synthesising research and using the outcomes to build confidence in our delivery
- Formalising and applying the visual language for the product from a 3 week brand design sprint
- Creating an early HTML + CSS prototype to facilitate research sessions
- Building and iterating the product with the Product manager (we had no engineers in the team)
- Testing our elements and components against accessibility criteria
- Making improvements to the product based on direct feedback from people at Fable - people that rely on assistive technology
Interaction design
Leading on all aspects on the interaction design for the Experience Library - prototypes and experiments for facilitation, navigation, taxonomy, page layouts, top tasks and structure.
Visual design
I progressed, formalised and applied our visual language.It is based on the outputs of a brand sprint involving multiple designers over a 3 week brand sprint.
User research
I organised interviews, created the discussions guides,facilitated the interviews and then facilitated synthesis sessions as a team. We prioritise together.
I'm not a user researcher but I've been very fortunate to have worked with researchers that wanted to teach so I've been able to observe and develop my own practice.
I will do everything I can for a team in regards to user research if needed but I'm conscious not to step on toes.
Front-end development
I'm obviously not a front-end developer but I have built prototypes that have gone on to become live products, including the live version of the Experience Library (along with the product manager).
I relied on the coop-frontend and prototyping kit, with all of the
pre-built packages including components, grid, foundations, variables and classes. It is because of the incredible work that has gone into the coop-frontend, that I have been able to learn, build, and deploy.
The team and delivery
I'm interested in behaviour and people - consciously observing team dynamics. I'm fascinated by many aspects of agile delivery and org structure, particularly the differences in team size and the effect that has on delivery and happiness within the team.
I've often been in teams without agile delivery managers. When that happens, I do try to take on aspects of that role - diagnosing problems, proposing ways we could improve or trial something new. Encouraging the team to decide on processes, ceremonies, when, where and how we work.
