In this podcast episode, Rob Ocel chats with Kathleen McMahon, a senior design systems engineer at Northwestern Mutual and a key contributor to the W3C Design Tokens Community Group.
Kathleen McMahon kicks off the conversation by defining design systems as versatile collections of patterns and efficiencies that streamline workflows in design and engineering. She emphasizes that design systems can encompass diverse elements, such as design patterns, component libraries, CSS frameworks, and more, tailored to the unique needs of a company or product. The focus isn't on rigidity but rather on promoting consistency and efficiency while allowing flexibility for innovation.
The dialogue then shifts to Kathleen's role as a design systems engineer and the dynamic nature of her work, influenced by factors like team size and company maturity. Kathleen shares her experiences in both small, multifaceted teams and larger, specialized teams at Northwestern Mutual. She provides insights into the varied responsibilities, from creating design tokens and components to ensuring accessibility and collaborating with diverse stakeholders.
Rob and Kathleen delve into the invaluable role of design systems in simplifying workflows for designers and developers. Kathleen highlights how design systems liberate creative energy by offering reusable patterns, enabling teams to focus on solving more complex problems. They also explore the strategic decision of whether to build a design system within a specific framework or keep it framework-agnostic, shedding light on the considerations and potential challenges associated with third-party component libraries.
The episode culminates with a discussion of ARIA (Accessible Rich Internet Applications) and its pivotal role in enhancing accessibility within design systems. Kathleen discusses the opportunities and challenges of leveraging libraries like Adobe's React ARIA hooks for accessibility.
This episode is sponsored by This Dot Labs.
S05E06 React Native with Jay Phelps, Brent Vatne, Eric Vicenti, and Ken Wheeler
S05E05 What's Going on in VR? with Ben Lesh, Tracy Lee, Aysegul Yonet, and Martin Splitt
S05E04 CSS Grid with Rachel Andrew, Jennifer Luker, and Necoline Hubner
S05E03 The Truth About Developer Relations with Simona Cotin, Tara Manicsic, Tierney Cyren, and Tracy Lee
S05E02 Proposals Coming to your Browser with Ben Lesh, Tracy Lee, Jake Archibald, and Jay Phelps
S05E01 State Management with Taras Mankovski, Tim Dorr, Michel Weststrate, and Charles Lowell
S04E12 - Web A11y with Jen Luker and Necoline Hubner
S04E14 Current State of WebAssembly with Sean Larkin, Jay Phelps, Ben Lesh, and Tracy Lee
S04E11 - The Future of RxJS 6 & 7 - Roadmapping Operators with Ben Lesh and Tracy Lee
S04E10 - The New Payment Request API with Molly Dalton, Zach Koch, and Ray Shan
S04E09 - Promoting Diversity in TC39 with Leo Balter and Tracy Lee
S04E08 - Vue.js with Evan You and Sarah Drasner
S04E07 - Accessibility with Rob Dodson and Alice Boxhall
S04E06 - Web Analytics with Andy Elliott (Google) and Calvin French-Owen (Segment)
S04E05 - NeuroJavaScript + Angular of Things with Stephen Fluin, Alex Castillo, and Uri Shaked
S04E04 - Firefox Developer Tools with James Long
S04E03 - UI Components - Challenges and Best Practices Across Web and Native
S04E02 - Polymer and Web Components vs Frameworks (Jerry Springer Edition)
S04E01 - Data Visualization on the Web with DataSketches
S03E06 - React Router, HistoryJS, State Management, Webpack vs Rollup, and more (React Rally Edition)
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