Articles on Design
Building Design Systems for Scaling Companies – SF Talk Night Recap
How can scaling companies maintain design consistency and quality as internal and engineering teams exponentially grow? Last week, Carbon Five San Francisco hosted Talk Night to answer this question and to discuss the secret benefits of building design systems for growing companies. Our guest speakers included: Sean Durham, Software Development Manager, Autodesk | @seandurham Erin …
We Belong Together
Five Ways Junior and Senior Designers Can Work Together Effectively Disclaimer – I am a designer so this is written for /designer pairs but it’s also relevant for any other Junior/Senior duos. Hello, wonderful Junior/Senior design duos! Odds are you are fairly new to working together. Perhaps the junior designer is fresh out of school …
Sketched, not Stirred: Attempts to Host a Drink + Draw
This is the journal of two LA designers attempting to host a drink and draw series. But to start – why a drink and draw? As designers in an office of 20-ish developers, we felt lonely (or insane) cooing over our own grid paper. Some days felt like far too much screen time and an …
How to Present a Design Review
Arguably the most difficult skill you’ll learn in your design career is how to communicate that you did what you set out to do in a way that gets people to support and continue the work you did. Presenting design successfully is about knowing what you want out of the meeting and structuring it to …
Designing for Engagement
One of the most interesting distinctions we make in design is between service design and engagement design. Service design is oriented around helping someone achieve a task. The interface that asks for information and prints your boarding pass is service design – it’s successful if you get through it without mistakes as quickly as possible. …
Dyslexia vs Typography
Design has made leaps and bounds to accommodate for all types of visual, auditory, and physical limitations. However, there are some boundaries to what it can accomplish. One example of this boundary where design has not been able to bridge the gap is Dyslexia. I was diagnosed with Dyslexia and Dysgraphia at the age of …
Product Management Resources for Designers
Product Managers are awesome! They keep goals in mind and priorities at the forefront – and when designers get to work with them, it’s a real treat. Clearly, there is a lot of overlap in skill sets, but sometimes you’ll find yourself on a team without a dedicated PM. So if you’re a designer in …
“We don’t need a designer for this.” (Yes, you do.)
Design is an important part of the development process and we don’t want you to take it away without considering the risks. Carbon Five has been practicing design for 10 years and in that time we have had the privilege of working with many design-driven companies. However, even the most design-focused companies get cold feet. …
How to make an experience map
An experience map is a structured customer journey map that we use at Carbon Five to help identify challenges and opportunities within an existing (or imagined) experience. Since we use it so often – both when scoping projects and when kicking off major phases of work – we’d love to share a bit about what …
How to save 90% of your development budget
Carbon Five was recently brought in to build a new product with a planned budget of 6 months. As the first step, we conducted a few rounds of customer development to try and validate the concept. After a month of experiments by a product manager and designer, we ultimately recommended that the company not pursue …