Design Principles. Who Needs Them? Why Have Them?

What exactly are design principles? What are they for? Are they useful? How? What makes a good design principle? Are all common questions I hear when talking about this topic. 

So let's start at the beginning…what are design principles and how do you use them? 

Have you noticed that a majority of corporate companies have the same brand principles? Usually, you will come across the word like simplicity and consistency. But to tell you a little secret these verbs and phrases are based on the legacy of good design principles and not specific to a company’s how they stand out from competitors in the marketplace or, what kind of user experience the company is striving for.

Design principles are a set of shared guidelines that reflect the core design values and vision of a company, they are meant to remind and keep the focus on the team and not the subconscious truths about how to design your “principles”.

So how do you break away from these generic catchphrases? Define your company’s values to tailor to your users, statements that help your team build towards the right products. These kinds of rules reveal how a company’s approach is different from their competitor’s. They don’t say we value good design, they imply it. What they do is help you make decisions. This is what your users need.

Are design principles even useful? It all depends on what your purpose is. If your company wants to spread awareness of design best practices, then generic principles may make sense for the time being. But as the industry evolves and concepts such as simplicity, consistency, and accessibility become unquestionably valuable, design principles will be more about users, and less about design.

How do you create principles customize to your company? Well, you must start by knowing your users from research and data gathering. “For example, in choosing direction over choice, the early Medium team clearly thought about their users: people that want to write uniquely good stories, as opposed to making them look uniquely different.” Another example is, establishing that your company should focus on fast technology over beautiful design. A good principal should be a tradeoff, a choice. Next time you have to decide whether or not to include that amazing animation that happens to double your page’s load time, you’ll know what to do. 

Finding principles for which you have answers to all your company’s challenges is not always black and white. But creating principles can help ensure your users’ needs are constantly prioritized. Principles that make your product better. Principles that serve their intended purpose.